THE VIDEO Guns N Roses, "Paradise City," Appetite for Destruction, 1987, Polygram
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SAMPLE LYRIC "Take me down to the Paradise City / where the grass is green and the girls are pretty / Take! Me! Ho-oh-ooooooome yeah yeah-ah!"
THE VERDICT This video always, always has said "summertime" to me. "Paradise City" is also, for my money, one of GNR's most iconic videos, as opposed to the bloated, over-budgeted monstrosities of their later years.
If you watch it, it has a lot of shots that will go on to get used in Vh-1 montages and the like, even moreso than "Welcome to the Jungle" (really mostly just Axl screaming and leaning on Slash, and Axl sitting on the bed watching all the TVs) and "Sweet Child O' Mine" (really just Slash plugging in his guitar). Let's review it together.
The beginning of the video, shot in gritty black-and-white, establishes that this is an "on tour" video. The camera pans around an empty Giants stadium, and we see GNR tees that are probably $150 on eBay right now. The camera pans past the stage, where we see various of the band members hanging out, looking young and oh-so-hot. I've talked about this many times before: These boys are in their Magic Hour.
Of course, Axl Rose only appears once the video is suddenly in color, and they're actually performing. He's wearing a customized white leather getup that somehow, no one ever makes fun of him for, even though people make fun of Warrant for their customized white leather getups all the time! Maybe it's 'cause he's also wearing a Cathouse t-shirt. If I could find a non-repro Cathouse tee, I'd be the happiest woman alive pretty much.
Shots of the band performing in color are interspersed with backstage shots in black and white in a very fast "meet the band" sequence, then when Axl finishes the first chorus and swings his arm out, we finally see the ginormous stadium crowd for a minute. Again, this is Giants Stadium, where GNR are opening for Aerosmith, who I assume are still touring off of Permanent Vacation (since GNR are likewise still touring off of Appetite). Can you imagine watching 1988 Guns N Roses do "Welcome to the Jungle" live, then watching Steven Tyler wheeze through "Dude (Looks Like a Lady)"? I don't mind Aerosmith, but that would really be a letdown.
Anyway, then we see the band (not Axl, of course) roaming around 80s Manhattan, which you know I love. Slash, Duff, and Steven go to beloved (and since departed) Manny's Music, where we get an iconic shot of the camera zooming in on Steven sitting against a bunch of amps.
Then we're back at Giants Stadium with more set-up shots, including a favorite of mine, Slash wearing cut-offs standing in the middle of the stadium. Fans begin to pour in, and we also see the boys looking at stuff on the street. I'm pretty sure they're in midtown, but I always picture them as being down near St. Mark's Place in this part.
The crowd is in full effect, and even Axl seems to have shown up. Everyone gets their guitars, and then with that piercing whistle, we're finally at the dunt-duh-nuh-nunt-duh-nuh-nunt-duh-nuh-nunt-duh-nuh-nuh-NUH guitar part, which rules. Everyone's going nuts, particularly white leather Axl. The crowd is going nuts, though interestingly you can see when they pull back enough (which they try to avoid doing I'm assuming for this reason), the top-tier of nosebleed seats is far from full.
In the midst of this performance footage, we get another of my favorite moments: Duff hits on a woman walking by, who totally keeps walking. Woman! You are being hit on by 1988 Duff McKagan!! He is not going to look like that forever! This is soon followed by another iconic shot -- the quick transition from "tell me who you're gonna believe" to the couple making out in the middle of the crowd. Damn! Can you imagine being like "that was me making out in the crowd during 'Paradise City' in 1988"? And then we've got yet another one -- Steven Adler riding around on a boat in the East River, with the World Trade Center behind him.
Then we're back with Axl, and what appears to be literally a sea of white people waving their arms at him rhythmically. A tiny security guard foils an equally small dude trying to get onstage. Lots of fast camera swings, but then we get some nice shots of Slash playing his guitar while standing next to a fan -- not a GNR fan, literally like a large box fan, 'cause they're playing during the daytime in the middle of summer at the freakin' Meadowlands. It's hot.
