at this point, the guitarists are completely 100% interchangeable and have been since Izzy left....just think about it. Circus sideshow as Maynard would say....everybody has their favorite clown. The list is endless....To me it is just pure amusement at this point. The more the merrier!

I am thinking that the new album will be out later this year and will be mainly old material with Dj added to the mix in parts like Ron was with Chinese. That is the optimistic side of me James!

I don't think anybody has any concrete evidence of anything....especially Axl's intentions of what material he ultimately wants to release.

The more I think about it, the lyrics to the album are pretty fuckin good. The foursome of Chinese Democracy, Riad, Catcher and Shacklers all have a theme of useless violence and simply show examples of how fucked up the world is. The Chinese government, individuals like Axl describes in his essay on Riad, Lennon's death, and Columbine with Shacklers.

Then, we got the theme of broken relationships on a bunch of songs (pick your poison as to who he is talking about but Seymour and Slash are obviously targets-I don't care if he sidesteps the question or not!). And, themes of defiance...Axl trying to rise above the turmoil of his outside world and his inside, personal world...move on with his life...be defiant (Madagascar, Sorry, Scraped).

Overall, really pretty brilliant. I am not a fan of all the music at times, but the lyrics are 100% solid.