Also, more from Richard:

Did you immediately know that you had a musical connection with Axl and the rest of the band? 
Tommy and Brain (aka Brian Mantia), I've worked with both of them before. Buckethead was there at that time, and I came in and was brought in to replace Paul, who had been writing with Axl and I guess he was a childhood friend of his. He was no longer there for whatever reason, and they were looking for someone to fill that spot.   It's funny because 2 years before, I had gotten a call to come in and audition for them. This was before I knew Tommy. I had gotten a call to audition, but then Buckethead got the gig before I came out. I was scheduled to come out and audition. They called and said, Yeah, we want to fly you out this week. I was going to be there anyway doing sessions, so I could do it at that time. They said, Perfect. I didn't hear back from them, so I just figured, Well, it must not be happening.   I got out to do the session, and Tommy Stinson and Josh Freese were on the session that I was doing for Yoshiki, ironically enough. So I said, Hey, I was supposed to come and audition for you guys this week. They were like, Yeah! You're the guy! Well, Axl found this guy Buckethead and we just stopped doing auditions. Axl was convinced with Buckethead, so it was no problem. No big deal. A few years later another guitar player left, so that's when I got the call. That was in 2001.

http://www.ultimate-guitar.com/intervie … _tone.html

This part is interesting, again with the multiple albums concept:

How involved were you with the writing of Chinese Democracy? 

The first record, everything was written. I went in and rerecorded parts, but it was all written before I got in. It's funny because that was a big part of why I was brought in. It was because of the writing. I think Axl, he wants a band that can write with him. That's always put into consideration.

Never heard of that! Got any quotes?

That would be very interesting, musically wise, despite the fact of having a doppelganger on stage!

Yeah, to me it seems like Axl is just tired. I think up to a point he fought really hard, on his own erratic ways, to keep the old band together. It didn't work.

Then he fought really hard to make the new band work. It also didn't work (up until the release of Chinese Democracy, it was never a band, just a revolving door of musicians and hangers-on).

So now, he seems to think he already "done all that he should", and is just tired of fighting.

I mean... Tell 80's Axl he'd be headlining Las Vegas residencies, being followed by (his word) his mom all over the world while touring and starring Budweiser ads...

Perhaps now, even Axl's version of the feud is starting to have the lines blurred. But he can look at it like "Well, I've been really hurt and invested all my strength into this for so long, I don't want to do all that again" regarding a reunion. You can see how really comfortable and happy he is around Izzy and Duff. Would he be that way around Slash? Don't think so.

Then, it's the same "I've fought enough" approach regarding the new band. He does have a stable band who, no matter what are their agenda, seem to have his back and are loyal to him and have been for the past 5 years, since Ashba joined, touring the world and just expecting to move forward.

Honestly I think Axl will stay on this limbo. He just retracts from fighting these days and as a fan I blame him for not having the energy but as a human being who have had a few bad experiences on trying to do the hard thing and getting burned, I totally get it.

Good read but what he says is the rasp in 2000 with Gilby is actually the bootleg from Guns in Argentina, in 1993, playing Dead Horses

And also a lot, and I do mean A LOT, of speculation... These surgeries and procedures are all but rumors.  We don't have any confirmation of that.

GNR's The Spaghetti Incident sold around 1 million, if I'm not mistaken. I find it hard to see IFOCS selling 1.5 million copies.