chinese democracy = axl rose's caligula or eraserhead?

A) how much did Buckethead contribute to this record?
B) I've heard Bernie Worrell also played on it...is this true?
C) On the album, will Axl sound as shitty as he did on the VMAs?

Bernie Worell + Tommy Stinson on a GnR record = my mind is BOGGLING

Doesn't this proposed title refer to his method of running a band?

I found myself wondering that, too! Seriously, couldn't they have had some guy show up at Axl's house with a baseball bat around, say, 1999? I bet if Cobain didn't kill himself but went on to wallow in unproductive misery for the next 7 years, he wouldn't get 1/10 of the sensitive-genius treatment Axl is getting.

It should not have taken US pressure to keep Europe from selling arms to China

Timothy Garton Ash
Thursday March 24, 2005
The Guardian

Good news: it looks as if the European Union will postpone lifting its embargo on arms exports to China, at least until next year. This is right. The only thing wrong is that it took heavy US pressure to make it happen.
Consider. Europeans claim moral superiority over Bush's America on the grounds that we always favour the peaceful resolution of conflicts and respect for human rights. Last week, China's National People's Congress passed a law which authorises the use of "non-peaceful means" to prevent moves towards Taiwanese independence. "Non-peaceful means" is an Orwellian euphemism for war.

These are not mere words. There is a serious Chinese military build-up, directed at Taiwan, the world's first Chinese democracy. The veteran Singaporean leader, Lee Kuan Yew, recently told a visitor that he saw a 40% probability of war between China and Taiwan at some point over the next 10 years. And at this perilous moment, peace-loving Europe should be hurrying to sell arms to China?
As for human rights, Amnesty International estimates that last year "tens of thousands of people continued to be detained or imprisoned in violation of their rights to freedom of expression and association, and were at serious risk of torture or ill-treatment". Despite the occasional release of a well-known political prisoner, China's human rights record has barely improved since the Tiananmen massacre of 1989 - in protest at which the EU arms embargo was originally imposed. We are right to be outraged by Guantánamo and Abu Ghraib, since the US, claiming to be a beacon of freedom to the world, deserves to be judged by a higher standard. But let's keep a sense of proportion here. (Oh yes, and China uses the death sentence far more promiscuously than the US.)

Now you may say - and officials in Brussels, Paris and Berlin do say - that such a reaction is naive. Of course we can't expect the same standards from China as from the US. As it emerges from communist dicatorship, this great country, with a culture and history very different from our own, is engaged in a process of modernisaton. We must patiently encourage positive change by dialogue, trade and constructive engagement, as we did with the Soviet Union. That is the European way: change through detente.

Fair enough. But then those officials go on to claim that lifting the arms embargo is purely "symbolic". "You don't think," they exclaim with expressions of outraged innocence, "that because we propose lifting an embargo on selling arms to China we actually intend to sell arms to China?" To which the only appropriate response is: humbug and balderdash!

What happened was this. The Chinese communist regime has long been irked by the embargo, both for symbolic, political reasons, since it places China in a small, ignominious club, together with Zimbabwe and Burma, and because it prevents the regime from importing weapons and weapons-related technologies that it wants. In autumn 2003, the Chinese foreign ministry published a paper on relations with the EU. Under the heading "the military aspect", the paper said that "the EU should lift its ban on arms sales to China at an early date so as to remove barriers to greater bilateral cooperation on defence industry and technologies".

Jacques Chirac picked this up, and urged the EU to oblige. Meanwhile, he declared 2004 the "year of China", painted (or rather, illuminated) the Eiffel Tower red, backed the Chinese official position on Taiwan and failed to criticise its record on human rights. His servility was rewarded with a few trade contracts and qualified Chinese endorsement of his vision of a "multipolar" world, to counterbalance American power.

The main motive for wanting to lift the arms embargo is not political but, as one senior European commissioner put it to me, "mercantilist". With sluggish growth and high unemployment, France and Germany are desperate to secure more export contracts from the world's largest emerging economy. On the eve of his own wooing journey to Beijing, Chancellor Schröder described this policy as an expression of "true patriotism". Translation: jobs for Germans take precedence over human rights for Chinese.

