EDIT: Rick Richards is an amazing and talented guitarist, who does indeed "have soul," but unfortunately, he is NOT playing on this track.
Very nice and all but that ain't Rick Richards playing the solo, it's Ronnie Wood himself.. he's guesting on that Izzy track w/ guitar and vocals. They recorded it live at 4 am after first watching 'Spartacus' at Ronnie's place.
There's an old JJH live bootleg track where they're covering the Faces' My Fault, that one has an incredible guitar solo played by Rick Richards, who also sang the song live. That one truly has soul.
In a brand-new interview with Icon vs. Icon, South Windsor, Connecticut-born rock-guitarist Alex Grossi talks about his stint with Adler's Appetite and his work on Dizzy Reed's solo album with producer Del James.
Adler’s Appetite parted ways with one singer and now you have brought Rick Stitch in to handle the vocals. What does Rick bring to the table?
It is really, really difficult when you are trying to emulate something that people are so familiar with. Appetite for Destruction sold well over 30 million copies worldwide and people know every note from that album. We just played over in Argentina. They don’t speak English but they can even sing the guitar solos! So, we needed someone who can be true to the music but we also don’t want to be a tribute band. The drummer in this band, Steven, wrote a fifth of the music playing on that album. When we made the singer change, a lot of people would contact me or Steven through Myspace. They were wearing the bandanna and one even went so far as to have the fake Axl Rose tattoos put on. That wasn’t what we wanted. We wanted a guy who can hit the notes and do the stuff but at the same time is not a clone. We’re not Steel Dragon, ya know! [laughs] Rick has been great. It is nice to have a guy who is on the same page off stage as he is on stage. What people don’t realize about a touring band that works as hard as we do is that you have to live with these people twenty four hours a day. You may have two straight days off in the middle of God knows where or Iowa and you have to be friends. Certain people get along, certain people don’t but that is the nature of the beast. Instead of being married to one person, try being married to five or six! That’s basically what it is like.
You mentioned recording guitars for Dizzy Reed’s solo debut and I know Del James is serving as producer on that release. What can you tell us about this project and any idea on when it may hit stores?
I have no idea about it’s release date. I know that they are mixing it right now. Once Chinese Democracy came out, I am sure it took a little bit of a back burner. Working with Del was great. For a guy who doesn’t really play an instrument he has a really great ear. He will walk into the room and say “No, no! Do it more like…” and then throw out some crazy analogy that ends up making perfect sense at the end of the day! It was really great working with those guys. As a Guns N’ Roses fan, and I am sure not too many people will be a fan of me saying this, but it is cool to work on every end of the spectrum. By that I mean, I am working with a guy who was there at the very beginning, Steven Adler, all the way up to the guys who are in the band now. Whether that ties the two things together, I can tell you 100% that it does not, but it is really cool to hear the stories and the history of the band. If you think about it, as far as I am concerned, they are the band of my generation. You had The Who, Led Zeppelin and The Beatles for previous generations. As far as rock bands and anyone that is in their early thirties to forties, our band is Guns N’ Roses or Nirvana but definitely one of the two.
Have you had a Spinal Tap Moment on stage?
[laughs] This entire tour has been a Spinal Tap Moment! [laughs] The most recent one was about a week and a half ago. We played a show called Cornstock. It was held in a huge corn field. Big, big show! Tons of people, great show! However, when we got there the promoter came onto the bus and said “Fellas we have a little bit of a problem here. See that there inflatable beer can?” because it was sponsored by Budweiser and they had one of those giant fifty foot beer cans. They had to tear down the entire stage and move it around this beer can. All I could think about was Stonehenge! It was what Stonehenge should have been if it were a can of beer! We had to wait four hours in the sun due to a giant inflatable beer can, so that was very Spinal Tap. Whoever wrote that movie must have been in a band or followed a band around because they were dead on. They actually predicted the future in a lot of ways. They always say watch Spinal Tap and then go on tour for ten years and then watch it again, you will be laughing so hard your ribs hurt! [laughs]
What should we be on the lookout for from you in the coming months?
Definitely the new Adler’s Appetite record! Right now, I have a song out in the new Sandra Bullock movie The Proposal, so if you feel like hearing a song by Beautiful Creatures in a Walt Disney picture, a family movie, that was written by a very un-family band, check that out! [laughs] It is pretty cool! Also look out for possibly some more Paul Reed Smith Road Show dates and a ton more of Adler’s Appetite dates, that’s for sure!
There's much more to this interview, and you can read the entire thing here.
Adler’s Appetite, the band led by original Guns N' Roses drummer Steven Adler, will embark on the second leg of their 2009 US tour next month. Check out the band's upcoming tour dates below.
Upcoming Tour Dates:
June 13 - Las Vegas, NV - Cheyenne Saloon 15 - Colorado Springs, CO - Sodo Niteclub 16 - Oklahoma City, OK - Rock Theater 18 - Tolono, IL - Radmaker’s 19 - Cedar Rapids, IA - Rock 198 KFMW Festival 20 - Shaumburg, IL - Chicago City Limits 21 - Greenville, WI - Route 51 23 - Warren, MI - The Ritz 25 - Harris, WI - The Back Door 26 - Waterloo, IA - Reverb Rock Room 27 - Monroe City, MO - The Dam Rally 28 - St Louis, MO - The Library 30 - New Bedford, MA - New Wave Cafe
July 01 - Rumford, ME - The Shak 02 - Farmingdale, NY - Crazy Donkey 03 - Cinncinati, OH - Riverstar Entertainment Complex 04 - Bridgeville, IL - Toyota Park Festival 05 - St Paul, MN - Taste Of Minnesota (Harriet Island)
August 15 - Lake Elsinore, CA - Storm Stadium Rock Fest 28 - Universal City, CA - City Walk
Adler’s Appetite recently brought vocalist Rick Stitch, of the Los Angeles-based group Ladyjack to handle vocals, when their former singer, Sheldon Tarsha, parted ways with the group.
Last month, Steven told Beat Magazine that his autobiography will be out in late-January 2010.
"It’s almost completed, it should be out by late January of next year. Basically it takes Slash’s book, Nikki Sixx’s book and puts everything together as one. Because we were all together – we’ve known Nikki forever – so if you read his book and you read Slash’s book and when you read mine, everything, all the pieces of the puzzle will be put together. That’s how it works, and yeah, it’s very exciting."
Recently, Steven laid down some drum tracks for Slash's forthcoming solo album.
In addition, Adler's Appetite is threatening to release a new record, hopefully next Fall.
