Guns and Roses - Paradise City
One of the most excessive rock bands of all time takes a slice of humble pie, as Tom discovers.
Take me down
To the paradise city
Where the grass is green
And the girls are pretty
Oh won't you please take me home
yeah yeah
Axl Rose appears to want to go to one of any number of different eco-cities in the UK (in addition to London which boasts some magnificent parks, may I also say that Cardiff is, while not a paradise city by Axl's judgement (the girls, well...if Valley Girls are what you're into I guess, and I doubt that they quite fix Axl's evidently high standards), nevertheless a fantastic Green city with some amazing park-land and park-life).
Axl feels as though this paradise city is his natural home, which is just a lovely sentiment - however one might argue that his criterion (green grass and some passable girls) would lend to the claim that many, many cities could be described as paradisiacal. Axl would like to go home to, er, hundreds of cities. Maybe that's where all the money for Chinese Democracy went - a property portfolio as opposed to making a great, great album (because that it is not, that it is not).
Just a' urchin livin' under the street
I'm a hard case that's tough to beat
I'm your charity case
So buy me somethin' to eat
I'll pay you at another time
Take it to the end of the line
Axl Rose at the very least is willing to admit that he is naught more than an urchin living under the street. It's easy to forget that those multi-millionaire "urchins" really lead a tough life, barely scraping by with a staff base of 30. He even refers to himself as a charity case (what, insofar as he has a bigger personal budget than the turnover of Barnardos and the NSPCC combined several times?) who requires the efforts and monies of other people in order to gain the nutritional sustenance he needs to get through life.
I suppose there does come a point in fame where money doesn't become an issue because everyone buys everything for you in order to keep you money, as illustrated in my rough diagram below.
NORMAL PEOPLE = POOR > ABOVE NORMAL PEOPLE = AVERAGE LIVING > KINDA FAMOUS = AVERAGE LIVING > FAMOUS = WEALTHY > VERY FAMOUS = SO WEALTHY YOU DON'T NEED TO BUY ANYTHING, EVER
Axl Rose does say that he'll pay them back; however, judging by his recent delivery rate, you may well have a fifteen year wait. Efficient.
Ragz to richez or so they say
Ya gotta-keep pushin'
for the fortune and fame
It's all a gamble
When it's just a game
Ya treat it like a capital crime
Everybody's doin' their time
Now Rose is beginning to admit his vast personal wealth, and in addition to this it appears that he's giving us motivational classes as to how we can ourselves gain some wealth.
I have always pictured Axl Rose as someone who would make an absolutely excellent motivational speaker. With that voice he would be able to rouse certain emotions among an audience that Carl or Michael, your average every-day motivational speaker, just wouldn't be able to get. I could imagine him wearing smart-casual attire, walking down the middle of a group of people in a village hall or hired out women's institute building. He may need to get a haircut and put on some weight in order to complete the look but those are just small aesthetics.
If he fancied a career change from his new role as a motivational speaker it appears as though he could become a gambling therapist; he feels as though it is more than a game and that it IS a capital crime (presumably "ya" means "I") and he feels that he could use the money from helping people recover from their gambling addiction to supplement his lifestyle of motivational speaking which incorporates sex, drugs, rock and indeed roll.
Strapped in the chair of the city's gas chamber
Why I'm here I can't quite remember
The surgeon general says it's hazardous to breathe
I'd have another cigarette but I can't see
Tell me who you're gonna believe
This song has now gone down an entirely different direction as Axl claims that he is going to be stuck in the gas chamber in this paradise city (well, they've got to keep it paradisiacal somehow and in some bizarre Hot Fuzz style plot, getting rid of the hoodie infestation and, you know, those people who dress up as statues and get money for staying perfectly still) - why the city's authorities have chosen to punish him he has no idea, but there's probably something in it (maybe it's the, ya know, being a bit of a twat thing?).
Meanwhile Axl is also suffering from apparently unrelated health problems (I'm pretty sure being executed is going to be a major health problem) but he is going to go a step further and have a cigarette anyway - in all fairness I can't see it making much difference, although I do resent the fact he is even asking whether I would believe him or a trained professional when it comes down to health advice.
Clearly the ridiculously overblown rockstar. Clearly.
So far away
So far away
So far away
So far away
Well Axl is apparently a bit far away from Paradise City now. This is a development and a half, it would appear as though he has escaped (somehow) an almost certain death and he sounds almost remorseful about being forced to leave the city of his dreams; a city certain to become the city of his nightmares. Oh no.
Captain America's been torn apart
Now he's a court jester with a broken heart
He said
Turn me around and take me back to the start
I must be losin' my mind-
"Are you blind?"
I've seen it all a million times
Axl Rose's hero Captain America has been defeated!
This is a sad development, and it turns out that CA is now nothing more than a pathetic comedian getting cheap laughs (Jim Davidson?) - something which Rose claims to have seen happen something like a million times. Rose seems to be taking Jim Davidsons comments seriously, something which the average person may not want to admit to.
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