Guns'N'Roses: Chinese Democracy

A brilliant, swashbuckling, confused and uncompromising hard rock album. You could say the record sounds pretty much like those Guns N' Roses you remember from the past, with that sound now compressed into one explosive record: super-hard guitars, orchestral interludes, electronic hip-hop elements, metal choruses, and Axl Rose's unmistakable voice, which still sounds pretty damn lively. Even if Rose should have been in doubt at some point about how much time (13 years), money (14 studios are listed in the booklet) and personnel "Chinese Democracy" has cost him - after all, apart from him no founding member is there anymore - nothing of that can be heard in these 14 songs. Most of the new tracks are characterized by an extreme richness and variety, as if Rose had always tried new choruses or transitions, only to come to the following realization: "Fuck it, they're all cool."