Slash

been. Axl was convinced that we should hire Dave Navarro, which I didn’t think was a good idea at all. I think it was a question of style: whoever was going to filly Izzy’s spot needed to play like Izzy, who was a skilled rhythm player that added a unique, subtle texture. Dave Navarro is an amazing guitar player; he’s someone better suited for my spot, not Izzy’s. I don’t think Dave wanted to make the commitment, anyway. Besides, at the time he had a heroin problem and obviously that was a major issue.

Axl had a few long conversations with Dave about joining the band, and he wasn’t going to be discouraged, so finally I surrendered and tried to arrange a rehearsal with Dave. We agreed on a time for him to come down to Mates and then he never showed up. He did that three times.

I called Axl after I’d been stood up that third time. “Man, this guy Dave has issues,” I said. “I am not into this.”

“Okay, okay,” he said. “I’ll talk to him.”

Axl convinced me that Dave was really committed and that he’d show up when I called him again. I did call him again, and as I expected, he didn’t show up again. That was it, I was furious; that was the last that I was willing to entertain the prospect of Dave Navarro.

I had been thinking about the one guitar player that I’d seen who reminded me of Izzy: he was in a band called Candy that had opened up for Hollywood Rose back at Madame Wong’s West before I was ever even in a band with Axl. His name was Gilby Clarke, and as far as I could recall he was the only guy that I knew with an Izzy- like feel, which wasn’t easy to come by.

I got in touch with Gilby and he wanted the gig more than anything. He learned sixty songs in two weeks; he came in for an audition and just nailed it. A couple of weeks later, we rehearsed him with the whole band and we put a set together, and like that, we were back in fighting shape.

It was a strange moment. Izzy’s departure happened so quietly, with no fanfare, and no media awareness. It was such a major change within the band, but to the outside world it was a nonevent. Probably because it was overshadowed by the fact that the records came out right before we got back on the road.

On September 17, 1991, Use Your Illusion II debuted at number one while Use Your Illusion I debuted at number two. We’d broken a record: no other artist of any kind had pulled that off since the Beatles. We were getting all of this major, positive, super news while all of this negative drama was going on simultaneously. By then I’d gotten so used to life being such a rocky road that I dealt with it, and didn’t think twice about the possibility that it might not be normal.

ONCE GILBY WAS IN AND WE WERE back on tour, we added Soundgarden to the bill for the next leg, which began in December 1991 in Worcester, Massachusetts. They were a favorite band of ours and it was cool to have them, but we didn’t have a good rapport with them at all. We had no common vibe with any of the grunge bands, actually, because we were such a big name; we were the Led Zeppelin of the time, so coming from their more underground, indie point of view, they thought of us as “fat, lazy, and self-indulgent.” We’d take them on tour and they wouldn’t talk to us. It was hypocritical because they didn’t really want to be there, but then again, unless I’m mistaken, they didn’t say no to the gig. All things considered, Duff and I got along with Chris Cornell and Kim Thayil really well, and I understood their wanting to steer clear of the circus all around them.

We had a much more antagonistic situation on our hands with our other support band, Faith No More, once their front man, Mike Patton, started talking shit about us onstage. We let it go once, twice, but after that, that was it. We had to have a talk with him. Axl came in with me, as did their guitarist Jim Martin, because Jim was as fed up with Mike as we were.

“Listen, man,” I said. “If you don’t like it here, just fucking leave. It can’t be like this. Either let’s do this thing and make it great, or forget it, go home.”

They ended up finishing the tour and that was the last outburst we heard from Mike during their set.

We did three nights at Madison Square Garden (December 9, 10, 13, 1991), the same arena where Led Zeppelin filmed The Song Remains the Same. One of those nights we met one of Axl’s heroes, Billy Joel. It isn’t obvious until you think about it, but Axl loves all of the great songwriters: the Eagles, Elton John, Billy Joel—he knows his shit. I didn’t know anything about Billy Joel aside from the fact that my best friend’s mom played his breakout album, The Stranger, nonstop back in 1978. But it was great to meet Billy that night because he’s such an icon and also because he was very, very drunk—I had no idea that he was such a fuckup, and I loved it. Duff and I could certainly relate to him, and Axl was really fucking happy. Billy was led into the dressing room, where we had all of our booze, and he rummaged around the bar area, making all this noise.

“Where’s the Johnnie Walker Black Label?” he said, out loud, as much to himself as to us. “There’s no Johnnie Walker Black.” Needless to say, we sent someone out and they came back with a bottle for Billy in no time.

FEBRUARY 1, 1992, WAS OUR LAST SHOW with Soundgarden, at Compton Terrace, Arizona, and we decided to commemorate it with a little prank. We got ourselves a few inflatable sex dolls and Matt and Duff and I took our clothes off and went onstage with them. Come to think of it, I was the only one of us completely naked. In any case, Soundgarden was touring the Badmotorfinger album, and they came from a place where there was no fun to be had while rocking, so they were mortified. They looked around and there we were screwing blowup dolls all around them; I was drunk and I fell. I got separated from my doll, and at that point I was totally naked—it was a scene.

^{Slash the prankster, naked, embracing a blowup doll during Soundgarden’s show.}

WE PLAYED THREE SHOWS AT THE TOKYO Dome in Japan (February 19, 20, 22, 1992), which was something; in fact, I played five shows in a row in the Tokyo Dome—two with Michael Jackson and three with Guns N’ Roses. I experienced the biggest contrast you can imagine between those two audiences; I can’t think of a more surreal switch than playing one night for Michael Jackson, who was flying around the stage and had kids and toys backstage, to playing with Guns and everything that came with that world two nights later—all in the very same building. To top it off, I spent the day I had off between the two shows at Tokyo Disney.

I flew over early to play with Michael; I had recorded with him back in L.A. between the time that we finished the Illusion records and their release. It was while we were home between legs of the tour. I was staying at the Hyatt on Sunset at the time when I got the call from our office.

“Hey, Slasher, Michael Jackson is trying to get in touch with you,” Alan said. “He wants you on his record.”

“Oh, wow,” I said. “Okay.”

The next call that came through was Michael.

“Hello?” I said.

“Hello? Slash?” he said in his typically nervous, timid voice.

Off we went from there. I was flattered and I was intimidated, but it came off great. We did two songs: the first one, the cooler one, was called “Give in to Me,” which was kind of like a new take on his song “Dirty Diana.” When I went in to record it at the Record Plant Michael was there with Brooke Shields, who he was dating at the time. It was trippy: the studio was as dimly lit and as dark as Guns liked to have it when we recorded.

“Hi,” Michael said. “This is Brooke.”

“Hi, nice to meet you,” I said. I think I put my hand out for a shake.

“I really want to thank you so much for being on my album,” he said. “I really can’t wait to hear what you come up with.”

And then they split—they went off to dinner or something. I recorded my solo and that was it. A few days later I came back and recorded the introduction to “Black and White.” They wanted something on the front end, which didn’t even make it into the album version of the song. You can hear my part if you watch the video: it’s what Macaulay Culkin is playing on guitar before the song starts. That was strange; to say the least, it wasn’t quite what I had in mind for that solo.

I think Michael Jackson liked me because of the animated element of my persona. I think he saw me as a caricature. But that’s just me. I still don’t know if he knows that about me.

I could feel it in my loins that she was having a look.