Sucking up - or should we say kowtowing? - pays off. Last year, the EU became China's largest trading partner. The main purpose now is to get more civilian contracts, especially in the run-up to the 2008 Beijing Olympics. But we'll sell some arms too.

In fact, we already do. Despite the embargo, in 2003 EU member states approved licences for weapons exports to China worth more than £280m. And Chirac's own defence minister has let the cat out of the bag, saying that it would be better for the Chinese to import our military technology rather than developing their own.

American legislators are outraged at what they see as the prospect of French missiles being targeted at US warships in the Taiwan straits. They have threatened sanctions against European companies. It's mainly thanks to this bruising message from the US Congress, as well as warnings from the Bush administration, that the EU seems set to postpone what Chirac hoped would be a festive announcement of the lifting of the embargo at an EU-China summit in May. If so, the issue will then have to wait until after the end of the British presidency of the EU in the second half of this year.

Humbug is not a European monopoly. American firms are also desperate for more exports to China, and their government backs them. According to a report in the Economist, some 6.7% of Chinese arms imports actually come from the US, compared to just 2.7% from Europe. American Humvees are produced in China for the People's Liberation Army. Robert Kagan interpreted the contrast between US and European approaches to international relations as Hobbes versus Kant, but where trade is concerned, it's Humbug versus Cant.

On this issue, however, America is more right than wrong. The real danger of war between China and Taiwan, and China's still abyssmal human rights record, should be concerns to us all. Europe should not have paused because Washington bullied us; Europe should have paused because we ourselves saw the larger picture.

And believe me, this is one of the largest pictures there is. It may not seem as large today as, say, the Iraq war, or dealing with Iran, but in 20 years' time the great triangular diplomatic game between China, Europe and the United States will be the biggest game in town. Thirty years ago, Henry Kissinger played the China card against the Soviet Union. Today, China is playing the Europe card against the United States.

Our response should not be to side unthinkingly with the US. We have our own interests, and on many issues - climate change, the international criminal court - the Bush administration is simply wrong. But our response should be to work out, in conversations both among ourselves and with the Americans, what are the basic liberal conditions on which we will engage with the emerging giant dragon of the east. Even for a dragon with such a hugely attractive appetite for our exports, those minimum standards must include a commitment to the peaceful resolution of conflicts and a gradually improving respect for human rights.

It's been over a decade since the original members of Guns N' Roses went their separate ways, but their feud is still going strong.

Slash and Duff McKagan filed a federal lawsuit in Los Angeles on Wednesday against Axl Rose, accusing the GN'R frontman of changing the publisher of the group's copyrighted songs without their consent and pocketing the royalties.

The lawsuit follows Rose's multimillion-dollar publishing deal with Sanctuary earlier this year, in which he sold the publishing rights to the GN'R back catalog. "Suffering an apparent attack of arrogance and ego ... Rose recently decided that he is no longer willing to acknowledge the contributions of his former partners and bandmates in having created some of rock's greatest hits," the lawsuit reads.

Though the Sanctuary deal was reported on by the press, Slash and Duff claim they weren't aware of the scope of Rose's dealings — which they say he "omitted and concealed" — until their expected royalty payments for the first quarter of 2005 didn't arrive in the mail. "When the ASCAP check didn't come, we called and they looked into it," McKagan's lawyer, Glen Miskel, said. "We didn't know all the facts at first."

Miskel said that only last week did they discover that Rose had notified ASCAP on or around May 26 that he was switching over the publishing from Guns N' Roses to Black Frog Music Publishing (which he owns) and Kobalt Songs Music Publishing (which is a joint venture with and handles the administration of Sanctuary's publishing). Consequently, the ASCAP check for the first quarter of 2005 — some $92,000 — went to Rose and "his accomplices" instead, the lawsuit contends.

