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Velvet Revolver is everything
the band's name suggests and much more.
This is modern rock with a sense of danger
and beauty that's been missing for far too
long. Their suitably explosive yet gorgeous
debut effort, "Contraband", marks
the spot for a new beginning from a band
of rock & roll brothers united by some
legendary pasts and a suddenly brighter
future.
"We're all looking
for a rebirth here," explains the group's
lead singer Scott Weiland. "We're looking
to get back that same feeling we had when
we all first started making music —
the sense of doing it for the pure joy of
making music. Along the way the whole idea
that got us into this had been raped and
sodomized. We were all in mourning of that
and wondering if we could somehow get it
back. As it turns out, the only way we could
get it all back was to start it all new.
Now we have that opportunity and it's fucking
amazing. This music is just vicious, very
aggressive and it forces you to lace your
boots up and sort of get ready for the fight."
The idea behind Velvet
Revolver remains a powerfully simple one.
"There is no real concept to me,"
explains guitarist Slash. "We set out
to make music we enjoy and can feel proud
of playing — music that people we like
will want to listen to. As soon as you start
thinking beyond that — about wanting
to keep up with the Joneses or about fitting
in with somebody else's format — that's
when you lose the map. So we've just done
what we do, and tried to have a cool time
doing it."
Everything you've heard
about Velvet Revolver is true. This is the
band that brings together three former members
of one of rock's greatest groups Guns N'
Roses — Slash, bassist Duff McKagan
and drummer Matt Sorum — together with
one of rock's most charismatic frontmen
Scott Weiland, formerly of Stone Temple
Pilots, and guitarist Dave Kushner, ex-Wasted
Youth, Electric Love Hogs and Dave Navarro's
[Jane's Addiction] band, among others.
While Velvet Revolver inevitably
offers a few echoes of its members' illustrious
pasts, their sound is defiantly forward-looking
and truly fresh in all senses of that word.
"Our music is very aggressive,"
says Duff. "There's always that 'Fuck
you' element to it. Really that's all we
know how to do. We can't play nice or play
radio. Slash, Matt and I were always that
way in Guns N' Roses, and Scott and Dave
are very like-minded. To me, this is the
first dangerous band that's come around
in a while — truly dangerous. People
are going to say, 'Oh a supergroup. These
guys have everything.' And I can understand
that, but we're not coming at this that
way. We really hope to bring some chaos
back into the whole world of rock."
"This is the real
deal," says Matt Sorum. "This
is all of us firing on all cylinders."
Slash, McKagan and Sorum
came together to play a benefit/tribute
for their friend and fellow musician Randy
Castillo in 2002. The buzz of playing together
again got the three thinking. "There
was still something very powerful and intense
between us," says Slash.
"That chemistry never
went away," says McKagan.
Sensing enough time had
lapsed since their less-than-pleasant departures
from Guns N' Roses, the trio linked with
Kushner — a high school friend of Slash's
who had been playing with Duff in recent
years. "He's our secret weapon,"
says Duff. "He plays amazing textures
and he can handle himself with Slash."
After some false starts with other musicians,
the four decided to try an unusually open
call for a new frontperson.
Documented by VH1 cameras
for an upcoming special, this process turned
out to be long and sometimes painful. "We
heard so many different singers, and every
singer lent itself to a different vibe,"
Sorum recalls. Unfortunately, the vibes
were usually not too good. "As soon
as we heard the vocals that people were
sending in, we knew we were in trouble,"
Sorum remembers. "And we knew we just
couldn't put out some shabby rock tribute.
It had to be something special."
"There were so many
fucking variations on the theme," recalls
Slash. "And all of them wrong."
As Dave Kushner remembers,
"The experience really was brutal.
There was nothing fun about it except for
the fact that I got to go and play with
these guys five days a week. It was just
really disheartening and frustrating at
times. But in the end because of all the
time we spent looking, we went a lot of
different places musically. It seemed like
we were killing time, but we were really
building the foundation."
Fortunately, as the Great
Lead Singer search was going on, Duff was
spending time socially with Weiland, then
still with Stone Temple Pilots.
"I was sort of at
the end of my rope, mentally and emotionally
with STP at the time, though we've actually
sort of made up since our last explosion,"
Weiland explains. "Duff told me he'd
gotten together with Slash and Matt and
that Dave Kushner was also playing. Now
I've known Dave for years since he was in
Electric Love Hogs who I use to play on
bills with when STP was known as Might Joe
Young. And I was a huge Guns N' Roses fan.
'Appetite For Destruction' had the same
impact on me as 'Never Mind The Bollocks'
by the Sex Pistols, Nirvana's 'Nevermind'
and Jane's Addiction's 'Nothing's Shocking'.
'Appetite…' was one of those records
that made me believe, that became my bible
and taught me everything."
For Weiland, the idea of
joining forces with this foursome proved
enticing. Then when Slash dropped off a
CD of some of the music the guys had been
recording, Weiland was impressed. "There
were like fifteen songs out of the sixty
that I could really wrap my head around,"
Scott recalls. "I thought if we went
in that direction, we could turn into a
five-headed beast which would be completely
lethal and indestructible."
