February 23, 2026 • 59 mins
Imagine if your therapist wrote Guns N' Roses songs. Chris Weber of Hollywood Rose returns to the podcast to dive deep into "Anything Goes," "Move to the City," and his songwriting process. We also talk music therapy, Axl and Izzy living at his mom's house, thoughts on GN'R still playing his songs, and more!
More info:
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/therapists/chris-weber-los-angeles-ca/783692 https://www.instagram.com/waterstoneguitars
Our website: www.afdpod.com
More info:
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/therapists/chris-weber-los-angeles-ca/783692 https://www.instagram.com/waterstoneguitars
Our website: www.afdpod.com
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Did you hear that?
Speaker 2 (00:35):
Welcome to the podcast Appetite for Distortion, Episode number five
hundred and fifty three. My name is Brando. Welcome back
to the podcast, mister Chris Weber. How are you, sir?
Speaker 1 (00:47):
I'm very well, thanks for having me back.
Speaker 2 (00:49):
You're very I should have said this right before. You're
very angelic because in your living room you have a
nice light behind you. But you're perfect. Right now, you're
blocking the sun.
Speaker 1 (00:57):
So I'll tell my kids that, Phil, but they'll think
about that.
Speaker 2 (01:02):
Is that where you are? You're at home right now?
I am okay, all right? So yeah, obviously I record
out of my home. My son, baby Brownstone, is with
his babysitter right now, so should not interrupt us because
I'm excited for you to come on. For those of
you who there's a lot of main you may not know.
I'm sure if you listen to this podcast you already know,
(01:22):
but you may have missed old episodes with Chris. The
last time was episode just was four years ago? My god, Chris,
I mean you follow too long? Too long, sir? Episode
three hundred and twenty nine, okay with Marcel Circus who
went that you guys went to high School with Slash Awesome, Awesome,
(01:43):
My Conversation and then Facts episode twenty four. So that's
over five hundred episodes. Chris, that sounds just insane to me.
So I want to go set the table for thanking
you because I should. You follow me on the Appetite
page on social media, and it's so cool that you do,
(02:05):
and also shout out to also because she says Hi.
It says how awestome you are. Because when I announced
you're coming on, that's Michelle Young My Michelle.
Speaker 1 (02:13):
Okay, sure, I love Michelle.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
It's very cool that these characters that are part of
the Tell the Guns Rose the story follow my page.
It's just it's it's an honor. So it's an again
the honor to talk to you. But you reached out
to me, which was what a pleasant surprise, and you
meant it in the best way. Sorry as I choke
as I'm like pre laughing. Uh, you're like, well, you know,
(02:41):
I follow Appetite just like I said, and you're still
doing it. And in my head because a lot of
people are saying that you're still doing it, Mike am
Ike crazy, like Brando's still doing it. Good for that
for that guy, he's still he's still plugging away appetite
or or yeah, never give up the little engine that could,
or wow, he's still doing it like you're doing a
(03:03):
great job, which you thankfully, I mean you did also
say I'm not putting words in your mouth. So thank
you for the email, Thank you for coming on. I'll
shut up now. Just thanks man, And I hope you're
doing well.
Speaker 1 (03:15):
Yeah I am, I am. Things are good in my life.
Speaker 2 (03:18):
You just came out of, I guess a session. I
know there's a client privilege, you know, therapist client privilege,
So you just got out of a session. Just now.
Speaker 1 (03:29):
Yeah. So after twenty five years in music on the
road and I became a marriage and family therapist. So
for the last twenty years as a therapist, I've been
(03:52):
I meet with a lot of clients and I started
to wonder with the benefit of using my musical background
and skills would have. So I did a little bit
of training in music therapy and then started to include
that in some of the some of my practice. Uh
and and while I'm in private practice, I also work
(04:17):
at a mental health treatment program called Resolutions and in
Santa Monica, California, and over the years we were sort
of talking about sort of incorporating music therapy, and a
couple of years ago we started to do that, and
the clients that I began to work with were unique,
(04:38):
and I just it really really meant something to me
because many that most all the people that I work
with have some challenges and sort of expressing themselves in
ways that's that's you know, easy to say the least.
So the work that I do with them allows them
to write lyrics, to sing on some occasions and express
(05:02):
themselves in ways that they wouldn't have had that opportunity,
and they don't and they continue to not have that
opportunity lest working with me. So I'm motivated to be
very prolific with them and to do more.
Speaker 2 (05:15):
That's really cool. And I said this to you right
before the air, and I've said it. You can all
document it throughout these near ten years. May it'll be
like the anniversary if you want to call it that.
On my first episode, that mental health has always been
the secondary theme of this gn R bar Mitzvah party
to broadcast. I haven't said that that's made up slogan
(05:36):
in a while, So I do want to talk to
you before that before we get to some of the
more GNR centric stuff, because if you're watching this on YouTube,
you see Chris has a guitar in hand also behind
leaned up against the wall. We'll talk about some of
the G and R songs that he wrote when it
was with Hollywood Rose. We want to get there. But obviously,
(05:59):
if you're in a band of this podcast, you're a
fan of listening to me complained about things, and it's
almost like my therapy session. A lot of times it's
the truth. I started this podcast out of like a depression,
like a need to be creative, to find something, and
I didn't have. I don't have the talent for a guitar.
I don't. I just don't have the talent for your
(06:21):
to be a musician. And you could say try. But
also I don't want to get too sappy right away,
but I mean my physical disability. I have a neurological disability.
You know. My my leg braces are back here.
Speaker 1 (06:35):
I got.
Speaker 2 (06:36):
My leg braces are back here, I got. I put
a very cheap like off the off. There's a bunch
of bands on there. I could just put them on
my desk for a second. There is a guns and
Roses one. I got like very cheap like stickers off
Amazon because I used to you know, I had been
doing it since I was a kid, and just to
(06:56):
be different because I don't I don't wear shorts. I'm like,
I felt very different, so putting stickers on them and
it affected It affected me. So it affects not just
my legs, with my hands, so I can't. I can't
like play guitar like that. But then I see people
with no hands play guitar. That's a thing they'll play
with their feet.
Speaker 1 (07:15):
I think I've seen a couple of people on YouTube
do that. Amazing, isn't it.
Speaker 2 (07:19):
So forgive me if I'm asking questions that those pre conversations,
that's we're talking years ago, but getting when you got
into therapy, what is that that transition, Like I guess
to go from your musician you're entire and you still are,
that's never going to end. But to commit, you know,
(07:41):
it's it's a big thing. I have family and mental
health also in that field, and that's a big commitment
to make you know, it's a commitment just to go
to therapy just for myself. It's another one to say, hey,
this is going to be my life's work from now on.
Speaker 1 (07:56):
Yeah, I over what twenty five years ago, I decided
to get sober and just hang up the bottles and whatnot.
And I was in UPO at the time, and we
were on our second record, and I was sober through
the you know, early sobriety through the recording of that
(08:19):
second record, on the on the heels of a pretty
successful first record, marginally successful, and so I hadn't thought
about doing anything else, right, So I went and did
that record, and lo and behold, I had to wait
until Sony released it. So you wait around a lot.
And I decided to get a job answering the phones
(08:41):
that where I went through treatment, and I liked it.
It was it was fine, you know. But then I
went on tour and I came back and after touring
for the better part of a year, this record, the
second UPO record, didn't do quite as well as the
first one, and I thought, you know what, I liked
working where I was working, and I think I want
to do that. So I I kind of just made
(09:06):
that transition. I was like, you know what, I think
I'm good. I've done everything that I wanted to do
in music up to that time, right is you know,
with the recording, the and the touring and being able
to play with some great musicians and you know, really
living the life that I wanted to live. And I thought,
but I want something else as well, And so I
(09:30):
began working at this program and then lo and behold.
I wasn't a therapist yet, but I was working in
the admissions department. And admissions does two things right. It
lets you talk to people that are in need and
try to help them, and also asked you to ask
for money. And I hated asking for money. So I
was talking about a colleague of mine and he said,
(09:51):
why don't you just become a therapist? So then I went,
I went back to grad school. Okay, okay, that's now,
you know that's decades.
Speaker 2 (10:00):
Now, sure, sure, but I want I appreciate you sharing
that and again if you, uh sure you shared that
story before because it has become sexual part of your life.
But I wanted like a foundation to jump off of
you to discovery of the music therapy. Can you tell
us like some of the practices that you do, because
it's not like I'm going to name this person, so
(10:22):
I don't think I'm too speaking out a school. But
I have a friend who has a a nonverbal autistic son,
and you know, I don't ask too much, you know,
whatever he's willing to my friend to tell me about him.
You know, just how the ways of different ways to
communicate and how music can brings so much joy. And
I see it in my son, you know, when you're
(10:42):
trying to figure out what did this toddler there's two
three almost three year old is trying to tell you.
But there's that certain joy in certain communication you can
have with plane, you know, something like a drums or
they're seeing something on TV dancing something like that. Uh sorry,
I have to say I had a random thought in
my had him and I shared a laugh. It's musical
(11:03):
and it ties in, you know, and I want to
give credit to this person who sent it to me,
and I'll have to send it to you, Chris. Maybe
I should just straight up post it at some point
because its guns Roses related. So Satya sent me filming
from Vin Hirio Vinhio on YouTube. He's an orkesh. He's
(11:26):
like a conductor and part of his bit is that
he lines up Rubbert chickens and he plays like classic
rock songs so he did. That was a sweet child
of mine and my son thought that was the greatest
thing in the world. Sorry, I deviated.
Speaker 1 (11:41):
That's a very creative way to place rich Lamar.
Speaker 2 (11:44):
The internet man. But whatever works, whoever brings to you
with smile. So can you tell us a little bit
more about your music therapy and things that you do?
Speaker 1 (11:51):
And yeah, so, I mean the the processes. You know,
it's unique to whoever I'm working with. But you know,
I work with a fellow by the name of Pete. Hey,
Pete if you're watching. And Pete had at some point
in his life had a TBI traumatic brain injury which
(12:13):
affected his ability to communicate in some ways. Uh, and
music and lyric writing and singing, and he sings and
he writes lyrics and he sings and and giving him
an opportunity through create creation, creating the music for him
to do that and then working on it with him
is really sort of an opportunity for him to really
(12:34):
express himself because without that, and there's some struggle in
being able to just just to have a conversation. So
he being able to write lyrics and sing them is
something that he can do effortlessly.
Speaker 2 (12:48):
Oh wow, isn't that interesting how the brain can do that.
You know, there's certain different things that are difficult and
that can just come naturally.
Speaker 1 (12:56):
I have a u I know, a neurosurgeon as a
matter of fact, at just a quick plug if if
that's okay. I use Waterstone guitars. I've been used and
I'm friends with the fellow that owns the company, and
I've used and I've used them primarily for all the
music therapy stuff that I do, but I really like
playing them. So but why I mentioned him is he
(13:25):
this friend of mine who's a neurosurgeon, is sort of
informed how the brain works in the different parts of
the brain. And yes, it's amazing, but it makes a
lot of sense when you when you realize that vocalizing
something actually takes there's many different parts in the brain
that contribute to that, and everything from reading something is
a different part of the brain than singing something yeah yeah.
(13:48):
So wherever it is that there's perhaps damage or or
something that happens to the brain, you may find that
it affects only a part of the verbal or the
vocalization of.
Speaker 2 (14:01):
Yeah, and you want to nurture that that part. You
ever see the video of some guys getting brain surgery
and you can film anything today, and he's I think
it was the violin he was playing, playing something man
and that's just wow. Wow. Some people go under for
a root canal. That's that's that's brave.
Speaker 1 (14:21):
Yeah. Yeah, So I mean having that opportunity with the
fellow that I was mentioning another another person that I
work with has some other challenges that prevent them from
really communicating and in effective ways, and so that the
ability to write lyrics and to help them put to
(14:41):
music is a real blessing for them.
