There are plenty of emo bands that have singers with unique voices.  Guess what?  The little girlies love them too, so don't make it into some Axl is better than everybody thing because it simply isn't true.  Axl has a unique voice that girls love, not the only unique voice girls love.

NR and SCOM were acceptable to guys because of the guitar work.  There weren't too many 16 year old guys going "SCOM is so sweet - I just love that Axl and his pure singing voice" - at least not where I lived.  SCOM came on one time when I was getting stoned around the age of 16 and we rocked out to the guitar, not Axl.  Axl may as well not have been there.  Now that you're older, you may look at it differently, but put yourself back in 1987 or 1991 and think about what would have happened to a 16 year old guy that walked around saying "Axl writes such pretty lyrics and has a beautiful voice" all the time.

I'll give it a 7.  Some of it musically is better than I expected, but the production values and the overkill of sounds bring the overall value down in my mind.  I've only given it one listen start to finish, so it may change as I listen more.  I'd have loved to have heard this album as a Rose/BH/any old rhythm guitarist/Tommy/Brain/Dizzy (if I must) album.  Axl just nails the song structures but needs someone to tell him enough is enough with the adding parts here and there.

I ONLY knew it was coming out because of this site and the numerous myspace messages they sent out (too many actually).  I never saw an ad for it on tv, heard one on the radio (and it was advertising the listening party, not the album itself).  I think a lot of people that don't listen exclusively to rock stations (in other words, most people) still have no idea the album is out, but more importantly, they don't care either.

You're entitled to your opinion.  I wrote a song about as good lyrically as SCOM when I was in HS, but I didn't have Izzy and Slash to turn it into a great song.  SCOM is about as simple as you can get from a lyrical perspective.  It may be poetic, it may be beautiful, but it's no different than the emo fluff out there today other than Axl Rose wrote it, so that makes it better.  It doesn't work that way.  There's nothing wrong with simple, but you need to accept it for what it is.  I love SCOM, I love NR and Estranged.  Axl's songs are some of my all time favorites, but they are what they are...pansy songs saved by some good to amazing guitar work.

I expect some resistance from a GnR site obviously, but I really figured some of the old timers would be able to look at it more honestly than they did when they were 16.  Axl Rose = Hinder and all the other fluff bands out there minus the name Guns N' Roses.  He writes pansy songs about how sad his life is now that he, I mean others, fucked it up - that's pretty emo.  There's nothing wrong with it, but it is what it is and pretending otherwise because it was released under the name Guns N' Roses is irresponsible.  The name lost it's value when the key rock guys were removed from the equation (both old and new bands).

Great singers aren't only good when they are on.  When he's on, he's one of the best as indicated by studio performances and occasional live efforts.  When he's off (most of the time live) he's pretty bad.  Sure, everyone has bad days, but Axl has had bad tours with a few good days mixed in.

I'm sure some of that has to do with the different "styles" he sings in, but that's just making excuses.  If you can't handle different styles, don't use them.  He's my favorite rock singer of all time - that doesn't mean he's the best.