"Rocket Queen" | |
---|---|
Song by Guns N' Roses | |
from the album Appetite for Destruction | |
Released | July 21, 1987 |
Recorded | 1987 |
Genre | Hard rock |
Length | 6:13 |
Label | Geffen |
Songwriter(s) | |
Producer(s) | Mike Clink |
"Rocket Queen" is a song by American rock band Guns N' Roses, featured on their debut studio album, Appetite for Destruction (1987). The song is notable for incorporating moans from a woman, Adriana Smith, who was recorded having sexual intercourse with the band's singer, Axl Rose.
Slash stated in his autobiography that he and Duff McKagan wrote the main riff to "Rocket Queen" when they first got together in the short-lived band Road Crew with Steven Adler, prior to Slash and Adler joining Hollywood Rose. [1]
According to frontman Axl Rose:
I wrote this song for this girl who was gonna have a band and she was gonna call it Rocket Queen. She kinda kept me alive for a while. The last part of the song is my message to this person, or anybody else who can get something out of it. It's like there's hope and a friendship note at the end of the song. For that song there was also something I tried to work out with various people—a recorded sex act. It was somewhat spontaneous but premeditated; something I wanted to put on the record. [2]
A credit in the booklet for Appetite for Destruction reads "Barbi (Rocket Queen) Von Greif", implying that she was "this girl" Rose mentions in the quote. Slash states that, while Von Grief was only 18 at the time, she had a notorious reputation and was "a queen of the underground scene back then. She'd eventually become a madam, but Axl was infatuated with her at the time." [3] She was also mentioned in the acknowledgments section of L.A. Guns' self-titled debut album. [4]
In an October 1991 interview in Guitar Player magazine, John Frusciante of the Red Hot Chili Peppers said Axl Rose told the Chili Peppers that Guns N' Roses had the Chili Peppers in mind when they recorded "Rocket Queen". [5]
A woman named Adriana Smith, Guns N' Roses groupie and stripper at the time, had been with drummer Steven Adler for around a year. [6] Smith later claimed in a TV interview that, after Adler insisted that she was not his girlfriend, she went to the mixing sessions at Mediasound Studios in New York City. Rose and Slash were there. Rose propositioned Smith that they have sex in a vocal booth so that the sounds that Smith made could be recorded and put over the bridge of the song. Smith replied that she would do it, "For the band, and a bottle of Jack Daniel's". [7]
Steve Thompson, an engineer of the album, said:
Axl wanted some pornographic sounds on "Rocket Queen", so he brought a girl in and they had sex in the studio. We wound up recording about 30 minutes of sex noises. If you listen to the break on "Rocket Queen" it's in there. [8]
Another engineer, Michael Barbiero, did not want to record the sex session, so he set up the microphones and left the task to his assistant, Vic Deyglio. [8] Deyglio said the studio was "like a Ron Jeremy set", and he even had to enter the booth to adjust a microphone which Rose and Smith had crashed into. [9] The Appetite for Destruction liner notes jokingly acknowledge Deyglio's contribution by crediting him as "Victor 'the fucking engineer' Deglio". [8]
It was later stated in the music magazine Classic Rock , as well as Rolling Stone , that the person who had been recorded performing sex noises on the song was indeed Adriana Smith, an on-off girlfriend of Adler. She also allegedly had an intimate relationship with frontman Rose. [9] [10] Smith revealed in an interview that Adler "freaked out" when he found out about the recorded sex session, and she spent some years using alcohol and drugs "because I had this extreme shame and guilt and stuff." [9]
Smith also later said in The Girls Behind Guns N' Roses:
Somehow I became the Rocket Queen. And I have never, I have never, said, "I'm the Rocket Queen." It's just not me. The real Rocket Queen is Barbi. [11]
However, further revelations could indicate that Smith and Rose have not been the only people recorded for the song. Mike Clink, longtime producer of the band, said: "The guys were taking turns fucking this girl in the studio. Those are actual sounds of sex, captured live on tape." Furthermore, a former Geffen employee claimed that Rose had sex several times with two or three girls on tape, unhappy with the results. [12]
The song contains two separate, distinct phases joined by a bridge. The first of these is in a format of verse, chorus, verse, chorus and is accompanied by lyrical bravado.[ clarification needed ] There is also an instrumental section in the latter part of the first phase during which the sexual recording is also played.[ citation needed ]
The second phase of the song has no chorus and contains lyrics of affection and love in contrast to the bravado of the lyrics in the first phase of the song. [13] The lyrics continue into the coda before the climax of the song (the conclusion of the song is not a fade out).