Speaker 2 (14:43):
So how does that process go? I guess, with writing
lyrics and putting to music? And is are you you
mentioned something off air? I don't know if you were
joking or not, both because you were being humble about
your voice. But the use of AI, I mean, there
is a there is a very good use for AI.
It's used for a lot of really some memes are funny,
(15:04):
but it's is it really worth? You know, the technology?
Some things are better worth it's so talk to me
about the good use for AI about things like this.
Speaker 1 (15:13):
You know, I'm really a nubie in the whole thing,
but I'm using it just really to to create vocals
that are are that sound good enough that it doesn't
ruin the song. Right, So if somebody writes some lyrics
and they and they're not a singer, I will sing
sing it. But I don't want to be the voice
(15:34):
on their song one and I also don't want to
be a bad voice on their song. I've been blessed
with a lot of things, and good voices not one
voicesn't one of them. So I'll write the song. I
do all my work on garage band. I know it's
not the most sophisticated daw, but it's it's a very
(15:55):
useful writing tool, and I've gotten pretty good at it
manipulating him and and then I will sing on it.
And then I'll fly my vocals into an AI that
allows it to kind of create a usable voice, you know.
(16:15):
And I'll keep the same phrasing, I'll keep the same meter,
and then I'll fly that back into the song. So
it's not created by AI. The song is not created
by A at all, that's all. It's all by my hand.
But the vocals do have an AI a flare to them.
Speaker 2 (16:33):
Okay, all right, I guess an overall question, I think
about somebody who they talk about therapy. A lot goes
to therapy. What do you think of just the state
of mental health today that we talk about it so
openly now and you said decades ago that you made
this transition, it wasn't as open. You don't see you
(16:56):
can see commercials for it. So I don't not that
I grew up with uh.
Speaker 1 (17:01):
You know.
Speaker 2 (17:01):
I I may have said this to you uh and
passed the interviews or not. I don't, but it's his
part in this conversation is, you know, I lost my
dad to depression. So it's like, I just there's a
certain starting point for me for a lot of things.
And I just I just don't recall because it was
a year later when Robin Williams passed that it was
(17:23):
that was such a big thing in this on this
planet that that's when the conversation to me changed. You know,
I'm just curious of how you feel about it and
how the access that we have online with certain apps
and so yeah.
Speaker 1 (17:38):
I mean, it's it's evolved, it's evolving, and I have
to give uh. And this is a it's a I
don't know if it's controversial, but it's an odd thing
to say, but I have to give COVID credit, right,
And the COVID had a lot of very negative impact
on society and all. You could just go on and
on about that. But the one thing that it did
do is it it moved therapy to virtual right by
(18:02):
the nature of sort of a lot of places being
closed and you couldn't you couldn't do therapy in person,
and so for many so for those for those couple
of years that that really happened, it's sort of created
an environment that it wasn't taboo to to see see
a client or have a client see their therapist virtually.
And now it's commonplace. And so while it's not always
(18:27):
the better alternative, and it's certainly not a great alternative
for some clients or some families. I work with a
lot of couples, and it's not great with couples all
the time, it does it does allow for people that
would not make their way to a therapy office to
see their therapists in person because they just couldn't do that.
That maybe they couldn't leave the home, maybe there's a
(18:49):
there's diagnostically there's some issues that they wouldn't even want
to leave home, and that's prevented them from having care
or people that have got or mobility issues, you know,
So it's allowed for that and for that, it's it's
a real blessing.
Speaker 2 (19:05):
I agree with you obviously, and August, so it's not
too controversial. I'll kind of agree obviously. COVID terrible, millions
of people died terrible. But if you want to take
any sort of silver lining and the terrible, yeah, those
are things that happened. It's kind of the reason why
I get to work from home now. I made that
transition from you know, I'm able to it just wasn't
(19:28):
set up for me to be able to do. That's
why those previous conversations you and I had were just
a school radio just wasn't set up like that and
to make it. You know, Mary, that makes sense with
with therapy. I went through that transition too, where I'm
seeing my therapist and there is such a difference between
seeing them in person and over the phone or on zoom.
(19:52):
But you shouldn't just say hey if I can't see
them in person, sometimes you really need someone to talk to.
Although I kind of wish I always had that that
opportunity to do it over the over zoom because you
mentioned mobility and you know I'm handicapped. You know, when
I was really in it getting sober from alcohol, it
(20:12):
was a winner. It was over the winter and my
therapist like, you have to go to AA and like
it was just unsafe for me to walk around and
go to these churches and go down. But I'm safe enough,
you know, just a fear of falling, but you do it.
I just wish I could have done over zoom.
Speaker 1 (20:30):
So I don't know.
Speaker 2 (20:30):
I want to share because I know you share, so
I people. I know people people appreciate hearing it. Shout
out to a listener Connie from Greece, who just celebrated
I believe five years sober. He lets me know every
year that's great. Yeah, so it's graduations. Yeah, isn't that cool.
Connie is a huge obviously g n R fan. So
is this the awkward pivot where I made the talking
(20:52):
about guy, I'm.
Speaker 1 (20:53):
Just gonna grab something real quick one second.
Speaker 2 (20:55):
Oh yeah, that works for me. Uh And it's I
thank you to Connie. And there's a lot of other
listeners who reach out and let me know that they
haven't had a drink in a while, or checking in
on me, and I really do appreciate and it's part
of the reason why I keep going and doing that.
(21:16):
So when you've reached out, it's not just talking about
guns and Roses, it's getting a chance to talk about therapy,
because this is my therapy. My therapist said, I got
to find myself a hobby, and I've been doing this
hobby called Appetite for Distortion for nearly ten years and
even nowadays in a better place with my wife and son,
(21:36):
there are days I need it. There days I need
to go on and just bs about GNR. So thank
you for allowing me to do that. You're being a
therapist in many ways here for me today. So thank you.
Speaker 1 (21:48):
I can be of service.
Speaker 2 (21:50):
Yeah, right on. So, Chris Weber, if the Guns and
Roses fans know kind of responsible for a lot of
classic Guns or Roses songs, the first one, I guess
is the one that's an appetite. Maybe the most obvious
one is anything goes. I know you've you've shared the
(22:12):
story before, and forgive me for I would you mind
kind of just sharing like how the the origin of
how that that happened? And it's been a New Year's
resolution of mine to credit listeners. So I want to
credit this to a listener. Uh. This goes out to
carry on Facebook carry Michael. Uh the anything Goes backstory?
(22:35):
So what you what can you you share about that
underrated song on appetite it gets it's underrated. I'm telling you, Chris,
I'm gonna end up here on getting angry because whenever
we talk about appetite, people are like, it's yes, usually
ten out of ten, but more often than not, did
I see people are like, oh, anything goes? Maybe it's no, no, no,
(22:56):
it's it belongs in everything is at ten? Anything goes
is a part of that. So I needed, sorry, I
needed to get that out because its.
Speaker 1 (23:05):
Off, thank you very much. And I noticed that occasionally
with that where you'll you'll uh, you'll post that some
somewhere or something or somebody champions that and that it
warms my heart at times, you know. I mean the
backstory to that is, you know, we we came together,
me and Izzy and then and then soon uh Axel
(23:31):
which who by the way, for for just a quick
thing as a as a birthday present to my mom
because they lived at my mom's house. Excellency was that's
where he sends his name Bill, and I always liked
that picture because that was probably right before he asked
anybody to ask to call him Axel Yeah, signed signed
(23:54):
a bill to my mom, which I thought was sweet
because my mom used to call him Bill.
Speaker 2 (23:57):
I love that was it framed beforehand? He took it
out just for this or no, I.
Speaker 1 (24:03):
Well I have this. It's not. No, it's not in
a frame, but it isn't a little.
Speaker 2 (24:08):
Lock box.
Speaker 1 (24:09):
No, it's which we're called a photoell.
Speaker 2 (24:12):
Oh, okay, okay, that's that's a piece of memorabilia right there.
Speaker 1 (24:18):
But the but the I mean, the backstory is we
were we were together. There wasn't a bass player or
a drummer yet, so we weren't really rehearsing yet. We're
just writing songs. And I remember sitting at my parents house,
which is where we were all kind of living at
the time, and Rock and Heart Place came out, and
(24:42):
me and Izzy really liked Rock and a Heart Place,
really listened to it a lot. It's great. It's a
I don't know if it's underrated, because I think many
people are appreciate it, but I don't think people recognize
I mean, it doesn't have Joe Perry. It's it's Jimmy
Crestbok playing lead. But the rifts are awesome, The riffs
(25:02):
are really awesome. So I got really excited by that record,
right and on those rifts inspired the you know the right.
(25:26):
So there was something in that record sort of inspired that,
and I was like, oh okay, And I certainly put
that together with some other of the styles that I
was playing with, which was you know, I was a
little bit more. I was listening to some Juice Priests
at the time for years before actually, and that's how
(25:48):
that that song kind of came to be. And is
he's part? And you know Buzzy was here, he would
tell you, I mean, is his part in a lot
of the songs, all the Guns and Roses songs. If
you just you know, split hard left and hard right,
you'll hear a completely different part and you'll will go like, wow,
this doesn't even sound like the song. But together it
makes what Guns and Roses. Why Guns and Roses sounds
(26:09):
like it does. If Busy wasn't there, it wouldn't have that,
it wouldn't have that element. It's the it's the seasoning
to those songs. So and and with that song. He
If you listen to the Hollywood Rose Roots, Guns and
Roses albums that Cleopatrick put out with the demos that
(26:31):
I did with the band, you'll you can really hear
that part from Izzy So Together that turned into Anything Goes.
And the writing process was always me and as you
would put it, put it down a tape and then
give the tape to Axel, and then Axel would go
away for a couple of days and come back with
the lyrics.
Speaker 2 (26:52):
When he came back with those lyrics, do you remember
your what went on through your head when you're going
through like I've been thinking about, think about sex?
Speaker 1 (27:02):
You know you're well, you're for you know that those
that the the original Hollywood Rose Roots of Guns and
Roses records, which is playing the version that we gigged
on that we that we wrote and gigged. He rewrote
the lyrics to have the sex part right, So they
were originally something else, so he rewrote them for the appetite.
Speaker 2 (27:24):
Okay, if it's it's either I completely forgot that or
I never knew. So that's that's something.
Speaker 1 (27:30):
Listen. I encourage encourage you and everybody to listen to
routs and Guns and Roses.
Speaker 2 (27:35):
I've listened to it just that's just that has just
been a long time because you get God now I
feel like an ask because you get used to the original.
So like I, I've listened to which has been I
should have listened to it beforehand. I suck. I'm sorry.
What's what's the I'm sorry to everybody? Uh So it's
(27:56):
how different? Then are the original lyrics?
Speaker 1 (27:58):
Then?
Speaker 2 (27:59):
Are they completely different?
Speaker 1 (28:00):
It?
Speaker 2 (28:00):
Uh?
Speaker 1 (28:02):
Uh? I mean I buy my time it's totally different. Yeah,
the verses are different, and the courses are the same.
The courses, I mean, it's it's that's all the same,
(28:29):
but the vocal, the versus the lyrics are different.
Speaker 2 (28:32):
Okay, so okay, nothing about the rubber made okay.
Speaker 1 (28:35):
Uh And then my favorite part is yeah, I thought
was great.
Speaker 2 (28:48):
Okay, see all right, snap, now now I understand a
little bit better. I should have. I don't know why
I listen to that album now. I just feel very foolish.
But I like to take it on. I like to
own it.
Speaker 1 (29:00):
I mean, you know, it didn't it didn't sell forty
million records like Appetite for Destruction. So you're you're, you're
it's just.
Speaker 2 (29:08):
Been like a long time. It's It's funny though I
always credit my listeners that they're smart. I say it
often they're smarter than me. Like I read Slashes. I
read all the autobiographies, not Duff, so you know Slash,
but I don't remember so much from it. It's doing
this every day, or I should say on the social
media helps me keep my brain. Is fried Man. So
(29:28):
it's uh, but I appreciate you, uh.
