The moment Slash was told he had six weeks to live and how David Bowie saved him
When dreaming up the archetypal rocker, it is difficult not to imagine Slash.
Wielding his guitar like a swinging axe in the Middle Ages, the vision of the Guns N’ Roses man, hair draped over his face, poking out from underneath a top hat as the shirtless Slash absolutely shreds a guitar solo, is an image burned into the annals of history.
For a while, Slash wasn’t just one of the most revered guitarists in the world, he embodied the triumvirate of what many people believed fuelled the music scene: sex, drugs and rock ‘n’ roll. But there are always lows to accompany the highs.
Although rock ‘n’ roll has been more or less romanticised or glorified at the hands of cultural nostalgic tropes, there’s a very bleak reality we would all do well to remember once in a while. Great music aside, many rock ‘n’ roll figures have become subjected to the perils of fame and fortune, often surfing the waves one day to another with a little help from well-known demons, also known as drugs and alcohol. Unfortunately, Slash is one of the more familiar musicians with the concept.
Slash has never exactly been elusive about the subject, but even if he were, it would be entirely redundant, considering the guitarist was part of one of the most humble beginnings to superstardom stories in the history of music. Like many musicians, Slash jumped head-first into the lifestyle without thinking much of it—the whole cycle was as commonplace as breathing, and it just made sense.
From the moment he woke up, he would head down to the bar and start again, drinking vodka until the build-up to a live show warranted something a little more fancy, like cocktails. The energy and hype surrounding standing in front of a vast live audience were almost inseparable from the high generated by the substance. Despite the cause for celebration, it’s rock bottom before it even registers, a fact Slash almost realised much too late.
During an interview with Piers Morgan in 2012, Slash reflected on this dark period and how a wake-up call from the doctor urged him to reassess his entire lifestyle. “I’d drink those big jugs of vodka with a dash of cranberry. I’d do at least half a gallon, then cocktails before the show, then shots of Jack Daniel’s afterwards until 4-5am,” he said, “Then we’d do it all over again the next day. And I kept doing that until 2001 when I was told I had six weeks to live.”
That level of partying is unstoppable. To try and cope with the level of damage you are doing to your body on such a regular occasion is a battle you will never win alone. And, sadly, most people try and fail to do so, losing their lives in the process.
Lamenting the moments it would become the hardest, he stated he “basically carried on the rock’n’roll lifestyle,” which would be harder after touring because of the fast-paced environment. “Once it stopped,” however, the musician didn’t know how to do anything else except keep going. Or, as he put it, “I didn’t know what the hell to do and I descended into drugs oblivion.”
The musician was diagnosed with cardiomyopathy caused by long-term drinking and drug usage when the doctor said he only had weeks to live. Thankfully, however, following successful cardioverter-defibrillator surgery in 2005, Slash declared his decision to quit drugs and alcohol – a pledge he’s managed to uphold ever since. Notes of doubt began to seep in long before his GP visit, though, as another hard-hitting moment occurred when he opened up to David Bowie about his usage years prior.
Interestingly, Bowie provided little more than someone to talk to, that was until Slash started opening up about his hallucinations. “I talked to [Bowie] about [the hallucinations] because it was disturbing,” he told Kerrang. “He’d said, ‘No, you’re probably in a bad place right now, and you have become vulnerable to a lot of outside interaction with things that people don’t normally see, and you’ve exposed yourself to this.’ And I was like, ‘Woah! That’s heavy…’ But that was a sound piece of advice. Or maybe an eye-opening clarification of the state of mind I was in.”
Bowie wasn;t just an icon who had struggled and overcome his own addiction issues, but also a longtime friend of Slash. Bowie knew the guitarist’s mother and would be a part of the Guns N’ Roses story, for better or worse, for many years. It meant he wasn’t just an experienced user but a genuine friend.
Though Bowie’s advice undoubtedly piqued his interest and urged him to step back and reconsider some of his choices, however briefly, learning about his condition provided the turning point needed for him to ditch the lifestyle for a better, healthier one completely. Drugs and alcohol might be two words that immediately follow the concept of rock ‘n’ roll, embellished by those who have yet to experience the darkness that comes with it. Thankfully, however, Slash emerged from the other side with his talent and ego still intact.
