{"id":213902,"date":"2025-06-25T19:13:14","date_gmt":"2025-06-25T19:13:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/213902\/"},"modified":"2025-06-25T19:13:14","modified_gmt":"2025-06-25T19:13:14","slug":"i-watched-guns-n-roses-deliver-a-rock-masterclass-at-villa-park-and-axl-rose-really-surprised-me-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/213902\/","title":{"rendered":"I watched Guns N’ Roses deliver a rock masterclass at Villa Park and Axl Rose really surprised me"},"content":{"rendered":"

Lifelong Guns N’ Roses fan Steve Wollaston takes his teenage daughter to watch the band in action – hoping to find them on the top of their game<\/p>\n

05:20, 24 Jun 2025Updated 10:25, 25 Jun 2025<\/p>\n

\"Steve<\/p>\n

Steve is the Head of Sport for Reach PLC in the Midlands. He has been with the company for 25 years, spending most of his time in Birmingham. He now oversees sports coverage for our titles in the West and East Midlands. This covers teams like Aston Villa, Birmingham City West Brom, Wolves, Derby County, Stoke City,Nottingham Forest, Leicester City,Coventry City<\/p>\n

\"AxlAxl Rose and Slash of Guns N’ Roses<\/p>\n

Way back in 1988 at the tender age of 12-years-old, I heard a noise that changed my life forever.<\/p>\n

The hell-raising, high-pitched sound of Axl Rose – lead singer of the ‘Most Dangerous Band In The World’, Guns N’Roses.<\/p>\n

Appetite For Destruction was the album that reinvented rock and roll music and lit a fire inside me and shaped a music obsession that has stuck with me throughout my life.<\/p>\n

At Villa Park for the first of the football club\u2019s series of summer live shows, this 49-year-old ‘G’N’R’ fan was back to see the Hollywood rockers in action on British soil, and it was something to behold.<\/p>\n

At the tender age of 63, Axl Rose somehow manages to get through an incredible 30 songs over the course of a blistering three hour set.<\/p>\n

I will admit to being slightly nervous about the vocal display because after watching many YouTube videos over the years, I’d seen some examples of Axl struggling to hit some of the treacherous high notes.<\/p>\n

That was not evident in Birmingham this evening with a vocal display that rolled back the years and actually peaked on the penultimate track of the evening, Nightrain.<\/p>\n

You could have closed your eyes and been back in the early 90s as that trademark voice shredded the night sky.<\/p>\n

Live and in person, it was way better than I expected, Axl of course has learned to be clever with his voice and sometimes switches to a lower register as he builds back up to the bigger moments in songs.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a powerful and impressive performance from him and he looks in great shape, lean, healthy and happy in his favourite environment.<\/p>\n

There are the odd moments where his voice dips, but that\u2019s fine. Who really expects a guy of his age to be hurling out the hits with the power he used to for three hours?<\/p>\n

\"GunsGuns N’ Roses at Villa Park<\/p>\n

Villa Park genuinely doesn’t care that this isn’t the 80s or the 90s, they are treated to a barnstorming, stomping rock show that covers all eras of the band’s back catalogue.<\/p>\n

Musically, Guns and Roses are a force of nature, from the menacing bass lines of Duff McKagan to the wizardry and awe-inspiring guitar skills of Stoke On Trent raised, Saul Hudson, aka Slash.<\/p>\n

Complete with trademark top hat and a mop of black curls over his face, Slash as ever looks every inch the rock icon.<\/p>\n

The band have been back together for a decade now after a bitter and acrimonious break up that lasted the best part of two decades. That’s firmly behind them now and the real joy for fans like myself is just to see them enjoying being united, sharing the songs they created together.<\/p>\n

They are backed by a new drummer in Isaac Carpenter, guitarist Richard Fortus, and Dizzy Reed, and Melissa Reese who provide piano, keyboards, percussion and backing vocals.<\/p>\n

The band’s sound back in the day emerged from their sleazy, debauched lifestyle, spending every minute living the rock and roll life as hard and fast as they could.<\/p>\n

They were the punk rock band that ended the glam rock movement and signalled to everyone that the 80s were well and truly over.<\/p>\n

World tours and chart domination happened but just as the band seemingly had everything, they became the ultimate example of excess. Slowly but surely they self imploded due to drink and drugs problems, and they had a lead singer who couldn’t keep out of the headlines, or even manage to find the stage on time.<\/p>\n

That controversy isn’t there anymore. Replaced with professionalism, clean living, and family life.<\/p>\n

The music though, wow, tonight it tears through the stadium like a hot knife through butter. It’s the same dark, dangerous, uplifting, and anthemic music it always was, just with added polish from years of perfecting the trade and adding layers to the live show.<\/p>\n

The hits come thick and fast from the seminal opening track of Welcome To The Jungle, to the beautiful ballad of November Rain<\/p>\n

There are deep cuts like Catcher In The Rye and Reckless life and some brilliant covers like Wichita Lineman and Live And Let Die.<\/p>\n

Musically it is as good as it gets, and it\u2019s great that the voice is back with a bang and still making these songs sound so sharp.<\/p>\n

They deserve to be doing what they are doing for a while to come. This isn\u2019t just a greatest hits tour though, sure they play eight songs from Appetite For Destruction, and eight from the Use Your Illusion albums, but they also play a trio of newer songs recorded in the last couple of years.<\/p>\n

\"SteveSteve Wollaston and daughter Lily enjoying Guns N’ Roses at Villa Park<\/p>\n

The heaving crowd in Birmingham loved every minute of it, and there were a lot of minutes. I enjoyed taking my teenage daughter to the concert, she enjoyed it so much more than I had hoped she would, and it was a nice moment for me to share the band that has meant so much to me throughout my adult life.<\/p>\n

She was impressed that the stadium wasn\u2019t awash with mobile phones, people choosing to just record the odd bit, but largely keeping them in their pocket and watching the performance.<\/p>\n

Just like it used to be back in the day. Of course, when the iconic riff chords of Sweet Child O\u2019Mine landed, everyone reached for their phone, even me.<\/p>\n

I’ve seen the band and all of the different line-ups a handful of times since the early 90s – but it felt special seeing them here at Villa Park. I left feeling like I’d seen some magical again, I’m not sure I had expected that, which made it even more perfect.<\/p>\n

This was a rock and roll masterclass for the ages, and a gig that sets the tone perfectly for Ozzy and pals On July 5th.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Lifelong Guns N’ Roses fan Steve Wollaston takes his teenage daughter to watch the band in action –…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":213903,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7820],"tags":[422,855,748,393,4884,83862,16,15,18874],"class_list":{"0":"post-213902","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-birmingham","8":"tag-aston-villa-fc","9":"tag-birmingham","10":"tag-britain","11":"tag-england","12":"tag-great-britain","13":"tag-midlands-gig-reviews","14":"tag-uk","15":"tag-united-kingdom","16":"tag-villa-park-stadium"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114745600164372898","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/213902","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=213902"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/213902\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/213903"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=213902"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=213902"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=213902"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}