Speaker 1 (29:31):
Play Yeah to to your initial question, Yeah, the lyrics
are different. So I had no problem with whatever he
was singing at the time. And to be honest with you,
and I've probably said this to you before in other settings,
is as a as a as a as a musicians
that learned, you know, from age nine listening to you know,
(29:54):
Zeppelin and Russian just sitting there. To be able to
have a real singer, even though he was like in
the beginning of his career like it, I mean, it
was remarkable to have somebody that could really sing, you know.
So when we started playing and gigging. Here's a here's
a some pulling out old pictures. Here's that's at the
at the troubad that was probably nineteen eighty three or
eighty four, there's excellent in the white shirt in the
(30:17):
front and oh I see that me with the white hair,
and then is he over on the other side? But
it was you know, where's it going with that? It
was remarked, it was just he was a remarkable singer,
so to have have him sing anything, he could have
been singing about, you know, dishwashers, and I didn't find.
Speaker 2 (30:42):
Yeah, well, now with to bring up AI, you can
make that happen a singing about dishwasher somebody.
Speaker 1 (30:48):
I'm sure you inspired somebody to do that.
Speaker 2 (30:51):
I don't know if I want credit for doing that.
Speaker 1 (30:54):
Axel is the Maytag repair man.
Speaker 2 (30:57):
There we go. You want I just come off with
this whole side bit of us actually doing random things.
Uh so, No, that is very that is very cool
and insightful. And I appreciate that because we because you
have spoken about Axel's voice and the impression, and that's
I do talk about that a lot, I guess this
time around, which ends up biting me in the ass
a little bit where the lyrics. But I guess now
(31:20):
that I think about that, when you do hear it
on Appetite and the lyrics are different. What is your reaction,
then I could have if I wanted to, I can
say forget all of that that I said and reset
and ask an intelligent question that I know what I'm
talking about. But I'm not going to do any of that.
Speaker 1 (31:38):
So, you know, I don't know if I've ever if
I actually thought too much about it. I don't. I
take them as sort of more tongue in cheek and
sort of lighthearted, right, So it's a little bit of
a less serious song with the with the new verse
in it. I just listened to the you know at
the end of the day, you know, the music part
(32:00):
that I created at the time, sort of those in
Reckless Life and moved to the city and the other
songs are you know, I just think that, you know,
one of the things I recognize is, you know, I'm
very lucky that at some point when I initially put
those chords together or those riffs together, you know, forty
(32:22):
years later, people have, you know, are still appreciating them.
And had I not written that at the time, that
wouldn't have been a thing. They have that something else
in its place, but.
Speaker 2 (32:34):
Perhaps perhaps literally what the name of the guns are?
Sorry now it's I can't here like that an absurd
I can't hear a normal conversation anymore or better. Sorry,
but I digress. So I guess to kind of pivot
a little because the reason I asked that is when
(32:54):
I talk to musicians like yourself, a song or an
album like that's your baby, that's your child. So I
didn't know if I, Okay, here's your child and they're
changing it, or is it just like getting a haircut
or you or you weren't that attached to that song
and you were just happy enough, you know, delighted enough
for that to be on there. I guess that was
(33:14):
just my line of thinking with with.
Speaker 1 (33:17):
That, some of you know, that's a that's an interesting observation,
And I'd say that there's some songs that I've I've
had on records that have followed in different different bands
that have a lot of significance to me, and I
wouldn't want them messed with at all. Of all of
(33:39):
the ones that I that I that people are familiar
with that I'm most connected to is Moved to the
City and actually wrote move to the City with Izzy
after I was after out of the band. I had
left the band, I wrote move to I was I
had a task camp. I think it was a two
(34:01):
forty four, which is the four track with the cassette,
uh and me, me and Izzy where I would write
a bunch of songs in me and Izzy would sort of, uh,
work on, work on, you know, ideas and whatnot. And
moved to the city. Came from that, as a matter
of fact, in my in my in my mind's ear,
(34:24):
it's not even the thing, but my memory, I'll just say,
my I can I remember is he singing the lyrics
to it? So, I mean those lyrics were actually he
he actually wrote the lyrics because before we got them
to Axle or before actually heard it, it was a
it was a completed song with Izzy singing it. That's
my memory. I was there and I wrote it. So
(34:46):
that's that's you.
Speaker 2 (34:48):
Know, pretty good memory. It's for something it's got.
Speaker 1 (34:51):
To so so, I mean it was very It was
very uh basic. I used the Doctor Rhythm drum machine.
If anybody played with the Doctor Rhythm is the most
basic drum machine from the eighties that you could get,
very user friendly. You could just sit there, but the
sounds were terrible. They just kept a little beat going.
(35:15):
And I used that and I had a bass and
a guitar, and then you'd sing, and then that would
be the whole song, because you'd have your four tracks,
unless you decided to bounce the tracks around a little bit.
Speaker 2 (35:24):
That's that's so cool the technology that's advanced since then.
But and forgive me for not knowing this, is there
a version of is he singing that that's recorded?
Speaker 1 (35:37):
No, I've got a cassette somewhere that says move to
the city demo on it. And I know it's a
four track because as you play it it and I
don't have any cassette players anymore. It it's it's one.
It's at the wrong speed, which would be the case
if you had a fort cassette doing four track, because
(36:02):
it it goes a lot faster. The four tracks go
a lot faster because it covers. There's more more tape
for it to record on that way, so the fidelity
is better. So anyway, there's so I could I can
kind of tell that there's something on it. I just
don't have anything and I'm but forty four to play
it on.
Speaker 2 (36:21):
We got we had to work on that. You might
be sitting on a gold mine.
Speaker 1 (36:25):
But occasionally seeing one in Craigslist. I'm like, I don't
want to spend seven hundred dollars to cure my curiosity.
Speaker 2 (36:33):
Well we gotta we got to find Chris to somebody
who knows, somebody that you don't have to spend seven
hundred dollars for that can transcribe that, I mean.
Speaker 1 (36:42):
Would be great whatever whatever that model was, that that
Tascam model, I.
Speaker 2 (36:48):
Mean a picture that from Axel signed Bill maybe and
is he said saying, I know it must come blowing
it up up just for theatrics for but you never
know the song moved to the City. You never know,
but that is I love that song. So yeah, when
you when you it goes from second acoustic to the
(37:09):
band and use your illusion, Like what's your your thought
on on on that when you're that that song that
you feel so passionate about really got an added, I
added to I guess to keep it simple.
Speaker 1 (37:24):
What are you talking about moved to the City.
Speaker 2 (37:25):
Yeah, yeah, when that went, yeah.
Speaker 1 (37:27):
I mean that was sure.
Speaker 2 (37:28):
It was onlies right, and then we then went when
they did it on the on tour was use your
illusion and well it was on the the live era too,
Ladies and gentlemen, the band, whole band breakdown, and it
was just it became more than an acoustic song. It
was it was with the horn section and all that,
all that jazz.
Speaker 1 (37:48):
Yeah, does that bring a bit? I mean it's a
good song. I mean it has a you know, as
the guitar players that are of my generation, and maybe
it didn't have to be my generation, but there, you know,
that's that that sort of aerosmithy push pull swagger kind
of you know, it was it was all the rage
back then. You know, we had you know, everybody from
you know, we had a faster pussy cat playing stuff
(38:10):
like that. I mean, it was a that was our
vibe in the eighties, right, So that that song kind
of had a lot of a lot of the feeling
of the eighties for me.
Speaker 2 (38:21):
It's kind of spoke to that and not to treat
you like a circus monkey, but maybe good from what
you remember a taste of your your part of moved.
Speaker 1 (38:30):
Moved to the city.
Speaker 3 (38:31):
Yeah, is that you hear that?
Speaker 2 (39:07):
That was my music therapy right there? Beautiful, No thank you.
If I had applause button now, it'd hit that right there.
Speaker 3 (39:27):
Oh.
Speaker 1 (39:28):
I mean it's a lot of fun to play. I
mean because you know, guitar players can of right, you know,
they find these kind of like movement and sort of
things with it, like a flow to it. It's just
like you sit there and it's almost like you're on
a swing. You know, there's a kind of a.
Speaker 2 (39:41):
I love it. It's part of what got me into
Guns of Roses and the fact that it goes back
to the roots of Guns and Roses is just so special.
And you know, as they just completed their fortieth years
as an entity in nineteen eighty five and then going
on year forty one this year, you know, they they
add they're still playing songs that you were a part of.
(40:04):
So when they're playing Reckless Life and Shadow of Your Love,
what does that mean to you? Now that the current
version of Guns and Roses are playing stuff that you wrote?
Speaker 1 (40:19):
I mean, that doesn't mean so much to me so
as I mean, I'm I like the early stuff I think,
you know, I mean, I don't want to get into
a debate on like, you know, the the evolution of
Guns n' Roses and you know, and every band takes changes,
right there's I mean, it's just the nature of all bands.
(40:40):
I mean, I was disappointed after you know, Aerosmith came
out with whether it was Pomp or Dum, one of
those things, and it was like that was the end
for me because the seventies Aerosmith was important. You know.
It's the same with Van Hagar. I'm you know, I mean,
you could argue all day that there's some great songs
with that, but when when Dave left, it was it
(41:01):
was the end of Van Halen for me. And I
think that that them uh Gin are continuing to play
those songs. I like it best because it's like that
old stuff. I mean, it's the foundation of why everybody
got into him in the first place.
Speaker 2 (41:20):
So that's what I hear, you know, yeah, yeah, no, absolutely,
And same thing for me because there are people and
I talked to them, you know, I want to acknowledge
them that that became fans because of Chinese democracy, believe
it or not, and they're usually younger, whatever it takes.
But yeah, when I became a fan, and I'm obviously younger,
(41:40):
and the band was already broken up by the time
I really was, you know, hitting my stride as a
music fan. Born in in eighty three, so I mean
they you know, I was ten that that last you
know that during farm Aid, you know, I was I mean,
I'm still focused on the teenage Mutannique Turtles, but I
mean I really wasn't focused. So I'm not focused so
on that anymore. So it was going back and hearing
(42:04):
the acoustic and the bluesy rock and then yeah, So
I love that they're acknowledging it because there are bands
that don't. I'm a fan of Incubus, and they don't
play their older stuff. You know, even the Chili Peppers
you mentioned before. It's a lot of their newer stuff.
It's not the stuff that they you know, maybe maybe
it's different with them because it's the stuff that got
them popular. But the fans that were there since the
(42:25):
beginning this is you know, I like these the funk
style of those bands or with guns and roses. They
like that dirty rock and roll sound. So again that
it goes back to the roots, goes back to Chris whoever.
Is just it's special because there are bands that can
ignore their their roots, and you can. So I just
think it's cool that your riff is still alive in
(42:46):
twenty twenty six. I think, yeah, yeah, right right on.
Speaker 1 (42:51):
I mean, and you also also recognizing that the bands
that have that longevity, that that the unique as the
the thing that's similar to all them is that they
had these really great debut albums for these great second records, right,
So because because they just had that the magic in
(43:12):
the bottle at that moment allowed them to have these careers.
That's but those you needed those initial that initial spark.
So that's the common denominator, right, is like those were
all great records because and that allowed for them to
have the careers that you could kind of look back
on because had they not had those great songs in
the beginning, they just they wouldn't have been right.
Speaker 2 (43:31):
And and that's what right. And I'm not the fan
that's gonna want to compare our generations, you know, because
it's all encompassing of one. You know, I am what
that with gn R. I understand van Halen and van
Hagar both versions I think are cool. But obviously when
your head, like you met van Halen with Daily Roth,
that's van Halen to you, it's you met guns to Roses.
(43:54):
Maybe not with you, not to you, you met them
before anything. But I'm saying a lot of the general
popular population them with Slash, Yeah, they were still guns
and roses after. You know, it's just a it's a
perspective thing, and that's kind of a word I always
like to use. So if you can help us with
our perspective and whatever, you're able to share about another
(44:15):
song that you wrote. You know, we talked about appetite,
you know, talked about some pre uh you know, appetite stuff.
