It’s been 38 years to the day since Guns N’ Roses released their number one hit song, “Sweet Child O’ Mine”. And thank god they didn’t use frontman Axl Rose’s original music video idea for it, because it was gruesome.
The official music video for “Sweet Child O’ Mine” is just a basic black-and-white depiction of the band playing the song in their practice space. Speaking to Eddie Trunk back in 2006, Rose revealed exactly what he envisioned for the band’s music video. And it was practically a horror movie.
Seriously, Axl Rose’s music video concept is very graphic
Rose explained that, in his vision, the video would start with an Asian woman traveling with a baby. The mother would be depicted taking her baby through an airport and journeying to another country. However, once she arrives, it’s revealed the baby’s been dead the entire time, and its lifeless body is filled with drugs. We learn this when a drug dealer cuts the child’s body open to retrieve the illicit content from inside.
Turns out, Guns N’ Roses’ record label was not thrilled and shut the idea down very fast. Which is probably a good thing. I mean, look, is it a compelling idea? Sure. Just the idea of it invokes some big feelings and emotional responses, which is what art should do. It should have a message, or at the very least a purpose. But good lord, that would easily have gone down as the most controversial music video of all time.
Not everyone in Guns N’ Roses was a big fan of ‘Sweet Child o’ Mine’
Interestingly, Slash once confessed that he didn’t like the arrangement of “Sweet Child O’ Mine” all that much. In a 2014 interview with Kidd Chris, Slash admitted that he wrote the opening riff as a joke. He thought it was so opposite to the aesthetic and sound they were cultivating. However, that “circus music” guitar part turned out to be the beginning of the band’s lone number one-charting tune.
“You know, Guns N’ Roses was always a real hardcore, sort of, AC/DC kind of hard rock band with a lot of attitude,” Slash said, per Blabbermouth. “If we did any kind of ballads, it was bluesy. This was an up-tempo ballad […] It’s a great song — I’m not knocking it — but at the same time, it just did not fit in with the rest of our, sort of, schtick. And, of course, it would be the biggest hit we ever had.”
Notably, the song was ultimately edited for the radio, and this was something that Axl Rose and the rest of the band were very upset about. “I hate the edit of ‘Sweet Child o’ Mine’. Radio stations said, ‘Well, your vocals aren’t cut.’ My favorite part of the song is Slash’s slow solo; it’s the heaviest part for me,” Rose once told Rolling Stone.
“There’s no reason for it to be missing except to create more space for commercials, so the radio station owners can get more advertising dollars,” he added. “When you get the chopped version of ‘Paradise City’ or half of ‘Sweet Child’ and ‘Patience’ cut, you’re getting screwed.”
The post On This Day in 1988, Guns N’ Roses Released This No. 1 Hit, and Thank God They Didn’t Use Their Original Music Video Idea appeared first on VICE.