With Weiland, the project
became a living, breathing band. "This
guy has lived," says Matt. "Because
of where we've been as musicians —
and the kind of frontman we were next to
for all those years — it is pretty
tough for any guy to step up immediately
and be able to stand next to a guy like
Slash or Duff. Those guys are rock stars
in their own right. To front this band,
we needed someone who was above and beyond,
and we got one."
"I was beginning to
think there were no more great rock frontman,"
says McKagan.
Quickly the five got down
to work. "We recorded the song for
'The Hulk' ('Set Me Free'), but the only
way to really see if you can be a band is
to do a gig," says Scott. "So
we did a gig at the El Rey [in Los Angeles]
in June and that answered every question.
It was worth more than any time in the studio
or hanging out. This was undeniable and
the most sonically violent thing I've ever
been a part of. Singing 'It's So Easy' [from
'Appetite For Destruction'] with those guys
at the El Rey was fuckin' amazing. When
I wrote 'Sex Type Thing' [from STP's debut
album], it was sort of inspired by that
low vocal of 'It's So Easy'."
For Slash, "We were
like a bunch of kids who just learned how
to play the same chord together. That's
what it's been like every time we've done
something together. We're thrilled, like
'Hey, we wrote a song!' 'Hey, we played
a gig!' Maybe that's why this has worked
— because we're actually the opposite
of jaded."
Yet for all the good will,
launching Velvet Revolver hasn't always
been easy, especially with the group's frontman
publicly going through some personal turmoil
of late. "This has been a pretty rough
year for me," Scott admits. "The
whole divorce thing really pulled me through
a keyhole emotionally so I fell backwards
on a narcotic slide and had to pay the price.
But these guys were there to catch my fall.
This has been like a gang. And it helps
that they've all been through it themselves
a million times so there's no judgment there.
They've all kicked dope so it's not like
I'm the lone junkie in the band or I'm the
only one who knows what it's like to kick
a three-gram-a-day heroin habit. Through
all the difficulties I've been through,
they've all been there. That's more than
I could ever ask for — more than I've
ever experienced before."
"We went through a
lot of stuff with Scott," Duff explains.
"We got him to come up to the mountains,
to Washington State, and he was learning
martial arts and learning how to live a
different way. Whatever happens, he has
some more tools that he didn't have before."
"I feel like Scott
is still struggling in certain areas, but
that this is all meant to be," says
Matt. "Down the line our hopes are
that with this strong a positive influence
— and his knowing where we've all been
with the rock and roll indulgence —
we will pull through this together."
Early in its evolution,
the group released the song "Set Me
Free" on "The Hulk" soundtrack
and recorded a cover of Pink Floyd's "Money"
for another movie, "The Italian Job".
When it came time to sign a deal and record
their first album, the band chose RCA in
part because of the interest of Chairman
Clive Davis. "Clive actually flew out
here and courted us, and he watched us rehearse
along with his little posse," Slash
remembers. "It was really flattering
because he's such an icon and he's been
doing it for so long and can really recognize
something."
That decision made, it
was time for Velvet Revolver to take aim
and make their first album.
"Contraband"
is a rock & roll song cycle with an
eclectic streak and a sonic nerviness. It's
a rock-hard headphones classic for a new
generation, reflecting the players' influences
from The Beatles to The Refused, and for
obvious reasons a little Guns N' Roses and
Stone Temple Pilots too.
After sampling a number
of producers, Velvet Revolver opted to go
with Josh Abraham to co-produce the album
with them. "Josh was very much for
us a fresh face," says Matt. "We
went out and we tried other producers and
we tried the best of the old school, but
we needed to go in a different direction.
We needed a young, fresh collaborator with
a modern element — whatever the fuck
that is. We wanted to compete and we wanted
to be represented now."
"Who you work with
is important, and Josh and the people we
worked with on this album made things feel
effortless," says Slash. "They
made it feel like us."
"If we sounded slick,
we're going to be some over-thirtysomething,
over-produced super rock band," says
Duff. "But this is just a rock band
and the album had to growl just like we
do when we play together live."
The music came into sharp
focus when Weiland added his deeply felt,
deeply personal lyrics to the mix. "In
a nutshell, this whole album for me is pretty
much about the poisonous, toxic relationship
that I had been in and the catastrophic
effects my break-up and subsequent divorce
has had on me," Scott explains. "It's
complete honesty so if people relate, great.
If not, they can fuck themselves. Each song
is about where I was at in the situation
at that given day. As you can tell, some
days I was dealing with it better than others.
This is the most effort I've ever put into
anything. I put as much effort into the
first STP album, but now I know so much
more."
With "Contraband"
completed in the waning days of 2003, Velvet
Revolver now looks forward to the album's
spring 2004 release and hitting the road
hard. "We can't wait," says Slash.
"I'm just looking forward to fulfilling
a touring thing that I never got to really
finish with Guns N' Roses. That's what I
love, but we never got to do a lot of things
for reasons that still don't make sense
to me. I just want to play."
"We'll go down in
the gutter and play dirtbag clubs and we'll
play big fucking stadiums," says Matt.
"We don't give a fuck. And that's the
way we've always been. We're not precious."
But ultimately, Velvet
Revolver isn't about firing at the past.
It's about what these five men can do together
in the future. "You know all the possibilities
are there," says Slash. "And we
don't want to miss them this time."
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