Guns N' Roses: Use Your Illusion I and II Contributor(s): Weisbard, Eric (Author) |
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ISBN: 0826419240 ISBN-13: 9780826419248 Publisher: Continuum OUR PRICE: $13.46 Product Type: Paperback - Other Formats Published: December 2006 Annotation: Use Your Illusion marked the end of rock as mass culture. In this book, Eric Weisbard shows how the album has matured into a work whose baroque excesses now have something to teach us about pop and the platforms it raises and lowers, about a man who suddenly found himself praised to the firmament for every character trait that had hitherto marked him as an irredeemable loser. |
Additional Information |
BISAC Categories: - Music | Genres & Styles - Rock - Music | History & Criticism - General - Biography & Autobiography | Music |
Dewey: 782.421 |
LCCN: 2006035971 |
Series: 33 1/3 |
Physical Information: 0.28" H x 4.72" W x 6.76" (0.21 lbs) 136 pages |
Descriptions, Reviews, Etc. |
Publisher Description: It was the season of the blockbuster. Between August 12 and November 26 1991, a whole slew of acts released albums that were supposed to sell millions of copies in the run-up to Christmas. Metallica, Michael Jackson, Pearl Jam, Nirvana, Garth Brooks, MC Hammer, and U2 - all were competing for the attention of the record-buying public at the same time. But perhaps the most attention-seeking act of all was Guns N Roses. Their albums Use Your Illusion 1 and 2, released on the same day, were both 75-minute sprawlers with practically the same cover design - an act of colossal arrogance. On one level, it worked. The albums claimed the top two chart positions, and ultimately sold 7 million copies each in the US alone. On another level, it was a disaster. This was an album that Axl Rose has been unable to follow up in fifteen years. It signaled the end of Guns N Roses, of heavy metal on the Sunset Strip, and the entire 1980s model of blockbuster pop/rock promotion. Use Your Illusion marked the end of rock as mass culture. In this book, Eric Weisbard shows how the album has matured into a work whose baroque excesses now have something to teach us about pop and the platforms it raises and lowers, about a man who suddenly found himself praised to the firmament for every character trait that had hitherto marked him as an irredeemable loser. |