How Guns N’ Roses sparked my lifelong love for rock music

The first time I saw Guns N’ Roses perform live, I wasn’t at a concert. I was at a friend's house, watching a VHS tape of their 1992 Tokyo tour. Axl Rose hit the stage in bike shorts, a flannel shirt, and that iconic red bandana, and within minutes, I knew I was done for. This music was theatre, rebellion, drama, velocity. It was fire.

I didn’t fully understand the lyrics. I didn’t need to. The energy reached through the screen and rattled something loose in me. Slash’s solos carried the mood of the song, sometimes even more than the lyrics did. Duff McKagan looked like he didn’t care and cared deeply all at once. Axl? He owned the stage like he’d been born under those lights.

I was still a child. I didn’t even know what stage presence was; I just knew I wanted it.

Every album was a universe. Appetite for Destruction was raw, aggressive, and completely unpolished. Nightrain, the first song in that Tokyo concert video, opened the show with urgency and energy. It set the pace for everything that followed and immediately pulled me in.

Use Your Illusion I & II was where the drama exploded. Piano ballads met hard riffs. You Could Be Mine came in guns blazing, swaggering, aggressive, electric. Civil War had that haunting, almost mournful build that made you listen whether you wanted to or not. Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door, their Bob Dylan cover, was somehow both a tribute and a reinvention. And then there was Get in the Ring: loud, profane, controversial, and aimed squarely at the critics and the media. It was defiant, messy, and designed to provoke.

November Rain made heartache cinematic. I loved it, of course I did, how could you not? But oddly enough, it was my least favourite. Maybe because, as one critic once said, it felt like “an Elton John song that Elton neither wrote nor performed.” That line always stuck with me, and weirdly, I agreed.

Estranged made heartbreak feel like a movie you couldn’t look away from. I felt every beat like it was my own personal heartbreak, even though I was too young to have one.

Even Chinese Democracy, decades later, had me curious. By then, the original lineup had splintered. Axl held the rights to the name, and the rest — Slash and Duff — were out building Velvet Revolver. The world was against Axl Rose, but I was loyal. I refused to take sides. Chinese Democracy wasn’t the band I grew up with, but it was still him. And I liked it, enough to memorise the lyrics to songs most fans never gave a chance. The critics weren’t kind. It didn’t matter to me. Even as the world moved on, I stayed with them.

Like many teenagers drawn to music in the ’90s and 2000s, I once tried to play music. I begged for a guitar. Got one. Tried lessons. Gave up. Not because I didn’t love it; it simply didn’t love me back. My mother thought it would distract me from everything else, and maybe she was right. I stepped away from pursuing music. Still, I felt its pull.

Back then, it was common to see young fans emulating the musicians they admired. Guns N’ Roses had that effect on people. Axl’s style — the flannel shirts, ripped jeans, and bandanas — was everywhere. I was one of many who copied the look.

I still have those bandanas, stored away in a drawer. I don’t wear them anymore, except maybe at a concert. But I keep them for what they remind me of. A time when music felt immediate, urgent, and hard to shake off.

My love for music found its first real outlet when I got hired as an entertainment features writer. I covered concerts, reviewed albums, and wrote about the very thing I’d grown up obsessing over.

Years passed. I stopped writing about music. Moved departments. Covered different beats. But when Ozzy Osbourne died, something cracked open. I wrote a tribute. It wasn’t polished, it was raw. But it reminded me of a part of myself I’d boxed up. The girl who analysed lyrics for work and for fun. Who tried to tune a guitar and failed. Who sang along to Paradise City at full volume like it was a battle cry.

I’ve been to four Guns N’ Roses concerts, two during the Chinese Democracy era, and two after the classic lineup got (mostly) back together. I don’t wear the bandana much anymore, unless I’m at a concert (but I keep it close). I know I wasn’t meant for the spotlight. I belonged in the crowd, and that was enough.

Till the next song,

Krita