Another interview...
Velvet Revolver's Slash pulls the trigger on hard-partying waysLarry Rodgers
The Arizona Republic
Jan. 31, 2008 04:06 PM
Velvet Revolver, led by guitar-slinger Slash and singer Scott Weiland, is touring behind its energetic second album, "Libertad," and already weighing a third.
The band, featuring former members of Slash's Guns N Roses and Weiland of Stone Temple Pilots, mixes its original material with a few hits from the earlier bands in concert.
Slash, born Saul Hudson, checked in recently about sports, Velvet Revolver's music and his role in Guitar Hero III.
Question: Your band has played for both NASCAR and NFL-linked events. Are you much of a sports fan?
Answer: I can't say that I really am. I watch a lot on TV because, guilty by association, all the crew guys and a couple of the guys in the band really follow their college football, NFL and basketball.
Q: Do you change up the band's set for a sports-crazy crowd?
A: It'll be fine. Whoever is there, the majority will probably be familiar with who we are. And the other ones, this is a great band, and we usually win people over right away.
Q: Rock has become a sound track for sports in a big way. Why?
A: Rock and roll is great background music for anything in sports, with the exception of golf. Sports are usually high-energy, and rock and roll fits that bill perfectly. But I just can't hear "Slither" behind Tiger Woods.
Q: There were some doubts about how long Velvet Revolver would last, with its combination of high-profile personalities. It must feel good to get a second album out.
A: I think people are starting to warm up to the fact that we didn't get together to just make a bunch of cash, that super-group mentality. We got together just to be a band, and we're hanging in there.
Q: Did you have any doubts about how things would meld with Scott, Duff (McKagan) and the others?
A: It wasn't about the personalities. It was something that came together more organically; there wasn't a lot of forethought.
Q: Things seem to have worked with Scott from day one.
A: I made a list of all the great singers who were still living and weren't necessarily in a band. It was a very short list, and Scott was at the top. Word got out that STP was splitting up, and we sought him out. It clicked.
Q: Was the recording of "Libertad" easier than the band's first CD?
A: We had a couple years of experience under a belt ... and this band is still growing in that sense. It was more relaxed, and it was the most fun I've had in a studio in a long time.
Q: You seem to get plenty of room to stretch on guitar in concert.
A: I have a moment. (Laughs) I'm leading it, so they can't really stop me.
Q: Are you guys still throwing songs from Guns N Roses and Stone Temple Pilots into your live set?
A: It's cool because it's the easiest cover songs for us to do. But they are songs that we wrote. None of us are trying to pretend like we didn't come from where we come from.
Q: You're a modern guitar god. How do you react to being worshiped by fans and other players?
A: It's really flattering in some ways because kids come up and go, "I started playing guitar because of you." And that's really the biggest compliment you could ever get. It's also very humbling.
Q: Were you surprised when you were asked to be part of Guitar Hero III?
A: I was exposed to Guitar Hero (II) on the back of a tour bus. I got immediately hooked. It's introduced me to an entirely new demographic, all these kids who wouldn't know who I was.
Q: You finally released a self-titled autobiography last year. Why the timing?
A: With all this Guns N Roses (20th anniversary) stuff going on, all this misinformation that's out there, normally that stuff just falls off your back, but it's been overwhelming. Then somebody put out an unauthorized Slash biography, and I said, "You know what, I'm going to do this thing."
Q: The book documents lots of hard partying. How do you approach that now?
A: The partying thing, as much as I love all that stuff and have no real regrets about it, it got sort of boring. When I quit Guns, I was really hard-core, and that didn't gel with everyone else because times changing. ... I finally got to a point in Velvet Revolver, because all the guys are more or less clean, that became a factor. Then I had two kids. So I sort of moved away from it. It's been about a year and half for me, so we'll see.
http://www.azcentral.com/ent/music/articles/0131velvet.html
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