But back off, bitch that there was you know, songwriting
credit issues there. I know that this is all in
the past, So I don't know, is that something that
brings up certain feelings? Is that? Do you?
Speaker 1 (44:34):
I mean, I'm I wasn't in a place to recognize
that playing with playing with the big boys and big
business like record companies, you really need to be careful.
(44:56):
And so early days I was just like I just
trusted everybody. I trusted the publishing company that advanced me
some money that I don't worry about it and I
shouldn't have, And so a lot of things got I
lost opportunities to assert sort of I don't know, to
(45:20):
get really the get the truth out, and so my
you know, I'm not bitter about it, it's just the
way it turned out. Do I wish that I had
gotten credit for back Off bitch In after It because
it I mean, it didn't get released until later anyway. Yeah,
(45:45):
the Shadow of Your Love Thing, I mean, all those
songs in every musician out there that's been in the band,
you know that the creation of those songs, in those
early creation, everybody contributes to that. So I don't really
know what to say other than I I don't hold
any resentment and it just is what it was. And
I do feel very fortunate that the band and Geffen
(46:08):
and everybody at the time of pressing credited me for
the songs that I did write, because they could have
chose to not do that either.
Speaker 2 (46:15):
And just you know, I guess the question comes up
because it's a recent interview. What did late last year
with the sister of Billy McLeod. I don't know if
you cross paths with him at all. Billy co wrote
Yesterday's along with Axel Dell and west Arkeen. And the
story that she tells she told is one day Yesterday's
(46:39):
was on the radio because they were starting to play
some of their singles before the tour, and he's like,
that's the song I wrote with Axel, Like that's my song.
What do I do, and she had some connections and
turned out that they it's I mean, I don't know.
She gave all the details that she could give. But
(46:59):
he got paid one hundred k and like twenty nine
percent of the royalties and his nieces him and his
niece is still got that. And it's a good story
about Axel, you know, and and and and credits. So
I'm just, yeah, there are other stories out there that
maybe don't show that light. So I guess I'm just
curious about where you know, you're particular.
Speaker 1 (47:19):
It was. It's a different it's a different time. People
didn't have hundreds of millions of dollars to kind of
be generous with, and so I don't Again, it's it's
just in a different, totally different context. But good for
him for having recognize.
Speaker 2 (47:37):
That well, and I know it's not apples to Apple's,
but yeah, just the fact that he was able to happen.
And the hard thing was, you know, he was a nobody.
He was just you know, recovering drug addict, and they
could have easily just said, well you have we didn't
do this. You know, what's what are you even talking about?
Speaker 1 (47:54):
Is he credited on that record?
Speaker 2 (47:56):
He first went by Billy because they didn't know his name,
his last name, and then when they reached out in
future pressings, that's why it says Billy McLeod. Oh good
for him, so good for him.
Speaker 1 (48:08):
Yeah, I mean again, I'm I'm kind of more of
an optimistic person and it doesn't serve me to carry resentments.
It's just it hurts me. It doesn't hurt the person
that I'm resentful for towards. So I don't have you know,
I've just moved on from that and the opportunity that
(48:31):
having been part of what is essentially the biggest debut
record of all time, and I'm one of the top
ten record sellers of whole time because there's not going
to be any more records, so it's probably always remain that, right,
That's what great. Yeah, I will always have that, and
so that's that that that's meaningful, right, So.
Speaker 2 (48:54):
Of course, of course, and then the monetary thing I
I you know, that's that's not for me even to
talk about. But just as far as hey, I create,
I did this part of it. You know, maybe it's
not down and it's not they don't say it, or
certain record book books say it, but between us chickens.
(49:14):
You know what what did you do? You know, what's
what's your part? What do you what? What was your
claim as far as like back off Bitch and things
that you didn't get for like are you able to
demonstrate that that on guitar or what you were able
to bring to those songs?
Speaker 1 (49:30):
I mean I haven't played.
Speaker 2 (49:32):
I mean again, sorry, if you're making you a circus monkey,
I'm just trying to I don't even.
Speaker 1 (49:37):
Remember that was that was the That's what it sounded
like back then. Back on that, I think it was
(50:02):
like that I forget I forget the courts at least.
Speaker 2 (50:09):
What we know now we get the other you know
what the spot Sorry.
Speaker 1 (50:13):
Clear Cleopatra Records when they released The Roots of Guns
and ros Roses also did I gave them a lot
of videotape of rehearsals, and in some of those rehearsals,
I don't think there's any any live performances that I
that they that they posted, but but they have, you know,
(50:36):
Hollywood rows in in the rehearsal studio, and so we're
playing back Off Bitch on that. So there's a version
of it if if you find the Cleopatra's release, which
I think was blocked by g and R at some point,
but it wasn't blocked in Japan, so that there's a
Japanese version of it that's available blocked by gn R.
(50:57):
That's the video was gn R from my understanding, and
I don't work with Cleopatra on this, that this was there.
I licensed it to them or we you know, I
gave them the videos to kind of do what they wanted,
and they contributed. They added to the roots of Guns
and Roses by adding a video contribution. So in some
of those it's a CD, but it's also a DBD
(51:20):
and on those are some of the early our early rehearsals.
Speaker 2 (51:28):
Okay, all right, awesome.
Speaker 1 (51:30):
Whether it was Hollywood Rose or a Rose at the time,
or maybe it was XL, who knows, but back off,
back off bitches on that. So if anybody is interested
in exploring that, I'm sure that that's but it sounded
kind of like that some version.
Speaker 2 (51:44):
Thank you for sharing that, and you just as far
as like, oh it may have been Rose or Hollywood
Rose or AXL. It reminded me of my conversation with
Steve Darrow. You know, of course, of all Hollywood Rose
and rose of just because, of course, it's so hard
to remember back then. So I appreciate when people like
you take the time and my memory is is garbage
I talk about, uh, you know, I was talking about
(52:06):
my lack of memory today. So I appreciate when when
people like you pull it your not just your guitar strings,
but your memory strings. A few more questions. These are
from listeners before it gets you, Uh, you out of here.
I know you've had a long day of listening and talking,
not just with me. Uh, this is from Luigi. Have
you ever had the chance to meet Paul Paul Tobias?
(52:29):
Paul Tobias, I don't know if you guys would have
ever crossed paths. No, Okay, that's an easy answer. People
liked that comment. I'm like, how would that happen?
Speaker 1 (52:40):
But for for I mean, it speaks to Axel's you know,
friendship with somebody that he didn't, you know, certainly didn't
have to sort of offer that to his friend, and
he did, and he gave his friend a real great
opportunity to you know, step up into this that world,
and he really capitalize it. I don't follow them in
(53:02):
that way, but I think that he's considered a member
of Guns and Roses in good standing.
Speaker 2 (53:08):
Paul Tobias, are you thinking of Richard Fortis?
Speaker 1 (53:11):
No, Paul Tobias is good.
Speaker 2 (53:15):
Whatever, Paul Hugh Paul to Bayak. I guess because the
good standing threw me off because a lot of I mean, well,
I guess it depends on the fans.
Speaker 1 (53:22):
You.
Speaker 2 (53:22):
I know, he's the lesser known. He wrote some of
the classic songs on Chinese democracy. But uh, I guess
that through me?
Speaker 1 (53:29):
I don't.
Speaker 2 (53:29):
I don't know, and have never matter I would even
know how to contact the guy.
Speaker 1 (53:33):
So well, have the fifty members that been in the
band he's he's a member, right, I think you can?
Speaker 2 (53:40):
Yeah, No, he was officially, I mean in this band's
I don't know if people Axel likes the it's been
on record that like Matt Soum and Gilby Clark weren't members.
I consider them members as a fan. I don't know.
It's I know if Axel says that, how could I
say it? But growing up as a fan of the bands,
and these are the people that you see and you
go see them a concert, they become members. I'm sorry.
(54:03):
You know, people know who wrote the songs, right, we
know Chris who actually wrote the songs. Uh so so
fans obviously not the pault to Bias. But what about
oly Bach?
Speaker 1 (54:15):
I only had met only I was playing bass.
Speaker 2 (54:23):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (54:24):
I guess it was at the time. I wonder if
it was through raz Yeah. I think I might maybe
met him through around his house. Okay, but yeah, again
not friends with him. He was just kind of a
another another musician figure, you know, amongst and there was
(54:47):
a lot of musicians hanging around at the same time,
you know.
Speaker 2 (54:49):
So nothing that that that sticks out? Okay, all right,
we got to uncover all these rocks.
Speaker 1 (54:55):
Because you see Darrow on the other hand, Steve, you know,
I played that last Hell Rose Show with and Steve
Darrow played that at Dancing Waters, and so did Rob Gardner.
Speaker 2 (55:08):
Right and Rob. I got to get Rob back on too,
because you reminded me because I've interviewed Lucky enough to
interview some really cool people in the roots. I'm guns
and Roses early on before I started doing video, which
has been going on for years. But I don't know,
sometimes I got their story. Do they really want to
talk to me again? So I appreciate being able to
get your story again. I know there was some new
(55:30):
stuff to talk about with you, and obviously some classic
stuff to talk about. Anything else that you want to
you share and going on or if people need to.
I mean, how open is your people want to go
to you for therapy to be honest with you. Is
that something that I can say or is that you
take new clients or how does that work?
Speaker 1 (55:53):
Yeah, Psychology Today, the Psychology Today website has got some
great therapists on there. I'm on there, I can be
I can be searched, you know, as a therapist by anybody.
And I like to do and I really like to
do this music therapy. It has a unique, uh capacity
to really help people in ways that that traditional talk
(56:17):
therapy and some of the other approaches just have aren't
able to They're not really able to access the healing
in the way that they can with with music therapy.
So yeah, that's a it's a it's it's it's a
really nice thing.
Speaker 2 (56:31):
Well, we're thankful for people like you for creating help
create us not just classic and timeless music. Because I
got my music therapy. Listening to you move to the city,
I'm like, I'm gonna blast that later.
Speaker 1 (56:45):
Man.
Speaker 2 (56:45):
My son He's like, I don't want to rush him
growing up, but at the same time, like I can't
wait to teach him about the roots of guns and
roses and all these things. But yeah, now he just
wants ABC's and uh, you know, shapes and letters and
all that.
Speaker 1 (56:59):
That that fun I've got. I've got to myself. One
of them is about ready to go to college. So
we're you know, oh man, they enjoyed the shapes in
the and and the Thomas, the tank engine or whatever.
Enjoy it all now because that when that's gone, that's
it's gone.
Speaker 2 (57:14):
They say that that's the goods.
Speaker 1 (57:15):
Other good stuff takes its place, but those things don't,
you know.
Speaker 2 (57:20):
I know that. That's why whenever he does crash an interview,
I guess take it for what it is. I know
it's not going to be forever anyway. He's he'll be
back from with the babysitter soon, so I should probably
help my wife and get his meal prepared. Chris, thank
you so much for your time, very well, thank you
for reaching out. That means that really does mean a
lot to me, because it means like it makes me
(57:41):
feel like I'm doing something right. I'm somebody who doubts
himself all the time. Uh so it's somebody like who
wants to share their story. It's it's not easy. I
really do feel for the people who talked to me
giving interviews. It's not easy to re you know, look
back at your life and talk about some good things
some bad things are just to fly out to remember
(58:01):
that these things are hard. So it's not always you.
Speaker 1 (58:04):
Know, I don't think living in the past is healthy,
but I do think that, uh, engaging with our memories
and and and activating those really positive bits of nostalgia
and and and memories and experiences is crucial, right because
just moving forward doesn't doesn't capitalize on all those really
nice things that we had, you know, and if and
(58:26):
you're feeling sad, you're feeling disconnected, you know, thinking back
of when we felt connected to somebody or had fun
experiences can be really a good, good therapy in that moment.
Pictures are good. Look at these pictures I got Jesus,
I remember taking that picture.