"Rose's actions were malicious, fraudulent and oppressive, and undertaken in conscious disregard of [Slash and Duff's] property rights," the lawsuit reads. They're seeking damages for fraud, copyright infringement and breach of fiduciary duty, among other things.

Sanctuary didn't return calls for comment.

(Hey donut, check who wrote the story! :-) )

Is this the only board on the internet not talking about the leak or did I miss the thread

official liveblog rap album review thread

1. IRS f/Chamillionaire)
axl cannot rap for shit 7/10
2. There Was a Time f/Soulja Boy
axl is really terrible at rapping 6/10
3. Rhiad & the Bedouins
instrumental, wack beats, 4/10
4. Better
difference between this and the demo leak is that demos have an excuse, 5/10
5. Madagascar f/Narcisse Randrianarivon aka Name Six
points for trying, 5/10
6. The Blues f/Paul Kariya
makes up for infamous '91 riot, maybe, 7/10
7. Chinese Democracy
best song I have ever heard, 10/10
8. If the World f/Linkin Park & Jay-Z
if the world needed this it would have asked, 2/10
9. This I Love f/Yngie Malmsteen and the Anonymous 4
completely awesome, 10/10

The three "new songs" are just good, but the remastered versions of leaks we've already heard are absolutely fantastic. Better and T.W.A.T. in particular have been perfectly polished into 2 of the best rock songs ever made.

I've had it with this motherfucking Chinese democracy and its motherfucking absence.
(Can this be used later in ref to the Olympic games?)

2. There Was a Time f/Soulja Boy
Joker. Nobody features Soulja Boy

http://byfiles.storage.msn.com/x1piYkpqHC_35lqbK2iaMxMgR4EZVimSk0BeJJyH3chTvhn7O2X5trSe4pql-CFRTIoMAqAPDByjiARiRS-AjOT3PoOA1UsPhZ7QVtt2xyhms8nSgYRtaJbyA

two of the best rock songs ever? are you sure?

"Captain Hyperbole"
Who me?

the two best rock songs ever made

if you please

"two of the best rock songs ever? are you sure?"

top 500 for sure.

6. The Blues f/Paul Kariya

heeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee shoots & scores!

[ listening to it for the first time right now ] I've ignored previous leaks, so this is my first time hearing any of these songs and, I have to say, if this is not the actual "real album," these are the most intricately-mastered demos in the history of recorded music. But given the legend of Chinese Democracy, it wouldn't be such a stretch if these were rough cuts.

But let's suppose for a minute that it is the actual record. First impressions: (1) There are some absolutely mindblowing guitar solos here -- one, if not two, on just about every track (2) Several of the tracks feature what seem to be the remnants of nu-metal/trip-hop overtones that have probably been scaled back, smoothed out, and re-evaluated again and again over the past decade. If this had been released in 1999, it probably could have been Axl's visionary fusion of Korn and The Prodigy. (3) Axl's voice is more throaty than I remember. He still has an incredible dynamic range & it still sound like him, but it's lacking some of the grit of its glory days. I guess that's to be expected after 13 fucking years. (4) This thing has more layers of polish than (fill in the blank: any given huge superstar pop album). Big surprise, right? But this means that even the heaviest songs don't actually sound like "metal." It sounds like what might happen if Timbaland and Dave Fridmann got together and tried to make a metal album. (5) There is really no comparison to be drawn between this and previous GnR albums, but so far I like it better than Use You Illusion(s) (6) Too early to call it, but I think this might be a fantastic pop record.

did gnr really beat mbv to the finish line???

What are the real names of New Songs 1, 2 & 3?

"I Kissed A Girl"
"U R Gay"
"Escape (The Pina Colada Song)"

"What are the real names of New Songs 1, 2 & 3?"

One is still currently unknown, but the other two are "If the World" and "Rhiad and the Bedouins."

A lot of people are saying that the other is "This I Love," but a harpist who worked on that song confirmed via email that it isn't.

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/arts/AP-Blogger-Arrested.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

damn bloggers