The two guitarists Slash was terrified to play in front of: “I’ll never forget that”
Artists getting cold feet doesn’t suddenly stop once they become famous. The idea of playing to millions of people every single night isn’t lost on most of the best musicians in the world, and it’s as much of an adrenaline rush for them to nail a part in their twilight years as they did when they killed it in their prime. And while Slash has continued to be one of the most pitch-perfect guitar players in the world, even he had his moments where he could get starstruck in front of his idols.
But looking through Slash’s gig history, you’d swear he never had a bad show in his life. Throughout the ugliest parts of Guns N’ Roses’s career, he would still be found annihilating it on every single night, even if he had to deal with throwing up behind the monitors or having his cigarette drop inside his pants as he played through a solo. Because for him, the guitar wasn’t a job or a hobby; it was a lifestyle.
From the first time he played on Guns N’ Roses’ debut, Slash wanted to make the kind of statement that all his heroes did before him. He worshipped everyone from Eric Clapton to Joe Perry to Jimmy Page, and when all of those influences coalesced in his guitar playing, there was hardly anyone who could ignore a solo as beautiful as ‘November Rain’ or get hyped the minute that the final solo of ‘Paradise City’ started.
He may be one of the most singular guitar heroes in rock history, but he’s far from the first guitarist to have his own voice. Clapton may have had his tone down to a science, but Page was flying off the handle from the minute Led Zeppelin started, always being a little bit sloppy yet somehow finding a way of hitting everything at the right time whenever John Bonham came in with that signature groove.
So when Page came to one of Slash’s shows with Brian May in tow, he was shaken as he tried to make it through one of Velvet Revolver’s sets, saying, “I was doing a show at Hammersmith. So I guess it was 2005 with Velvet Revolver. Jimmy Page and Brian May, who I’ve not met before, showed up at the gig. Talk about just being really uncomfortable. But they’re lovely guys. I was really happy to meet them and also to find that they were so, sort of, human. But I’ll never forget that as being one of the most intimidating shows I ever did.”
While Slash’s guitar playing is far from being the fireworks show that May could pull off with Queen, both of them were great at prchestrating solos half the time. It was never clear with Zeppelin whether Page was going to play the same thing twice whenever he took a solo, but every May solo from ‘Killer Queen’ to ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ is the kind of melody you can be humming afterwards.
And it’s safe to say that Slash has at least a few of his own tricks that are as iconic as his heroes. Most people his age would have considered ‘Whole Lotta Love’ to be the definition of classic rock, but when budding guitarists are asked about the greatest riffs of all time, it’s much easier for them to gravitate towards something like ‘Sweet Child O’ Mine’.
Slash may have been incredibly reverent towards the biggest names in rock and roll when he started, but if you stay true to your craft over time, there comes a point where you reach their level. He might not have wanted to be mentioned in the same conversation as the legends of the genre, but it’s hard to deny that anyone who wrote the guitar part to ‘Welcome to the Jungle’ is anything less than a genius.