"Rocket Queen" is widely regarded as one of the band's best songs.[ citation needed ] In 2017, Paste ranked the song number four on their list of the 15 greatest Guns N' Roses songs, [14] and in 2020, Kerrang ranked the song number three on their list of the 20 greatest Guns N' Roses songs. [15]
Saul Hudson, known professionally as Slash, is a British-American musician, known as the lead guitarist of the hard rock band Guns N' Roses, with whom he achieved worldwide success in the late 1980s and mid 1990s. Slash has received critical acclaim and is considered one of the greatest guitarists in history.
W. Axl Rose is an American singer and songwriter. He is the lead vocalist and lyricist of the hard rock band Guns N' Roses, and has been the band's sole constant member since its inception in 1985. Possessing a distinctive and powerful wide-ranging voice, Rose has been named one of the greatest singers of all time by various media outlets, including Rolling Stone, NME and Billboard.
Appetite for Destruction is the debut studio album by American hard rock band Guns N' Roses, released on July 21, 1987, by Geffen Records. It initially received little mainstream attention, and it was not until the following year that Appetite for Destruction became a commercial success, after the band had toured and received significant airplay with the singles "Welcome to the Jungle", "Paradise City", and "Sweet Child o' Mine". The album went on to peak at number one on the US Billboard 200, and it became the seventh best-selling album of all time in the United States, as well as the best-selling debut album in the country. With over 30 million copies sold worldwide, it is also one of the best-selling albums worldwide.
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Michael Andrew "Duff" McKagan is an American musician. He was the bassist of hard rock band Guns N' Roses for twelve years, with whom he achieved worldwide success in the late 1980s and early 1990s. McKagan rejoined the band in 2016, following their induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
The Use Your Illusion Tour was a concert tour by American rock band Guns N' Roses which ran from January 20, 1991, to July 17, 1993. It was not only the band's longest tour, but one of the longest concert tours in rock history, consisting of 192 shows in 27 countries. It was also a source of much infamy for the band, due to riots, late starts, cancellations and outspoken rantings by Axl Rose.
Steven Adler is an American musician. He was the drummer and co-songwriter of the hard rock band Guns N' Roses, with whom he achieved worldwide success in the late 1980s.
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Guns N' Roses is an American hard rock band from Los Angeles, California, formed in March 1985 when local bands Hollywood Rose and L.A. Guns merged. When they signed to Geffen Records in 1986, the band's "classic lineup" consisted of vocalist Axl Rose, lead guitarist Slash, rhythm guitarist Izzy Stradlin, bassist Duff McKagan, and drummer Steven Adler. The current lineup consists of Rose, Slash, McKagan, guitarist Richard Fortus, drummer Frank Ferrer and keyboardists Dizzy Reed and Melissa Reese.
Road Crew was an American garage band from Los Angeles, formed in late 1983. The band consisted of future Guns N' Roses members Slash, Steven Adler and Duff McKagan. They auditioned a number of singers while writing material. However they disbanded the same year with no releases.
"Nightrain" is a song by American rock band Guns N' Roses. The song is a tribute to an infamous brand of cheap Californian fortified wine, Night Train Express, which was extremely popular with the band during their early days because of its low price and high alcohol content. The title is spelled differently, omitting a T and removing the space, making a portmanteau of the two words.
"It's So Easy" is a song by the American rock band Guns N' Roses, appearing on their 1987 debut studio album, Appetite for Destruction. The song was released as the band's first single on June 8, 1987, in the UK, where it reached number 84 on the UK Singles Chart as a double A-Side with "Mr. Brownstone". It was also released as a maxi-single in Germany later in the same year.
"Civil War" is a song by American rock band Guns N' Roses that originally appeared on the 1990 compilation Nobody's Child: Romanian Angel Appeal and later on the band's 1991 album Use Your Illusion II. It is a protest song on war, referring to all war as "civil war" and stating that war only "feeds the rich while it buries the poor". In the song, lead singer Axl Rose asks, "What's so civil about war, anyway?"
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