Speaker 2 (58:43):
Thank you for sharing some of those with me. I
appreciate it and well said and well said, so I'm
not going to add to that. That does it for
this episode of Appetite for distortion. When will you see
the next one? In the words of Axel Rose concerning
Chinese democracy, I don't know I as soon as the word,
but you'll see it, my God.
Speaker 1 (59:06):
Thanks to the lame mass security, I'm going home.
Did you hear that?
Speaker 2 (00:35):
Welcome to the podcast Appetite for Distortion, Episode number five
hundred and fifty three. My name is Brando. Welcome back
to the podcast, mister Chris Weber. How are you, sir?
Speaker 1 (00:47):
I'm very well, thanks for having me back.
Speaker 2 (00:49):
You're very I should have said this right before. You're
very angelic because in your living room you have a
nice light behind you. But you're perfect. Right now, you're
blocking the sun.
Speaker 1 (00:57):
So I'll tell my kids that, Phil, but they'll think
about that.
Speaker 2 (01:02):
Is that where you are? You're at home right now?
I am okay, all right? So yeah, obviously I record
out of my home. My son, baby Brownstone, is with
his babysitter right now, so should not interrupt us because
I'm excited for you to come on. For those of
you who there's a lot of main you may not know.
I'm sure if you listen to this podcast you already know,
(01:22):
but you may have missed old episodes with Chris. The
last time was episode just was four years ago? My god, Chris,
I mean you follow too long? Too long, sir? Episode
three hundred and twenty nine, okay with Marcel Circus who
went that you guys went to high School with Slash Awesome, Awesome,
(01:43):
My Conversation and then Facts episode twenty four. So that's
over five hundred episodes. Chris, that sounds just insane to me.
So I want to go set the table for thanking
you because I should. You follow me on the Appetite
page on social media, and it's so cool that you do,
(02:05):
and also shout out to also because she says Hi.
It says how awestome you are. Because when I announced
you're coming on, that's Michelle Young My Michelle.
Speaker 1 (02:13):
Okay, sure, I love Michelle.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
It's very cool that these characters that are part of
the Tell the Guns Rose the story follow my page.
It's just it's it's an honor. So it's an again
the honor to talk to you. But you reached out
to me, which was what a pleasant surprise, and you
meant it in the best way. Sorry as I choke
as I'm like pre laughing. Uh, you're like, well, you know,
(02:41):
I follow Appetite just like I said, and you're still
doing it. And in my head because a lot of
people are saying that you're still doing it, Mike am
Ike crazy, like Brando's still doing it. Good for that
for that guy, he's still he's still plugging away appetite
or or yeah, never give up the little engine that could,
or wow, he's still doing it like you're doing a
(03:03):
great job, which you thankfully, I mean you did also
say I'm not putting words in your mouth. So thank
you for the email, Thank you for coming on. I'll
shut up now. Just thanks man, And I hope you're
doing well.
Speaker 1 (03:15):
Yeah I am, I am. Things are good in my life.
Speaker 2 (03:18):
You just came out of, I guess a session. I
know there's a client privilege, you know, therapist client privilege,
So you just got out of a session. Just now.
Speaker 1 (03:29):
Yeah. So after twenty five years in music on the
road and I became a marriage and family therapist. So
for the last twenty years as a therapist, I've been
(03:52):
I meet with a lot of clients and I started
to wonder with the benefit of using my musical background
and skills would have. So I did a little bit
of training in music therapy and then started to include
that in some of the some of my practice. Uh
and and while I'm in private practice, I also work
(04:17):
at a mental health treatment program called Resolutions and in
Santa Monica, California, and over the years we were sort
of talking about sort of incorporating music therapy, and a
couple of years ago we started to do that, and
the clients that I began to work with were unique,
(04:38):
and I just it really really meant something to me
because many that most all the people that I work
with have some challenges and sort of expressing themselves in
ways that's that's you know, easy to say the least.
So the work that I do with them allows them
to write lyrics, to sing on some occasions and express
(05:02):
themselves in ways that they wouldn't have had that opportunity,
and they don't and they continue to not have that
opportunity lest working with me. So I'm motivated to be
very prolific with them and to do more.
Speaker 2 (05:15):
That's really cool. And I said this to you right
before the air, and I've said it. You can all
document it throughout these near ten years. May it'll be
like the anniversary if you want to call it that.
On my first episode, that mental health has always been
the secondary theme of this gn R bar Mitzvah party
to broadcast. I haven't said that that's made up slogan
(05:36):
in a while, So I do want to talk to
you before that before we get to some of the
more GNR centric stuff, because if you're watching this on YouTube,
you see Chris has a guitar in hand also behind
leaned up against the wall. We'll talk about some of
the G and R songs that he wrote when it
was with Hollywood Rose. We want to get there. But obviously,
(05:59):
if you're in a band of this podcast, you're a
fan of listening to me complained about things, and it's
almost like my therapy session. A lot of times it's
the truth. I started this podcast out of like a depression,
like a need to be creative, to find something, and
I didn't have. I don't have the talent for a guitar.
I don't. I just don't have the talent for your
(06:21):
to be a musician. And you could say try. But
also I don't want to get too sappy right away,
but I mean my physical disability. I have a neurological disability.
You know. My my leg braces are back here.
Speaker 1 (06:35):
I got.
Speaker 2 (06:36):
My leg braces are back here, I got. I put
a very cheap like off the off. There's a bunch
of bands on there. I could just put them on
my desk for a second. There is a guns and
Roses one. I got like very cheap like stickers off
Amazon because I used to you know, I had been
doing it since I was a kid, and just to
(06:56):
be different because I don't I don't wear shorts. I'm like,
I felt very different, so putting stickers on them and
it affected It affected me. So it affects not just
my legs, with my hands, so I can't. I can't
like play guitar like that. But then I see people
with no hands play guitar. That's a thing they'll play
with their feet.
Speaker 1 (07:15):
I think I've seen a couple of people on YouTube
do that. Amazing, isn't it.
Speaker 2 (07:19):
So forgive me if I'm asking questions that those pre conversations,
that's we're talking years ago, but getting when you got
into therapy, what is that that transition, Like I guess
to go from your musician you're entire and you still are,
that's never going to end. But to commit, you know,
(07:41):
it's it's a big thing. I have family and mental
health also in that field, and that's a big commitment
to make you know, it's a commitment just to go
to therapy just for myself. It's another one to say, hey,
this is going to be my life's work from now on.
Speaker 1 (07:56):
Yeah, I over what twenty five years ago, I decided
to get sober and just hang up the bottles and whatnot.
And I was in UPO at the time, and we
were on our second record, and I was sober through
the you know, early sobriety through the recording of that
(08:19):
second record, on the on the heels of a pretty
successful first record, marginally successful, and so I hadn't thought
about doing anything else, right, So I went and did
that record, and lo and behold, I had to wait
until Sony released it. So you wait around a lot.
And I decided to get a job answering the phones
(08:41):
that where I went through treatment, and I liked it.
It was it was fine, you know. But then I
went on tour and I came back and after touring
for the better part of a year, this record, the
second UPO record, didn't do quite as well as the
first one, and I thought, you know what, I liked
working where I was working, and I think I want
to do that. So I I kind of just made
(09:06):
that transition. I was like, you know what, I think
I'm good. I've done everything that I wanted to do
in music up to that time, right is you know,
with the recording, the and the touring and being able
to play with some great musicians and you know, really
living the life that I wanted to live. And I thought,
but I want something else as well, And so I
(09:30):
began working at this program and then lo and behold.
I wasn't a therapist yet, but I was working in
the admissions department. And admissions does two things right. It
lets you talk to people that are in need and
try to help them, and also asked you to ask
for money. And I hated asking for money. So I
was talking about a colleague of mine and he said,
(09:51):
why don't you just become a therapist? So then I went,
I went back to grad school. Okay, okay, that's now,
you know that's decades.
Speaker 2 (10:00):
Now, sure, sure, but I want I appreciate you sharing
that and again if you, uh sure you shared that
story before because it has become sexual part of your life.
But I wanted like a foundation to jump off of
you to discovery of the music therapy. Can you tell
us like some of the practices that you do, because
it's not like I'm going to name this person, so
(10:22):
I don't think I'm too speaking out a school. But
I have a friend who has a a nonverbal autistic son,
and you know, I don't ask too much, you know,
whatever he's willing to my friend to tell me about him.
You know, just how the ways of different ways to
communicate and how music can brings so much joy. And
I see it in my son, you know, when you're
(10:42):
trying to figure out what did this toddler there's two
three almost three year old is trying to tell you.
But there's that certain joy in certain communication you can
have with plane, you know, something like a drums or
they're seeing something on TV dancing something like that. Uh sorry,
I have to say I had a random thought in
my had him and I shared a laugh. It's musical
(11:03):
and it ties in, you know, and I want to
give credit to this person who sent it to me,
and I'll have to send it to you, Chris. Maybe
I should just straight up post it at some point
because its guns Roses related. So Satya sent me filming
from Vin Hirio Vinhio on YouTube. He's an orkesh. He's
(11:26):
like a conductor and part of his bit is that
he lines up Rubbert chickens and he plays like classic
rock songs so he did. That was a sweet child
of mine and my son thought that was the greatest
thing in the world. Sorry, I deviated.
Speaker 1 (11:41):
That's a very creative way to place rich Lamar.
Speaker 2 (11:44):
The internet man. But whatever works, whoever brings to you
with smile. So can you tell us a little bit
more about your music therapy and things that you do?
Speaker 1 (11:51):
And yeah, so, I mean the the processes. You know,
it's unique to whoever I'm working with. But you know,
I work with a fellow by the name of Pete. Hey,
Pete if you're watching. And Pete had at some point
in his life had a TBI traumatic brain injury which
(12:13):
affected his ability to communicate in some ways. Uh, and
music and lyric writing and singing, and he sings and
he writes lyrics and he sings and and giving him
an opportunity through create creation, creating the music for him
to do that and then working on it with him
is really sort of an opportunity for him to really
(12:34):
express himself because without that, and there's some struggle in
being able to just just to have a conversation. So
he being able to write lyrics and sing them is
something that he can do effortlessly.
Speaker 2 (12:48):
Oh wow, isn't that interesting how the brain can do that.
You know, there's certain different things that are difficult and
that can just come naturally.
Speaker 1 (12:56):
I have a u I know, a neurosurgeon as a
matter of fact, at just a quick plug if if
that's okay. I use Waterstone guitars. I've been used and
I'm friends with the fellow that owns the company, and
I've used and I've used them primarily for all the
music therapy stuff that I do, but I really like
playing them. So but why I mentioned him is he
(13:25):
this friend of mine who's a neurosurgeon, is sort of
informed how the brain works in the different parts of
the brain. And yes, it's amazing, but it makes a
lot of sense when you when you realize that vocalizing
something actually takes there's many different parts in the brain
that contribute to that, and everything from reading something is
a different part of the brain than singing something yeah yeah.
(13:48):
So wherever it is that there's perhaps damage or or
something that happens to the brain, you may find that
it affects only a part of the verbal or the
vocalization of.
Speaker 2 (14:01):
Yeah, and you want to nurture that that part. You
ever see the video of some guys getting brain surgery
and you can film anything today, and he's I think
it was the violin he was playing, playing something man
and that's just wow. Wow. Some people go under for
a root canal. That's that's that's brave.
Speaker 1 (14:21):
Yeah. Yeah, So I mean having that opportunity with the
fellow that I was mentioning another another person that I
work with has some other challenges that prevent them from
really communicating and in effective ways, and so that the
ability to write lyrics and to help them put to
(14:41):
music is a real blessing for them.
Speaker 2 (14:43):
So how does that process go? I guess, with writing
lyrics and putting to music? And is are you you
mentioned something off air? I don't know if you were
joking or not, both because you were being humble about
your voice. But the use of AI, I mean, there
is a there is a very good use for AI.
It's used for a lot of really some memes are funny,
(15:04):
but it's is it really worth? You know, the technology?
Some things are better worth it's so talk to me
about the good use for AI about things like this.
