At last in this lifetime

    Fans of Guns N Roses finally had their wish come true on Tuesday when the American hard rock supergroup made their long-overdue Thailand debut at SCG Stadium in Muang Thong Thani, rolling through on their “Not in This Lifetime” tour. It was a heady night for almost 10,000 devotees, treated to the full tour production, a top-notch sound system and a generous share from the repertoire of rock classics spanning the band’s 32-year career.
    Fans both foreign and local had been massing at the stadium since late afternoon, getting around the traffic snarl caused by the closure of the Thai-Belgium Bridge after a fire there earlier in the day.
    The lawn of artificial grass outside the stadium ended up hosting a miniature Guns N Roses festival where the fans, mostly in black T-shirts, hung out and enjoyed the supercharged atmosphere.
    The many who got there early enough were able to snap up official “Guns N Roses Bangkok” tour T-shirts before they sold out.
Inside the hall, at 8.15, the band stormed the stage – the Guns N’ Roses reunion line-up of original members Axl Rose, Slash, Duff McKagan and Dizzy Reed alongside new recruits Richard Fortus on guitar, Frank Ferrer on drums and, newest of all, Melissa Reese on keyboards.
    First track out of the pipeline was “It’s So Easy”, the instantly recognisable hit from their 1987 debut album “Easy Appetite for Destruction” and the crowd was already fully committed.
    Letting the song lyrics do the talking, singer Rose kept on belting out more classics from past to present, delighting fans with “Mr Brownstone”, “Double Talkin’ Jive”, “Estranged”, “Live and Let Die”, “Civil War”, “Coma” and the biggest hit of all, “Sweet Child o’ Mine”, the crowd in ecstasy from the first notes of the circular riff from Slash’s guitar.
    Enhanced with spectacular pyrotechnics and animated visuals on massive LCD screens, the show continued with “Welcome to the Jungle”, “Paradise City” and “November Rain”, for which Rose sat at the piano. A string of other hard rock hits completed what turned out to be a fun, fulfilling and highly energetic two-hour spectacular.
    One of the world’s biggest-selling bands of all time, Guns N Roses were heavily rumoured to be coming to Bangkok way back in 1993 and then again in 2008, but the fans were always left disappointed.
    The current second leg of the “Not in This Lifetime” tour began in January with Bangkok scheduled as the penultimate stop as the band churn through Asia and Oceania, eventually bound for Europe and then homeward to North America.
    Formed in Los Angeles in 1985, Guns N Roses have gone through numerous line-up changes, as well as controversies. Neither has ever slowed their output by much, with six studio albums (“Chinese Democracy” in 2008 was the last), three EPs and a live disc released. Together those records sold somewhere around 100 million copies worldwide.