I have a very special place in my heart for my copy of Appetite for Destruction, as it was the first album I owned that my parents told me to “turn down”. 

As with all great albums, Appetite for Destruction provides a snapshot of the times, an era when men could wear spandex and a bandana was not just the headgear of choice for the German tourist. It bestowed the rock world with more than a handful of classic moments that remain seared on the memory of even the least-hairy music fan – Axl Rose’s unique ayee-yaahs, Slash’s instantly-recognisable intro to Sweet Child O’ Mine and the driving, sing-along chorus to Paradise City. 

Appetite for Destruction was born kicking and screaming in 1987, a period where the bloated, cock-rock behemoth, about to be slain and exposed as a fraud by some greasy oiks from the American North-West, stumbled on regardless in a haze of smoke and Jack Daniels, surrounded by its poodle-permed minions and circled from above by the corporate vultures looking for the next face of Pepsi. 

A fact often overlooked by those who were there or are just fans, is that Appetite for Destruction was not just a collection of edgy, radio-friendly songs. It was a bridging album, that at once defined its time and place, but also strode punkily forward and away from the strutting, posturing and posing of the late eighties. This was, after all, a year in which Heart, Starship and The Bangles were in the Billboard Hot 100, so Guns N Roses had their work cut-out, to say the least.  No-one at the time could have known what was to follow in the nineties, but you felt that Guns N Roses knew that it wasn’t going to be more of the same, producing a debut (they had only been together two years when it was released) that fleetingly pays homage to, rather than glamorises, the excesses of the time, and then hurtles on into less well-trodden territory.  Axl Rose said at the time that too many of their contemporaries were afraid to write about what they really felt – sure, he indulged in the power-balladry of Sweet Child O’ Mine, but only after ripping through a paean to the horrors of modern city life in Welcome to the Jungle, and giving airtime to the grim realities of heroin on Mr. Brownstone. This was a brave move in circles where it was more fashionable to fill your song with references to the opposite sex and pack your videos with them shedding their clothes.  

Appetite for Destruction was by no means wall-to-wall morality though. Hidden away (as much as you can hide away on a fifteen-time platinum album) are lesser-noticed gems like Think About You, My Michelle and Rocket Queen, odes to the acres of female flesh that surrounded them wherever they went, with Slash and Izzy Stradlin frenziedly duelling away whenever the mood appeared to take them.

Despite its excesses and in some areas, guilty-pleasure status, Appetite for Destruction remains to this day an album much-loved by this reviewer and still cited by current artists as having a profound influence on their musical paths.  But at its most fundamental level, it’s just full of bloody good songs!

Let us know your views on Appetite For Destruction

Track Listing

Welcome to the Jungle
It's So Easy
Nightrain
Out Ta Get Me
Mr. Brownstone
Paradise City
My Michelle
Think About You
Sweet Child O'Mine
You're Crazy
Anything Goes
Rocket Queen

Line Up

W. Axl Rose - Vocals
Slash lead - Guitars
Izzy Stradlin - Guitars
Duff McKagan - Bass
Steven Adler - Drums

Related Links

Guns N' Roses - Hammersmith Apollo Live Review

Guns N' Roses - Birmingham NEC Gig Review

Velvet Revolver - Libertad CD Review

Velvet Revolver - Newcastle Live Review