Anyway, it's mostly color footage of an increasingly sweaty band performing at this point in the video, interspersed with backstage/behind-the-scenes black and white stuff. I love the trying-to-wake-up-Steven-at-the-hotel shots, as well as Slash signing an autograph using some guy's back as a table.
In the midst of all this, we see the band hopping on the Concorde to head to England to play the Monsters of Rock festival (so for this we know an exact date -- August 20, 1988). That year Donington was headlined by Iron Maiden, and also featured KISS, David Lee Roth, Megadeth, and Helloween -- can you imagine?! A bunch of behind the scenes shots (race track sign, GNR dressing room sign) establish that yes, we are in England now. Lots of fans, Slash getting interviewed in the press tent by... crap... I can never remember this guy's name. He looks like Bruce Villanch, but he's not. I remember seeing him talk about this video on a Vh-1 special once, and he was thrilled to pieces that he's in the video.
We don't get much clear performance video from Donington, just a lot of crowd shots. Though no one cites a source for this (and I don't think of GNR as a terribly thoughtful band, sorry), everything I've read about this video (which admittedly isn't much, remember, I am the best source of heavy metal video info on the web! Or anywhere else) claims that the band added all this Donington footage in honor of two fans who were crushed to death during the band's performance that day. The biggest difference between this and the Giants stadium footage is that it's in black and white; there's no seating, just a giant sea of people; and fans in Europe always bring big, elaborate homemade banners with them.
As the song goes more and more off the rails, the video actually gets more subdued. Yes, there's some Axl dance, in both Jersey and England, but we mostly get a lot of vaguely moody crowd shots, and images of the band members sitting around peacefully backstage.
The end of the video is almost all Donington -- chaotic shots of the band and the crowd, with lots of rapid cuts. But for the final "hooooooooooooooome" we cut back and forth between screaming Axl in both settings, in color and in black and white. The final shot is of Axl in Jersey with his arms upraised.
This video is a bit of a time capsule, really -- there are a lot of things in it that don't exist anymore (and no, I don't just mean a GNR lineup that isn't packed full of randos): The Monsters of Rock festival. Giants Stadium, just replaced by the outstandingly fugly Izod Center. Manny's. The World Trade Center, which is always hard to see. (I don't mean it's difficult to make out, I just mean, it's sad to look at.) The Concorde. Steven Adler as a full-fledged member of GNR, of course. In all, I like the time-capsule video more than I like the song.
Speaking of the song: Have you ever seen someone try to sing this song karaoke? Casual fans always just remember the sing-along chorus, which is realllly easy to sing, and completely forget what the rest of the song sounds like, which is a slower version of "Garden of Eden" without the helpful bouncing ball. (Weirdly, I can't find a version with the bouncing ball on Youtube, but I SWEAR it exists. Beavis and Butt-head watch it!)
They also tend to forget how long and instrumental the beginning is. You'll see them get a panicked look in their eye, then try to make the best of it with some air guitar. But then when the first verse appears ("jus' an urchin livin' under the street / I'ma, hard case that's tough to beat") the real fear sets in. Most people don't make it past the second verse (the "I'd have another cigarette" one), which is probably for the best. (I'm assuming they also forget that the song is nearly seven minutes long, but it never comes to that.)
The weird thing is, the verses are by far the coolest part of this song. The sort of breakdown part ("so faaaar away") comes in second, and anything involving the actual chorus (including at the end when it gets really fast) comes in a distant third for me. I think the chorus is just, for better or worse (but mostly worse), something frat guys can sing along to that helped GNR sell more albums.
But really, the verse on this song encapsulates everything I enjoy about Appetite-era Guns N Roses -- gritty lyrics, staccato delivery punctuated by the occasional yowl, and crunchy, heavy guitars. Guess I'll mostly stick to "Night Train" and "Mr Brownstone." But for when I need to see delectable footage of a young Duff McKagan, I'll put on this video.