Fargo Rock City (34 page)

In the same way, there are people who watch wrestling because it's considered trashy and idiotic. Elitists go to operas they don't understand because it makes them feel separate from the rest of society; blue-collar drunks watch pro wrestling for the exact same reason. Artists like Nugent foster that kind of anti-intellectual perspective. What probably started as a gimmick (at least from the perspective of the record companies) has evolved into a very real, somewhat scary philosophy. People rail against the posturing of metal, but the real problems begin when the posturing ends. That's when an artistic image becomes an actual personality type. That's when people start to see aggressive music as a call to actual aggression, and the enemy becomes anyone who doesn't openly embrace stupidity. And (to paraphrase sports radio host Jim Rome), that's when you hear the six most dangerous words in North America: “You think you're better than me?” Whenever that phrase is uttered in a small-town bar, somebody is going to lose teeth.

Some things are funny because they're true. Ted Nugent would be funnier if I ever got the sense he was lying.

The world premiere of Guns N' Roses' “November Rain” video.

By the time MTV turned ten years old in 1991, pretty much every rock video made by a major label artist was pretty sophisticated. Every metal artist was churning out videos (Mötley Crüe made five for
Dr. Feelgood
), and Saturday night's
Headbanger's Ball
was an essential part of MTV's weekly programming. Though a lot of the vids still looked the same, they were higher-grade knockoffs; technology made everything look more expensive and professional. In 1992, Skid Row made a simple black-and-white clip for “Monkey Business” that was just the band rocking in a desolate field (with a monkey), but it was doctored and tweaked enough to get substantial airplay all summer.

However, one band took the potential of video and pushed it to its ultimate extreme—so far, in fact, that it's unlikely any rock group will ever again try anything as ambitious or insane. The band, of course, was Guns N' Roses. The project was the ultraexpensive, ultimately unsuccessful
Use Your Illusion
“video trilogy,” and it may have been the decision that turned GNR from the biggest band in the world into … well, into what they are now.

What Guns N' Roses tried to do (or, more accurately—what Axl Rose tried to do) was take the three ballads off
Use Your Illusion I
and
II
and become George Lucas. Without fear of hyperbole, it can be said that this was the most ostentatious video concept ever attempted by a major rock artist. The goal was to make three
videos that could stand alone (and therefore enter MTV's heavy rotation), but they would also be interconnected in a way that they could be watched in sequence, much like a twenty-two-minute art film. Though I recognize the mild absurdity of this self-indulgence, I also think Guns N' Roses has never been given proper credit for attempting something that was legitimately formidable. In many ways, making three intertwined videos is a much more difficult assignment than making a conventional rock film (like
The Wall
or
Stop Making Sense
). The audience for videos is consciously expecting—almost
demanding
—a collection of eye-catching images not connected by a narrative. People who went into a movie theater to see something like
The Song Remains the Same
knew what they were getting into, and they watched the event as a feature. GNR expected people to follow a crazy, non sequitur story line that was (a) usually incomplete, and (b) dependent on their ability to recall videos they
weren't
watching. In retrospect, it was an almost impossible task.

In theory, here's what the
Use Your Illusion
trilogy was supposed to mean—or at least what I can deduce from watching it a few dozen times (I realize Rose has periodically commented on what all this was
supposed
to teach us, but that doesn't necessarily relate to how it came across on the TV). Regardless of the artistic intent, the plot seemed to work like this: “Don't Cry” was the first video, but is actually the second act of a three-act play (thus, “Don't Cry” contains the story's conflict). “November Rain” was the second video, but it's actually the story's first act (even though it opens with the beginning of the third act and ends with the conclusion of Act II). “Estranged” is the third act and supposedly the conclusion, but it has clips from both Act I and II and really doesn't explain anything at all.

On paper, this obviously makes no sense. On screen, it's only slightly more clear. But this is how a concept video works when you take it to its most logical (illogical?) extreme. This
is
“art,” although history has not treated these videos very well.

Released to TV soon after the
Use Your Illusion
records hit stores on September 17, “Don't Cry” opens with a baby who has
extremely (in fact, unrealistically) blue eyes, immediately followed by the image of a crow. The next shot is Axl walking through a blizzard, holding a bottle of booze and a gun. The significance of these clips is alluded to later in the production, but never explained. However, we soon get to the important stuff: Axl, looking very pissed off about
something,
gets into a fight with housemate Stephanie Seymour, the Victoria's Secret supermodel who was Rose's real-life lover. Seymour has a gun and Rose violently pushes her against a wall, which is a little disturbing in retrospect, particularly since Seymour would later accuse Rose of abuse (they eventually settled out of court; a 1995 issue of
Parade
magazine indicated that Rose's insurance company agreed to give Seymour a settlement of $400,000, but Rose's lawyers denied any payout).

This is a great example of what was so uncomfortably compelling about Guns N' Roses. Unlike other metal artists, Rose was completely willing to combine his personal life with his public persona: Not only does he use his real girlfriend, he openly addresses his two greatest demons—violence and misogyny. Later in “Don't Cry,” we learn the apparent reason for the domestic dispute: Rose has been unfaithful (or at least very friendly) with a blond girl at a piano, causing Stephanie to slap the woman and start a cat fight. Once again, the action is a glimpse into Rose's psyche; he has projected another of his weaknesses (jealousy) onto Seymour, and he's also exposed his personal sexual fantasies in a somewhat negative way (Rose has often admitted that he loves to watch lesbian sex, and the girl-on-girl fight in this video is far more sexy than scary).

