As a huge vintage GNR fan, I was eagerly awaiting the day that “Chinese Democracy” would finally be released.  I missed the chance to see the band live back in the ole days, and had tickets to see the “Chinese Democracy” tour in London, England in 2001 (the show was canceled … shocking!).

Anyway, I went to Best Buy and got my mitts on a hard copy of what is called a “Compact Disc” or “CD”.

My review of the album upon 2+ listenings:  Good but disappointing  - some good songs (and some with good snippets buried beneath other stuff), but too long (6 songs are over 5 mins 30 secs) and way over-produced (which isn’t surprising given that Axl was tinkering it with for years).  Also several songs feel like 2 or 3 songs combined into 1, with only 1 part that is memorable or quality.  I count 7 quality songs out of 14, pretty sad for the 10 to 15 years that was wasted.

Track 14 “Prostitute” - fairly catchy vintage style metal slower-tempo track - too long, a bit forgettable, should prob have been left off.
Track 13 “This I Love” - is a standout track, emotional slow power ballad - beautiful song.
Track 12 “Madagascar” - is a catchy epic style vintage slow metal song (with the famous “what we’ve got here is … failure to communicate” sound bite from earlier GNR) - spoken samples go on too long. 
Track 11 “IRS” - is a catchy hard rocker that will have you nodding (or banging) your head. 
Track 10 “Sorry” - has Axl singing in a different tone of voice than you prob ever have heard - seems like the lyrics are attacking Slash - vintage style power slow metal song, trite lyrics - not the standout it should be.
Track 9 “Riad N’ The Bedouins” - fast rocker, kind of a throwaway, prob should have been left on the cutting room floor.
Track 8 “Scraped” - Axl reaches almost Judas Priest vocal stylings here, good catchy metal rock jam.  This song would be great live, but I would like to see him to try to hit these notes.
Track 7 “Catcher In The Rye” - mid-tempo story song missing the killer hook.  Always skeptical of songs with “na na na” choruses, but that part is catchy in a 1970s way. Way over-produced yet again.
Track 6 “There Was A Time” - story style song, mid-tempo. Should have been left off the record, this track may actually cause some people to stop listening at this point. WORST SONG ON THE RECORD, AVOID!
Track 5 “If The World” - Axl singing in a soulful falsetto - sounds cool, like Rob Halford meets something RnB - funky, unlike any GNR I can remember - good stuff.
Track 4 “Street Of Dreams” - heartfelt, vintage GNR sounding - another very good song.
Track 3 “Better” - another vintage GNR sounding song meets Glam Rock - a good chorus mixed with a trite, amateurish one, deserves better - coulda been great but disappointing - about 3 songs in 1, and only 1 is good.
Track 2 “Shackler’s Revenge” - industrial crap with a few good parts - like “Better” has good snippets, but overall not good - this time a cool chorus, but the rest is kind of annoying - another that is 2 songs in 1, with only 1 good.
Track 1 “Chinese Democracy” - vintage GNR with noodling guitar solos - fairly catchy - industrial works here, once you get past the nearly 1 full minute of nothing ambient sounds it begins with.

Bottom line: Most of the songs are too long and over-produced, giving it a muddled sound overall (which isn’t surprising given that Axl was tinkering it with for years).  The big prob (among many) is there is not 1 track the quality of “Welcome to the Jungle”, “Patience”, “Civil War”, etc on the whole album (with the possible exception of “This I Love”) — a couple super instant-classics would have made this album just so much better. There are too many spiraling fast guitar solos — apparently done to one-up Slash.

What this album actually needed in my view was a stripped-down vintage Rolling Stones style vibe (mixed with Axl’s Elton John style ballads), not a mixture of Trent Reznor and Judas Priest that many of the tracks remind me of.  Just daydreaming, I would love to have heard a Jack White/Axl collab, not produced by Axl — of course I am a huge White Stripes/Raconteurs fan.  Or even imagine a Beck/Axl collab.  All we get is Tommy Stinson (of The Replacements) on bass, which is cool — but not one duet to be found.

Also, there are just not that many great hooks and classic power ballad type stuff that one would have expected Axl to have by the trunkoad after all these years.  Obviously his Brian Wilsonesque exile was not good for his creative juices.  The lyrics are so-so … there is some expected bitterness, but not as much as I expected, and not enough of the heartfelt sweetness/rawness that was in some vintage GNR.  And some stuff sounds downright amateurish.

Best Tracks:  “This I Love”, “Madagascar”,”IRS”, “Scraped”, “If The World”, “Street Of Dreams”, “Chinese Democracy”

Worst Tracks:  “There Was A Time”, “Riad N’ The Bedouins”, “Prostitute”

Your you know where you are you’re in the jungle baby pal,

Slappy Whyte