29 Absolutely Ridiculous Stories of Axl Rose's Hard Partying Days With Guns N' Roses

Axl frequently delayed the start of GnR shows with a ridiculous excuses, so when he made a special order food request minutes before he was supposed to go on stage before a crowd of 80,000 in Buenos Aires in July 1993, his assistant, Craig Duswalt, panicked, but wasn't surprised. The rest of the band was already at the venue. Rose was at his hotel, craving chili and cheese, which wasn't on the room service menu.

Duswalt knew the show would never go on if Rose didn't get what he wanted, so he explained, as best he could, to the hotel kitchen staff exactly what Axl wanted. An hour later, a platter was delivered to the room containing a chunk of cheese with a few chili peppers. Duswalt smashed the dish against the wall to distract Rose, and blamed the hotel for screwing up the order. Rose forgot his craving, and the show went on.

When stories about an artist's legendary feats of insanity make their rounds among the world's roadies, the tale is probably pretty crazy. When roadies turn a story into a verb, it must be an epic to rival the tales of Homer. Such is the case with "yellow-jacketing," a term used by roadies that began with Axl Rose. 

Interviewing real roadies before his catastrophic foray into television (Roadies), filmmaker Cameron Crowe discovered the origins of the term, as well as a brand new crazy account for the Axl Rose record books. As Crowe tells it:

I heard some roadies talking about how something had to be "yellow-jacketed" and I [asked] "What is yellow-jacketing?" They said, "There was a guy that worked with Guns N’ Roses, and there was a show and Axl Rose needed a yellow jacket that he’d left in England before he would perform. So a roadie was given the job to get on a plane as fast as possible, go to London, find Axl Rose’s yellow jacket, and come back so he could play the show."

Among the many things Axl Rose is known for is tardiness. He likes showing up late, sometimes hours so. A DJ from Tampa, Florida, witnessed this punctuality problem firsthand in 1991, while working as an assistant to a venue owner. As the witness tells it: 

When the owner asked why Axl was being late for the thousandth time, he said: "Axl’s management said he was watching Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Secret of the Ooze, and that Axl’s attention was 100% on the movie and couldn't be bothered."

Here's a video of Vanilla Ice performing in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II, if you need a refresher on that cinematic masterpiece. 

Guns N' Roses was scheduled to sign to Geffen Records in July, 1986. The label shot the band to stardom with the release of Appetite for Destruction in 1987, but the contract almost wasn't signed, thanks to Axl's eccentric behavior. The morning of the meeting, Rose was unable to find his contact lenses and decided someone had stolen them.

Axl refused to attend the meeting, threw a tantrum, and stormed off while the other members of the band frantically searched for the missing lenses. Manager Vicky Hamilton recalls, "What was going through Axl's head was 'Who took my contact lenses so I can't read the contract?'"

Slash eventually located the lenses, which were conveniently stored in a a pair of Rose's pants, then tracked down the singer, who was hiding out on the roof of the Whisky A Go Go. The band was about four hours late to the meeting, but some of the record executives were still there waiting for them. 

A lot went wrong when two of the biggest heavy bands in the world, Metallica and Guns N' Roses, rolled into Montreal on August 8, 1992. During Metallica's set, James Hetfield was seriously burned on stage in a pyrotechnic accident, cutting short Metallica's show. While Hetfield was rushed to the hospital, promoters tried to get GnR onstage, which took two hours and 15 minutes to accomplish. 

Guns N' Roses only played nine songs that night (usual set lists on the tour ran almost 20 songs). The band was off kilter from the start. Axl was having trouble with the monitor speakers and, instead of finding someone to fix the issue, broke his microphone, sat down on the monitors, then walked off stage, never to return. His bad performance may have been a self-fulfilling prophecy - he apparently believed "bad juju" befell the band in cities beginning with "M".

Fans rioted when they realized GnR wasn't coming back to the stage. Piles of t-shirts were set on fire, police cars were overturned, and the stadium's souvenir shop was looted. Backstage, Axl drank champagne with groupies while his management spatted with the concert promoters, and the rest of the band partied like it was 1999. 

Even at 44, Axl was up to his classic, wild man antics. While on tour in Sweden in 2006, Rose was arrested for allegedly biting a security guard in the leg. The guard was trying to break up an argument between Rose and a woman in a hotel lobby and somehow managed to get attacked by the rock star.

When police arrived, Rose was drunk, aggressive, and had to be restrained. He was left in a cell overnight, since he was too intoxicated to be properly questioned. After admitting to the charges, Rose was given a fine of $5,500, and had to pay $1,360 to the security guard.