SLASH: Why I Don’t Read Rock And Roll Books
Legendary GUNS N’ ROSES and VELVET REVOLVER guitarist Slash, who released his self-titled memoir, “Slash”, in 2007, was asked in a new interview with Barbara Caserta of Italy’s Linea Rock if there are any other rock autobiographies that he is particula…
Legendary GUNS N' ROSES and VELVET REVOLVER guitarist Slash, who released his self-titled memoir, "Slash", in 2007, was asked in a new interview with Barbara Caserta of Italy's Linea Rock if there are any other rock autobiographies that he is particularly fond of. He responded (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET): "To tell you the truth, I don't read rock and roll books. I've read a book about national artists and I've read books about rock and roll, but I've never read anybody else's… Well, I read the Jim Morrison one, and I read the most recent Joe Perry one, but for the most part, I stay away from autobiographies. A lot of it is because I know people — I know the people that wrote them — and it feels like spying on them. [Laughs] It's like following people on their Instagram; if you know them, it feels like spying. But I also used to think that rock and roll books were 75 percent bullshit too, and I didn't want to get into… 'Cause autobiographies are largely written by other people, or biographies are totally written by other people, so it's their own fantasy that they're sort of building up in these books. That sort of inspired me to write my book myself and not rely too much on a ghost writer — to be as honest as possible. So they inspired me in that way."
Back in 2008, Slash told the Los Angeles Times about the process of writing his own book: "It was a different experience. I was resigned to writing the book due to the fact that some guy came out with an unauthorized Slash book. So, I just decided to do my own book, because doing an interview or press release to offset any of this stuff didn't work. The guy who I wrote the book with [Anthony Bozza] had such a genuine zeal for my whole story. Not just the cliché stuff. It was a real collaboration between us. I wrote entire chapters of the book on my Blackberry… sending it to my co-writer. But you know, it was worth it, because finally after all my input, it turned out good."
Shortly before the book's release, Slash told E! Online that it would include a bunch of stuff about his years with GUNS 'N' ROSES, but not necessarily because he was feeling nostalgic on the occasion of what was at the time the 20th anniversary of "Appetite For Destruction".
"I never wanted to write a book, because it would be too final," Slash explained. "The only reason I wrote it is because a lot of the stuff I was reading and seeing about the band got pretty frustrating. I just had to straighten out some shit."
"It almost reads like a journal, except for the fact that I never wrote anything down," Slash said. "It was a hard book to make, because I was pretty fucked up from 1980 to 2000-something. I really had to dig deep to try and remember a lot of shit."
Bozza told BostonNow.com that the greatest thing for him as a writer working on Slash's book was that the iconic axeman "never really gave it up in the press. He didn't talk about the stuff that went on behind the scenes with himself or with the band," Anthony said. "To be honest, I don't think he ever really cared about that kind of stuff."
Getting the soft-spoken musician to open up for the book wasn't easy, Bozza admitted. Part of the problem was that when they first met, Slash was heavily into his oxycontin phase, "binging" on the synthetic heroin on a daily basis, according to Bozza. "So when he agreed to write the book, I wasn't sure it would really happen," he said. "But right after we met, he went into rehab and was sober — or not on oxycontin, when we did the interviews."
SLASH FEATURING MYLES KENNEDY AND THE CONSPIRATORS' new album, titled "4", will be released on February 11 via Gibson Records in partnership with BMG. "4" is Slash's fifth solo album and fourth overall with his band featuring Myles Kennedy (vocals), Brent Fitz (drums), Todd Kerns (bass, vocals) and Frank Sidoris (guitar, vocals).