Speaker 1 (15:13):
You know, I'm really a nubie in the whole thing,
but I'm using it just really to to create vocals
that are are that sound good enough that it doesn't
ruin the song. Right, So if somebody writes some lyrics
and they and they're not a singer, I will sing
sing it. But I don't want to be the voice
(15:34):
on their song one and I also don't want to
be a bad voice on their song. I've been blessed
with a lot of things, and good voices not one
voicesn't one of them. So I'll write the song. I
do all my work on garage band. I know it's
not the most sophisticated daw, but it's it's a very
(15:55):
useful writing tool, and I've gotten pretty good at it
manipulating him and and then I will sing on it.
And then I'll fly my vocals into an AI that
allows it to kind of create a usable voice, you know.
(16:15):
And I'll keep the same phrasing, I'll keep the same meter,
and then I'll fly that back into the song. So
it's not created by AI. The song is not created
by A at all, that's all. It's all by my hand.
But the vocals do have an AI a flare to them.
Speaker 2 (16:33):
Okay, all right, I guess an overall question, I think
about somebody who they talk about therapy. A lot goes
to therapy. What do you think of just the state
of mental health today that we talk about it so
openly now and you said decades ago that you made
this transition, it wasn't as open. You don't see you
(16:56):
can see commercials for it. So I don't not that
I grew up with uh.
Speaker 1 (17:01):
You know.
Speaker 2 (17:01):
I I may have said this to you uh and
passed the interviews or not. I don't, but it's his
part in this conversation is, you know, I lost my
dad to depression. So it's like, I just there's a
certain starting point for me for a lot of things.
And I just I just don't recall because it was
a year later when Robin Williams passed that it was
(17:23):
that was such a big thing in this on this
planet that that's when the conversation to me changed. You know,
I'm just curious of how you feel about it and
how the access that we have online with certain apps
and so yeah.
Speaker 1 (17:38):
I mean, it's it's evolved, it's evolving, and I have
to give uh. And this is a it's a I
don't know if it's controversial, but it's an odd thing
to say, but I have to give COVID credit, right,
And the COVID had a lot of very negative impact
on society and all. You could just go on and
on about that. But the one thing that it did
do is it it moved therapy to virtual right by
(18:02):
the nature of sort of a lot of places being
closed and you couldn't you couldn't do therapy in person,
and so for many so for those for those couple
of years that that really happened, it's sort of created
an environment that it wasn't taboo to to see see
a client or have a client see their therapist virtually.
And now it's commonplace. And so while it's not always
(18:27):
the better alternative, and it's certainly not a great alternative
for some clients or some families. I work with a
lot of couples, and it's not great with couples all
the time, it does it does allow for people that
would not make their way to a therapy office to
see their therapists in person because they just couldn't do that.
That maybe they couldn't leave the home, maybe there's a
(18:49):
there's diagnostically there's some issues that they wouldn't even want
to leave home, and that's prevented them from having care
or people that have got or mobility issues, you know,
So it's allowed for that and for that, it's it's
a real blessing.
Speaker 2 (19:05):
I agree with you obviously, and August, so it's not
too controversial. I'll kind of agree obviously. COVID terrible, millions
of people died terrible. But if you want to take
any sort of silver lining and the terrible, yeah, those
are things that happened. It's kind of the reason why
I get to work from home now. I made that
transition from you know, I'm able to it just wasn't
(19:28):
set up for me to be able to do. That's
why those previous conversations you and I had were just
a school radio just wasn't set up like that and
to make it. You know, Mary, that makes sense with
with therapy. I went through that transition too, where I'm
seeing my therapist and there is such a difference between
seeing them in person and over the phone or on zoom.
(19:52):
But you shouldn't just say hey if I can't see
them in person, sometimes you really need someone to talk to.
Although I kind of wish I always had that that
opportunity to do it over the over zoom because you
mentioned mobility and you know I'm handicapped. You know, when
I was really in it getting sober from alcohol, it
(20:12):
was a winner. It was over the winter and my
therapist like, you have to go to AA and like
it was just unsafe for me to walk around and
go to these churches and go down. But I'm safe enough,
you know, just a fear of falling, but you do it.
I just wish I could have done over zoom.
Speaker 1 (20:30):
So I don't know.
Speaker 2 (20:30):
I want to share because I know you share, so
I people. I know people people appreciate hearing it. Shout
out to a listener Connie from Greece, who just celebrated
I believe five years sober. He lets me know every
year that's great. Yeah, so it's graduations. Yeah, isn't that cool.
Connie is a huge obviously g n R fan. So
is this the awkward pivot where I made the talking
(20:52):
about guy, I'm.
Speaker 1 (20:53):
Just gonna grab something real quick one second.
Speaker 2 (20:55):
Oh yeah, that works for me. Uh And it's I
thank you to Connie. And there's a lot of other
listeners who reach out and let me know that they
haven't had a drink in a while, or checking in
on me, and I really do appreciate and it's part
of the reason why I keep going and doing that.
(21:16):
So when you've reached out, it's not just talking about
guns and Roses, it's getting a chance to talk about therapy,
because this is my therapy. My therapist said, I got
to find myself a hobby, and I've been doing this
hobby called Appetite for Distortion for nearly ten years and
even nowadays in a better place with my wife and son,
(21:36):
there are days I need it. There days I need
to go on and just bs about GNR. So thank
you for allowing me to do that. You're being a
therapist in many ways here for me today. So thank you.
Speaker 1 (21:48):
I can be of service.
Speaker 2 (21:50):
Yeah, right on. So, Chris Weber, if the Guns and
Roses fans know kind of responsible for a lot of
classic Guns or Roses songs, the first one, I guess
is the one that's an appetite. Maybe the most obvious
one is anything goes. I know you've you've shared the
(22:12):
story before, and forgive me for I would you mind
kind of just sharing like how the the origin of
how that that happened? And it's been a New Year's
resolution of mine to credit listeners. So I want to
credit this to a listener. Uh. This goes out to
carry on Facebook carry Michael. Uh the anything Goes backstory?
(22:35):
So what you what can you you share about that
underrated song on appetite it gets it's underrated. I'm telling you, Chris,
I'm gonna end up here on getting angry because whenever
we talk about appetite, people are like, it's yes, usually
ten out of ten, but more often than not, did
I see people are like, oh, anything goes? Maybe it's no, no, no,
(22:56):
it's it belongs in everything is at ten? Anything goes
is a part of that. So I needed, sorry, I
needed to get that out because its.
Speaker 1 (23:05):
Off, thank you very much. And I noticed that occasionally
with that where you'll you'll uh, you'll post that some
somewhere or something or somebody champions that and that it
warms my heart at times, you know. I mean the
backstory to that is, you know, we we came together,
me and Izzy and then and then soon uh Axel
(23:31):
which who by the way, for for just a quick
thing as a as a birthday present to my mom
because they lived at my mom's house. Excellency was that's
where he sends his name Bill, and I always liked
that picture because that was probably right before he asked
anybody to ask to call him Axel Yeah, signed signed
(23:54):
a bill to my mom, which I thought was sweet
because my mom used to call him Bill.
Speaker 2 (23:57):
I love that was it framed beforehand? He took it
out just for this or no, I.
Speaker 1 (24:03):
Well I have this. It's not. No, it's not in
a frame, but it isn't a little.
Speaker 2 (24:08):
Lock box.
Speaker 1 (24:09):
No, it's which we're called a photoell.
Speaker 2 (24:12):
Oh, okay, okay, that's that's a piece of memorabilia right there.
Speaker 1 (24:18):
But the but the I mean, the backstory is we
were we were together. There wasn't a bass player or
a drummer yet, so we weren't really rehearsing yet. We're
just writing songs. And I remember sitting at my parents house,
which is where we were all kind of living at
the time, and Rock and Heart Place came out, and
(24:42):
me and Izzy really liked Rock and a Heart Place,
really listened to it a lot. It's great. It's a
I don't know if it's underrated, because I think many
people are appreciate it, but I don't think people recognize
I mean, it doesn't have Joe Perry. It's it's Jimmy
Crestbok playing lead. But the rifts are awesome, The riffs
(25:02):
are really awesome. So I got really excited by that record,
right and on those rifts inspired the you know the right.
(25:26):
So there was something in that record sort of inspired that,
and I was like, oh okay, And I certainly put
that together with some other of the styles that I
was playing with, which was you know, I was a
little bit more. I was listening to some Juice Priests
at the time for years before actually, and that's how
(25:48):
that that song kind of came to be. And is
he's part? And you know Buzzy was here, he would
tell you, I mean, is his part in a lot
of the songs, all the Guns and Roses songs. If
you just you know, split hard left and hard right,
you'll hear a completely different part and you'll will go like, wow,
this doesn't even sound like the song. But together it
makes what Guns and Roses. Why Guns and Roses sounds
(26:09):
like it does. If Busy wasn't there, it wouldn't have that,
it wouldn't have that element. It's the it's the seasoning
to those songs. So and and with that song. He
If you listen to the Hollywood Rose Roots, Guns and
Roses albums that Cleopatrick put out with the demos that
(26:31):
I did with the band, you'll you can really hear
that part from Izzy So Together that turned into Anything Goes.
And the writing process was always me and as you
would put it, put it down a tape and then
give the tape to Axel, and then Axel would go
away for a couple of days and come back with
the lyrics.
Speaker 2 (26:52):
When he came back with those lyrics, do you remember
your what went on through your head when you're going
through like I've been thinking about, think about sex?
Speaker 1 (27:02):
You know you're well, you're for you know that those
that the the original Hollywood Rose Roots of Guns and
Roses records, which is playing the version that we gigged
on that we that we wrote and gigged. He rewrote
the lyrics to have the sex part right, So they
were originally something else, so he rewrote them for the appetite.
Speaker 2 (27:24):
Okay, if it's it's either I completely forgot that or
I never knew. So that's that's something.
Speaker 1 (27:30):
Listen. I encourage encourage you and everybody to listen to
routs and Guns and Roses.
Speaker 2 (27:35):
I've listened to it just that's just that has just
been a long time because you get God now I
feel like an ask because you get used to the original.
So like I, I've listened to which has been I
should have listened to it beforehand. I suck. I'm sorry.
What's what's the I'm sorry to everybody? Uh So it's
(27:56):
how different? Then are the original lyrics?
Speaker 1 (27:58):
Then?
Speaker 2 (27:59):
Are they completely different?
Speaker 1 (28:00):
It?
Speaker 2 (28:00):
Uh?
Speaker 1 (28:02):
Uh? I mean I buy my time it's totally different. Yeah,
the verses are different, and the courses are the same.
The courses, I mean, it's it's that's all the same,
(28:29):
but the vocal, the versus the lyrics are different.
Speaker 2 (28:32):
Okay, so okay, nothing about the rubber made okay.
Speaker 1 (28:35):
Uh And then my favorite part is yeah, I thought
was great.
Speaker 2 (28:48):
Okay, see all right, snap, now now I understand a
little bit better. I should have. I don't know why
I listen to that album now. I just feel very foolish.
But I like to take it on. I like to
own it.
Speaker 1 (29:00):
I mean, you know, it didn't it didn't sell forty
million records like Appetite for Destruction. So you're you're, you're
it's just.
Speaker 2 (29:08):
Been like a long time. It's It's funny though I
always credit my listeners that they're smart. I say it
often they're smarter than me. Like I read Slashes. I
read all the autobiographies, not Duff, so you know Slash,
but I don't remember so much from it. It's doing
this every day, or I should say on the social
media helps me keep my brain. Is fried Man. So
(29:28):
it's uh, but I appreciate you, uh.
Speaker 1 (29:31):
Play Yeah to to your initial question, Yeah, the lyrics
are different. So I had no problem with whatever he
was singing at the time. And to be honest with you,
and I've probably said this to you before in other settings,
is as a as a as a as a musicians
that learned, you know, from age nine listening to you know,
(29:54):
Zeppelin and Russian just sitting there. To be able to
have a real singer, even though he was like in
the beginning of his career like it, I mean, it
was remarkable to have somebody that could really sing, you know.