Since “Don't Cry” was the first of the three videos (and arguably not even part of a larger trilogy, depending on who you believe), it's a little more autonomous than the other two clips; when it first moved into MTV's rotation, even diehard fans had no idea this was part of a larger project, so “Don't Cry” needed the ability to stand alone. During the chorus, the band is shown performing on the top of a building with a helicopter in the foreground. Axl wears flannel and a Jane's Addiction T-shirt,
while Slash wears a sign that asks “Where's Izzy?” For most GNR followers, Slash's sign was the most intriguing part of the clip, because—at the time—Izzy Stradlin was rumored to be quietly quitting the band (Izzy, who cowrote “Don't Cry” but does not appear in the video or any leg of the trilogy, officially quit the group in November of 1991). Shannon Hoon, the lead singer of the band Blind Melon and a key contributor to the
Use Your Illusion
albums, also appears on the rooftop. Hoon would die of an overdose while touring in 1995, thereby destroying the theory that all pop stars become legends if they die early.

At the time of its origin, most people thought “Don't Cry” was an attempt at video surrealism that had no clear purpose. However, there were some overt references to the other videos (even though none of the viewing audiences knew they were supposed to be looking for them). Rose is shown thrashing in water, which connects with the conclusion of “Estranged.” One scene has three Axls in the same room simultaneously, obviously suggesting a multiple personality disorder (we also see Rose talking to a female psychiatrist). Another shows a grave marker that indicates W. Axl Rose was born in 1962 and died in 1990. Later videos would never explain the syllogism for the second date.

My favorite part of “Don't Cry” is when Slash consciously drives a car off a cliff, and the car immediately explodes. In the next sequence, Slash plays his solo at the cliff's summit, and then he throws his guitar over the edge. Without getting too obvious, the symbiotic relationship between the car and the instrument tied Slash back to his own
Appetite for Destruction
. However, these scenes have no bearing on the overall work, and they seem to have been included simply because it seemed like a cool idea that someone might misconstrue as symbiotic. The same can be said for the closing shot, where we see the original infant from the video's opening, only now it has incredibly green eyes. It links the beginning of the piece with the conclusion, but it has no significance on anything (unless we are to assume that Axl is implying that he had a twin brother who was separated from him at birth, a concept that is just stupid enough to be possible).

The understanding that this was going to be a trilogy emerged with the next video, the epic “November Rain.” When it premiered on
Headbanger's Ball
in the summer of 1992, it was hyped by MTV as the greatest video ever made. Immediately after its virgin broadcast, VJ Riki Rachtman looked directly into the camera and earnestly said, “That [
pause
] … was amazing.” This was funny for three reasons. It was funny because Rachtman was acting like
he
had just seen the video for the very first time. It was also funny because Rachtman actually had a cameo
in
the video, which seemed like a conflict of interest but was mostly just weird. However, the main reason it was funny was because “November Rain” was a ludicrously overblown mini-movie that absolutely did not work as a music video.

As time has passed, my take on “November Rain” has softened. When I watch it now, it seems like a big, better-than-average attempt at doing something “historical,” and in that respect it was successful. Like Michael Jackson's “Thriller,” it's the kind of video that's only played during MTV countdowns (the sequence changes slightly every Memorial Day weekend, but “November Rain” typically places fourth or fifth on MTV's list of all-time videos, behind “Smells Like Teen Spirit,” “Thriller,” Madonna's “Vogue,” and Peter Gabriel's “Sledgehammer”). The obvious problem is its length, and videos are hard to edit down (Metallica's “One” faced the same quagmire, and fans were always upset by the edited, less-powerful version of that video).

The director for the three videos was Andy Morahan, an established videographer who earned a living by directing videos for rock superstars (including George Michael's “Father Figure”), commercials for Guess jeans, and that horrible third installment of the
Highlander
film series. While most of Morahan's work with GNR is structured around Dadaistic imagery, “November Rain” is not. “November Rain” follows a traditional (almost cliché) dramatic narrative: It opens with Rose taking pills to cure his insomnia, only to dream about the joy of his wedding and the death of his wife (once again portrayed by Seymour).

The early moments (minutes?) of “November Rain” are in a
concert hall, but the sequence is obviously not from an actual Guns N' Roses tour. They are performing with a symphony, and Rose is at the piano doing his best Elton John impersonation. This setting is supposed to make concrete the Homeric nature of this endeavor, but it was a bad decision; critics who had already begun criticizing GNR for being a bloated '80s dinosaur ripped this video to shreds. There is one especially silly silhouette of Duff McKagan holding his arms in the air in a Jesus Christ pose. “November Rain” is probably the most unpunk video ever made.

Things improve when we are transported to a country church, just in time for the Wedding of the Roses. Stephanie is the hottest bride in rock history, and Slash is the shaggy best man. To be honest, very little happens in this video, especially when you consider it lasts for over nine minutes. One scene seems to suggest a bachelor party, but Seymour is in attendance. Several shots are so common that they could almost be real footage from an actual celebrity wedding (and since Rose and Seymour broke up before they got hitched, this video effectively acts as their faux wedding album). For casual fans, the most memorable scene is probably the extended guitar solo, when Slash stomps outside after the exchange of the rings.

The turning point in “November Rain” is when the wedding reception is interrupted by the kind of downpour that only happens in movies. Everyone runs for cover, and some idiot inexplicably dives into the wedding cake. The music become somber, and suddenly Seymour is dead. The wedding has become a funeral, and it closes with Axl crying at the foot of her grave.