So when we started playing and gigging. Here's a here's
a some pulling out old pictures. Here's that's at the
at the troubad that was probably nineteen eighty three or
eighty four, there's excellent in the white shirt in the
(30:17):
front and oh I see that me with the white hair,
and then is he over on the other side? But
it was you know, where's it going with that? It
was remarked, it was just he was a remarkable singer,
so to have have him sing anything, he could have
been singing about, you know, dishwashers, and I didn't find.
Speaker 2 (30:42):
Yeah, well, now with to bring up AI, you can
make that happen a singing about dishwasher somebody.
Speaker 1 (30:48):
I'm sure you inspired somebody to do that.
Speaker 2 (30:51):
I don't know if I want credit for doing that.
Speaker 1 (30:54):
Axel is the Maytag repair man.
Speaker 2 (30:57):
There we go. You want I just come off with
this whole side bit of us actually doing random things.
Uh so, No, that is very that is very cool
and insightful. And I appreciate that because we because you
have spoken about Axel's voice and the impression, and that's
I do talk about that a lot, I guess this
time around, which ends up biting me in the ass
a little bit where the lyrics. But I guess now
(31:20):
that I think about that, when you do hear it
on Appetite and the lyrics are different. What is your reaction,
then I could have if I wanted to, I can
say forget all of that that I said and reset
and ask an intelligent question that I know what I'm
talking about. But I'm not going to do any of that.
Speaker 1 (31:38):
So, you know, I don't know if I've ever if
I actually thought too much about it. I don't. I
take them as sort of more tongue in cheek and
sort of lighthearted, right, So it's a little bit of
a less serious song with the with the new verse
in it. I just listened to the you know at
the end of the day, you know, the music part
(32:00):
that I created at the time, sort of those in
Reckless Life and moved to the city and the other
songs are you know, I just think that, you know,
one of the things I recognize is, you know, I'm
very lucky that at some point when I initially put
those chords together or those riffs together, you know, forty
(32:22):
years later, people have, you know, are still appreciating them.
And had I not written that at the time, that
wouldn't have been a thing. They have that something else
in its place, but.
Speaker 2 (32:34):
Perhaps perhaps literally what the name of the guns are?
Sorry now it's I can't here like that an absurd
I can't hear a normal conversation anymore or better. Sorry,
but I digress. So I guess to kind of pivot
a little because the reason I asked that is when
(32:54):
I talk to musicians like yourself, a song or an
album like that's your baby, that's your child. So I
didn't know if I, Okay, here's your child and they're
changing it, or is it just like getting a haircut
or you or you weren't that attached to that song
and you were just happy enough, you know, delighted enough
for that to be on there. I guess that was
(33:14):
just my line of thinking with with.
Speaker 1 (33:17):
That, some of you know, that's a that's an interesting observation,
And I'd say that there's some songs that I've I've
had on records that have followed in different different bands
that have a lot of significance to me, and I
wouldn't want them messed with at all. Of all of
(33:39):
the ones that I that I that people are familiar
with that I'm most connected to is Moved to the
City and actually wrote move to the City with Izzy
after I was after out of the band. I had
left the band, I wrote move to I was I
had a task camp. I think it was a two
(34:01):
forty four, which is the four track with the cassette,
uh and me, me and Izzy where I would write
a bunch of songs in me and Izzy would sort of, uh,
work on, work on, you know, ideas and whatnot. And
moved to the city. Came from that, as a matter
of fact, in my in my in my mind's ear,
(34:24):
it's not even the thing, but my memory, I'll just say,
my I can I remember is he singing the lyrics
to it? So, I mean those lyrics were actually he
he actually wrote the lyrics because before we got them
to Axle or before actually heard it, it was a
it was a completed song with Izzy singing it. That's
my memory. I was there and I wrote it. So
(34:46):
that's that's you.
Speaker 2 (34:48):
Know, pretty good memory. It's for something it's got.
Speaker 1 (34:51):
To so so, I mean it was very It was
very uh basic. I used the Doctor Rhythm drum machine.
If anybody played with the Doctor Rhythm is the most
basic drum machine from the eighties that you could get,
very user friendly. You could just sit there, but the
sounds were terrible. They just kept a little beat going.
(35:15):
And I used that and I had a bass and
a guitar, and then you'd sing, and then that would
be the whole song, because you'd have your four tracks,
unless you decided to bounce the tracks around a little bit.
Speaker 2 (35:24):
That's that's so cool the technology that's advanced since then.
But and forgive me for not knowing this, is there
a version of is he singing that that's recorded?
Speaker 1 (35:37):
No, I've got a cassette somewhere that says move to
the city demo on it. And I know it's a
four track because as you play it it and I
don't have any cassette players anymore. It it's it's one.
It's at the wrong speed, which would be the case
if you had a fort cassette doing four track, because
(36:02):
it it goes a lot faster. The four tracks go
a lot faster because it covers. There's more more tape
for it to record on that way, so the fidelity
is better. So anyway, there's so I could I can
kind of tell that there's something on it. I just
don't have anything and I'm but forty four to play
it on.
Speaker 2 (36:21):
We got we had to work on that. You might
be sitting on a gold mine.
Speaker 1 (36:25):
But occasionally seeing one in Craigslist. I'm like, I don't
want to spend seven hundred dollars to cure my curiosity.
Speaker 2 (36:33):
Well we gotta we got to find Chris to somebody
who knows, somebody that you don't have to spend seven
hundred dollars for that can transcribe that, I mean.
Speaker 1 (36:42):
Would be great whatever whatever that model was, that that
Tascam model, I.
Speaker 2 (36:48):
Mean a picture that from Axel signed Bill maybe and
is he said saying, I know it must come blowing
it up up just for theatrics for but you never
know the song moved to the City. You never know,
but that is I love that song. So yeah, when
you when you it goes from second acoustic to the
(37:09):
band and use your illusion, Like what's your your thought
on on on that when you're that that song that
you feel so passionate about really got an added, I
added to I guess to keep it simple.
Speaker 1 (37:24):
What are you talking about moved to the City.
Speaker 2 (37:25):
Yeah, yeah, when that went, yeah.
Speaker 1 (37:27):
I mean that was sure.
Speaker 2 (37:28):
It was onlies right, and then we then went when
they did it on the on tour was use your
illusion and well it was on the the live era too,
Ladies and gentlemen, the band, whole band breakdown, and it
was just it became more than an acoustic song. It
was it was with the horn section and all that,
all that jazz.
Speaker 1 (37:48):
Yeah, does that bring a bit? I mean it's a
good song. I mean it has a you know, as
the guitar players that are of my generation, and maybe
it didn't have to be my generation, but there, you know,
that's that that sort of aerosmithy push pull swagger kind
of you know, it was it was all the rage
back then. You know, we had you know, everybody from
you know, we had a faster pussy cat playing stuff
(38:10):
like that. I mean, it was a that was our
vibe in the eighties, right, So that that song kind
of had a lot of a lot of the feeling
of the eighties for me.
Speaker 2 (38:21):
It's kind of spoke to that and not to treat
you like a circus monkey, but maybe good from what
you remember a taste of your your part of moved.
Speaker 1 (38:30):
Moved to the city.
Speaker 3 (38:31):
Yeah, is that you hear that?
Speaker 2 (39:07):
That was my music therapy right there? Beautiful, No thank you.
If I had applause button now, it'd hit that right there.
Speaker 3 (39:27):
Oh.
Speaker 1 (39:28):
I mean it's a lot of fun to play. I
mean because you know, guitar players can of right, you know,
they find these kind of like movement and sort of
things with it, like a flow to it. It's just
like you sit there and it's almost like you're on
a swing. You know, there's a kind of a.
Speaker 2 (39:41):
I love it. It's part of what got me into
Guns of Roses and the fact that it goes back
to the roots of Guns and Roses is just so special.
And you know, as they just completed their fortieth years
as an entity in nineteen eighty five and then going
on year forty one this year, you know, they they
add they're still playing songs that you were a part of.
(40:04):
So when they're playing Reckless Life and Shadow of Your Love,
what does that mean to you? Now that the current
version of Guns and Roses are playing stuff that you wrote?
Speaker 1 (40:19):
I mean, that doesn't mean so much to me so
as I mean, I'm I like the early stuff I think,
you know, I mean, I don't want to get into
a debate on like, you know, the the evolution of
Guns n' Roses and you know, and every band takes changes,
right there's I mean, it's just the nature of all bands.
(40:40):
I mean, I was disappointed after you know, Aerosmith came
out with whether it was Pomp or Dum, one of
those things, and it was like that was the end
for me because the seventies Aerosmith was important. You know.
It's the same with Van Hagar. I'm you know, I mean,
you could argue all day that there's some great songs
with that, but when when Dave left, it was it
(41:01):
was the end of Van Halen for me. And I
think that that them uh Gin are continuing to play
those songs. I like it best because it's like that
old stuff. I mean, it's the foundation of why everybody
got into him in the first place.
Speaker 2 (41:20):
So that's what I hear, you know, yeah, yeah, no, absolutely,
And same thing for me because there are people and
I talked to them, you know, I want to acknowledge
them that that became fans because of Chinese democracy, believe
it or not, and they're usually younger, whatever it takes.
But yeah, when I became a fan, and I'm obviously younger,
(41:40):
and the band was already broken up by the time
I really was, you know, hitting my stride as a
music fan. Born in in eighty three, so I mean
they you know, I was ten that that last you
know that during farm Aid, you know, I was I mean,
I'm still focused on the teenage Mutannique Turtles, but I
mean I really wasn't focused. So I'm not focused so
on that anymore. So it was going back and hearing
(42:04):
the acoustic and the bluesy rock and then yeah, So
I love that they're acknowledging it because there are bands
that don't. I'm a fan of Incubus, and they don't
play their older stuff. You know, even the Chili Peppers
you mentioned before. It's a lot of their newer stuff.
It's not the stuff that they you know, maybe maybe
it's different with them because it's the stuff that got
them popular. But the fans that were there since the
(42:25):
beginning this is you know, I like these the funk
style of those bands or with guns and roses. They
like that dirty rock and roll sound. So again that
it goes back to the roots, goes back to Chris whoever.
Is just it's special because there are bands that can
ignore their their roots, and you can. So I just
think it's cool that your riff is still alive in
(42:46):
twenty twenty six. I think, yeah, yeah, right right on.
Speaker 1 (42:51):
I mean, and you also also recognizing that the bands
that have that longevity, that that the unique as the
the thing that's similar to all them is that they
had these really great debut albums for these great second records, right,
So because because they just had that the magic in
(43:12):
the bottle at that moment allowed them to have these careers.
That's but those you needed those initial that initial spark.
So that's the common denominator, right, is like those were
all great records because and that allowed for them to
have the careers that you could kind of look back
on because had they not had those great songs in
the beginning, they just they wouldn't have been right.
Speaker 2 (43:31):
And and that's what right. And I'm not the fan
that's gonna want to compare our generations, you know, because
it's all encompassing of one. You know, I am what
that with gn R. I understand van Halen and van
Hagar both versions I think are cool. But obviously when
your head, like you met van Halen with Daily Roth,
that's van Halen to you, it's you met guns to Roses.
(43:54):
Maybe not with you, not to you, you met them
before anything. But I'm saying a lot of the general
popular population them with Slash, Yeah, they were still guns
and roses after. You know, it's just a it's a
perspective thing, and that's kind of a word I always
like to use. So if you can help us with
our perspective and whatever, you're able to share about another
(44:15):
song that you wrote. You know, we talked about appetite,
you know, talked about some pre uh you know, appetite stuff.
But back off, bitch that there was you know, songwriting
credit issues there. I know that this is all in
the past, So I don't know, is that something that
brings up certain feelings? Is that? Do you?
Speaker 1 (44:34):
I mean, I'm I wasn't in a place to recognize
that playing with playing with the big boys and big
business like record companies, you really need to be careful.
(44:56):
And so early days I was just like I just
trusted everybody. I trusted the publishing company that advanced me
some money that I don't worry about it and I
shouldn't have, And so a lot of things got I
lost opportunities to assert sort of I don't know, to
(45:20):
get really the get the truth out, and so my
you know, I'm not bitter about it, it's just the
way it turned out. Do I wish that I had
gotten credit for back Off bitch In after It because
it I mean, it didn't get released until later anyway. Yeah,
(45:45):
the Shadow of Your Love Thing, I mean, all those
songs in every musician out there that's been in the band,
you know that the creation of those songs, in those
early creation, everybody contributes to that. So I don't really
know what to say other than I I don't hold
any resentment and it just is what it was. And
I do feel very fortunate that the band and Geffen
(46:08):
and everybody at the time of pressing credited me for
the songs that I did write, because they could have
chose to not do that either.
Speaker 2 (46:15):
And just you know, I guess the question comes up
because it's a recent interview. What did late last year
with the sister of Billy McLeod. I don't know if
you cross paths with him at all. Billy co wrote
Yesterday's along with Axel Dell and west Arkeen. And the
story that she tells she told is one day Yesterday's
(46:39):
was on the radio because they were starting to play
some of their singles before the tour, and he's like,
that's the song I wrote with Axel, Like that's my song.
What do I do, and she had some connections and
turned out that they it's I mean, I don't know.
She gave all the details that she could give. But
(46:59):
he got paid one hundred k and like twenty nine
percent of the royalties and his nieces him and his
niece is still got that. And it's a good story
about Axel, you know, and and and and credits. So
I'm just, yeah, there are other stories out there that
maybe don't show that light. So I guess I'm just
curious about where you know, you're particular.
Speaker 1 (47:19):
It was. It's a different it's a different time. People
didn't have hundreds of millions of dollars to kind of
be generous with, and so I don't Again, it's it's
just in a different, totally different context. But good for
him for having recognize.
Speaker 2 (47:37):
That well, and I know it's not apples to Apple's,
but yeah, just the fact that he was able to happen.
And the hard thing was, you know, he was a nobody.
He was just you know, recovering drug addict, and they
could have easily just said, well you have we didn't
do this. You know, what's what are you even talking about?
Speaker 1 (47:54):
Is he credited on that record?
Speaker 2 (47:56):
He first went by Billy because they didn't know his name,
his last name, and then when they reached out in
future pressings, that's why it says Billy McLeod. Oh good
for him, so good for him.
Speaker 1 (48:08):
Yeah, I mean again, I'm I'm kind of more of
an optimistic person and it doesn't serve me to carry resentments.
It's just it hurts me. It doesn't hurt the person
that I'm resentful for towards. So I don't have you know,
I've just moved on from that and the opportunity that
(48:31):
having been part of what is essentially the biggest debut
record of all time, and I'm one of the top
ten record sellers of whole time because there's not going
to be any more records, so it's probably always remain that, right,
That's what great. Yeah, I will always have that, and
so that's that that that's meaningful, right, So.
Speaker 2 (48:54):
Of course, of course, and then the monetary thing I
I you know, that's that's not for me even to
talk about. But just as far as hey, I create,
I did this part of it. You know, maybe it's
not down and it's not they don't say it, or
certain record book books say it, but between us chickens.
(49:14):
You know what what did you do? You know, what's
what's your part? What do you what? What was your
claim as far as like back off Bitch and things
that you didn't get for like are you able to
demonstrate that that on guitar or what you were able
to bring to those songs?
Speaker 1 (49:30):
I mean I haven't played.
Speaker 2 (49:32):
I mean again, sorry, if you're making you a circus monkey,
I'm just trying to I don't even.
Speaker 1 (49:37):
Remember that was that was the That's what it sounded
like back then. Back on that, I think it was
(50:02):
like that I forget I forget the courts at least.
Speaker 2 (50:09):
What we know now we get the other you know
what the spot Sorry.
Speaker 1 (50:13):
Clear Cleopatra Records when they released The Roots of Guns
and ros Roses also did I gave them a lot
of videotape of rehearsals, and in some of those rehearsals,
I don't think there's any any live performances that I
that they that they posted, but but they have, you know,
(50:36):
Hollywood rows in in the rehearsal studio, and so we're
playing back Off Bitch on that. So there's a version
of it if if you find the Cleopatra's release, which
I think was blocked by g and R at some point,
but it wasn't blocked in Japan, so that there's a
Japanese version of it that's available blocked by gn R.
(50:57):
That's the video was gn R from my understanding, and
I don't work with Cleopatra on this, that this was there.
I licensed it to them or we you know, I
gave them the videos to kind of do what they wanted,
and they contributed. They added to the roots of Guns
and Roses by adding a video contribution. So in some
of those it's a CD, but it's also a DBD
(51:20):
and on those are some of the early our early rehearsals.
Speaker 2 (51:28):
Okay, all right, awesome.
Speaker 1 (51:30):
Whether it was Hollywood Rose or a Rose at the time,
or maybe it was XL, who knows, but back off,
back off bitches on that. So if anybody is interested
in exploring that, I'm sure that that's but it sounded
kind of like that some version.
Speaker 2 (51:44):
Thank you for sharing that, and you just as far
as like, oh it may have been Rose or Hollywood
Rose or AXL. It reminded me of my conversation with
Steve Darrow. You know, of course, of all Hollywood Rose
and rose of just because, of course, it's so hard
to remember back then. So I appreciate when people like
you take the time and my memory is is garbage
I talk about, uh, you know, I was talking about
(52:06):
my lack of memory today. So I appreciate when when
people like you pull it your not just your guitar strings,
but your memory strings. A few more questions. These are
from listeners before it gets you, Uh, you out of here.
I know you've had a long day of listening and talking,
not just with me. Uh, this is from Luigi. Have
you ever had the chance to meet Paul Paul Tobias?
(52:29):
Paul Tobias, I don't know if you guys would have
ever crossed paths. No, Okay, that's an easy answer. People
liked that comment. I'm like, how would that happen?
Speaker 1 (52:40):
But for for I mean, it speaks to Axel's you know,
friendship with somebody that he didn't, you know, certainly didn't
have to sort of offer that to his friend, and
he did, and he gave his friend a real great
opportunity to you know, step up into this that world,
and he really capitalize it. I don't follow them in
(53:02):
that way, but I think that he's considered a member
of Guns and Roses in good standing.
Speaker 2 (53:08):
Paul Tobias, are you thinking of Richard Fortis?
Speaker 1 (53:11):
No, Paul Tobias is good.
Speaker 2 (53:15):
Whatever, Paul Hugh Paul to Bayak. I guess because the
good standing threw me off because a lot of I mean, well,
I guess it depends on the fans.
Speaker 1 (53:22):
You.
Speaker 2 (53:22):
I know, he's the lesser known. He wrote some of
the classic songs on Chinese democracy. But uh, I guess
that through me?
Speaker 1 (53:29):
I don't.
Speaker 2 (53:29):
I don't know, and have never matter I would even
know how to contact the guy.
Speaker 1 (53:33):
So well, have the fifty members that been in the
band he's he's a member, right, I think you can?
Speaker 2 (53:40):
Yeah, No, he was officially, I mean in this band's
I don't know if people Axel likes the it's been
on record that like Matt Soum and Gilby Clark weren't members.
I consider them members as a fan. I don't know.
It's I know if Axel says that, how could I
say it? But growing up as a fan of the bands,
and these are the people that you see and you
go see them a concert, they become members. I'm sorry.
(54:03):
You know, people know who wrote the songs, right, we
know Chris who actually wrote the songs. Uh so so
fans obviously not the pault to Bias. But what about
oly Bach?
Speaker 1 (54:15):
I only had met only I was playing bass.
Speaker 2 (54:23):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (54:24):
I guess it was at the time. I wonder if
it was through raz Yeah. I think I might maybe
met him through around his house. Okay, but yeah, again
not friends with him. He was just kind of a
another another musician figure, you know, amongst and there was
(54:47):
a lot of musicians hanging around at the same time,
you know.
Speaker 2 (54:49):
So nothing that that that sticks out? Okay, all right,
we got to uncover all these rocks.
Speaker 1 (54:55):
Because you see Darrow on the other hand, Steve, you know,
I played that last Hell Rose Show with and Steve
Darrow played that at Dancing Waters, and so did Rob Gardner.
Speaker 2 (55:08):
Right and Rob. I got to get Rob back on too,
because you reminded me because I've interviewed Lucky enough to
interview some really cool people in the roots. I'm guns
and Roses early on before I started doing video, which
has been going on for years. But I don't know,
sometimes I got their story. Do they really want to
talk to me again? So I appreciate being able to
get your story again. I know there was some new
(55:30):
stuff to talk about with you, and obviously some classic
stuff to talk about. Anything else that you want to
you share and going on or if people need to.
I mean, how open is your people want to go
to you for therapy to be honest with you. Is
that something that I can say or is that you
take new clients or how does that work?
Speaker 1 (55:53):
Yeah, Psychology Today, the Psychology Today website has got some
great therapists on there. I'm on there, I can be
I can be searched, you know, as a therapist by anybody.
And I like to do and I really like to
do this music therapy. It has a unique, uh capacity
to really help people in ways that that traditional talk
(56:17):
therapy and some of the other approaches just have aren't
able to They're not really able to access the healing
in the way that they can with with music therapy.
So yeah, that's a it's a it's it's it's a
really nice thing.
Speaker 2 (56:31):
Well, we're thankful for people like you for creating help
create us not just classic and timeless music. Because I
got my music therapy. Listening to you move to the city,
I'm like, I'm gonna blast that later.
Speaker 1 (56:45):
Man.
Speaker 2 (56:45):
My son He's like, I don't want to rush him
growing up, but at the same time, like I can't
wait to teach him about the roots of guns and
roses and all these things. But yeah, now he just
wants ABC's and uh, you know, shapes and letters and
all that.
Speaker 1 (56:59):
That that fun I've got. I've got to myself. One
of them is about ready to go to college. So
we're you know, oh man, they enjoyed the shapes in
the and and the Thomas, the tank engine or whatever.
Enjoy it all now because that when that's gone, that's
it's gone.
Speaker 2 (57:14):
They say that that's the goods.
Speaker 1 (57:15):
Other good stuff takes its place, but those things don't,
you know.
Speaker 2 (57:20):
I know that. That's why whenever he does crash an interview,
I guess take it for what it is. I know
it's not going to be forever anyway. He's he'll be
back from with the babysitter soon, so I should probably
help my wife and get his meal prepared. Chris, thank
you so much for your time, very well, thank you
for reaching out. That means that really does mean a
lot to me, because it means like it makes me
(57:41):
feel like I'm doing something right. I'm somebody who doubts
himself all the time. Uh so it's somebody like who
wants to share their story. It's it's not easy. I
really do feel for the people who talked to me
giving interviews. It's not easy to re you know, look
back at your life and talk about some good things
some bad things are just to fly out to remember
(58:01):
that these things are hard. So it's not always you.
Speaker 1 (58:04):
Know, I don't think living in the past is healthy,
but I do think that, uh, engaging with our memories
and and and activating those really positive bits of nostalgia
and and and memories and experiences is crucial, right because
just moving forward doesn't doesn't capitalize on all those really
nice things that we had, you know, and if and
(58:26):
you're feeling sad, you're feeling disconnected, you know, thinking back
of when we felt connected to somebody or had fun
experiences can be really a good, good therapy in that moment.
Pictures are good. Look at these pictures I got Jesus,
I remember taking that picture.
Speaker 2 (58:43):
Thank you for sharing some of those with me. I
appreciate it and well said and well said, so I'm
not going to add to that. That does it for
this episode of Appetite for distortion. When will you see
the next one? In the words of Axel Rose concerning
Chinese democracy, I don't know I as soon as the word,
but you'll see it, my God.
Speaker 1 (59:06):
Thanks to the lame mass security, I'm going home.
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