BIOGRAPHY – L.A. Guns

While some fans may be confused that today there are two groups called L.A. Guns, both of which feature members from their late 1980s ‘classic era,’ almost thirty years ago there was just one teenage and a burning desire to play rock ‘n’ roll. Tracy Ulrich was Hollywood born-and-bred and had developed a passion for music after discovering Led Zeppelin at the age of six. Even before he was a teenage he was attempting to form a band, adopting the stage name Tracii Guns. In 1983, while still in high school he teamed up with a young singer called Michael Jagosz, Danish bassist Ole Beich and drummer Rob Gardner. L.A. Guns began to perform locally and soon gained a reputation around Los Angeles. Their first studio effort was an EP entitled Collector’s Edition No.1, which featured four songs that owed a debt to the likes of Judas Priest and the Dead Kennedys.

Jagosz left the band soon afterwards and Guns hired an arrogant-yet-charismatic singer called Axl Rose, whose own group Rose (later renamed Hollywood Rose) had also been struggling for attention on Sunset Strip. When L.A. Guns seemed to stall and members began to lose interest, Guns decided to form a new band with Rose, Gardner and Beich and, combining their names, christened it Guns N’ Roses. Guns soon left the group, along with Gardner and Beich, prompting Rose to recruit his former Hollywood Rose bandmates; guitarists Izzy Stradlin and Slash (born Saul Hudson) and drummer Steven Adler, along with bassist Duff McKagan, who had previously worked with Slash and Adler in the short-lived garage band Road Crew. Guns decided to reform L.A. Guns with a new line-up, including rhythm guitarist Mick Cripps, drummer Nickey Alexander and Scottish singer Paul Black. To play bass Guns hired Kelly Nickels, a former roadie for local group Hotshot, who would also be associated with fellow Los Angeles glam metallers Faster Pussycat.

Black soon left the band and formed Black Cherry, who would regularly perform around Hollywood in popular venues like The Roxy and the Whisky A Go Go. This would prove to be a major break for L.A. Guns, as this would lead to a meeting with Phil Lewis, an experienced singer who had enjoyed modest success during the late 1970s in his native England with his glam rock band Girl, which would also include future Def Leppard guitarist Phil Collen. In early 1987 the revamped L.A. Guns signed a contract with Polygram Records and spent the summer recording their eponymous debut album, using material mostly written by Guns and his new line-up, although one track would be co-credited to Black. The album would also feature tracks from the members’ former groups; a cover of Girl‘s Hollywood Tease and a reworking of Shoot for Thrills, originally performed by Nickels’ previous band Sweet Pain.

The track Sex Action was released to promote the album, with Hollywood Tease as the B-side, and soon afterwards Alexander left and was replaced by former W.A.S.P. drummer Steve Riley. Almost immediately the band began to generate interest from music magazines and metal fans, with the album being certified Gold after selling 750,000 copies. L.A. Guns finally managed to break out of the Hollywood scene by touring in support of such acts as Iron Maiden, AC/DC and, ironically, Def Leppard. Despite the exposure and acclaim, their success was somewhat overshadowed by that of Guns’ former band, Guns N’ Roses, whose debut album Appetite for Destruction had become a surprise hit and had transformed them into one of the biggest rock groups in the world, with their singles Welcome to the Jungle, Paradise Lost and Sweet Child o’ Mine receiving heavy rotation on MTV.

Following the tour, they returned to the studio to work on their much anticipated follow-up, Cocked & Loaded. The recording sessions would take place at three locations – Conway Recording Studios, Music Grinder and One on One – and were overseen by Tom Werman, who had recently produced Poison‘s second album, Open Up and Say… Ahh!, and Duane Baron and the late John Purdell, both of which would later collaborate on Ozzy Osbourne’s 1991 classic No More Tears. Cocked & Loaded would not only mark Riley’s first appearance on a L.A. Guns album but would also see the band inviting in guests, in this instance Robin Zander and Rick Nielsen, frontman and guitarist from Cheap Trick, respectively. The album would become a huge success and was eventually certified Platinum, while also spawning three popular singles; Rip and Tear, Never Enough and The Ballad of Jayne, the latter of which would become their most famous song.

Despite changes in the music industry shifting attention from the Hollywood metal scene to the rising Seattle grunge movement, L.A. Guns returned in 1991 with their third album. Hollywood Vampires, named after the band’s fan club, was recorded the previous autumn and would gain exposure when the track Over the Edge was included on the soundtrack to the action thriller Point Break. Four months after its release, former bassist Beich died in Copenhagen after a long history of alcohol and drug abuse. He was thirty-six years old. Following another success tour, Riley left the band in 1992 and was temporarily replaced by Michael “Bones” Gershima, who would contribute towards the next album, Vicious Circle. Fans were further shocked when Lewis decided to quit to focus on other projects, teaming up with Bones once again for Filthy Lucre, recording the album Popsmear in 1997. L.A. Guns continued without Lewis, hiring an unknown singer called Chris Van Dahl to perform vocals on the album American Hardcore, while Riley returned to the drums.

For their next release, the 1998 EP Wasted, Van Dahl was replaced by Ralph Saenz, who would enjoy success over a decade later with his glam metal act Steel Panther, performing under the alias Michael Starr. Once again, a new release brought a new singer, with Guns drafting in former Love/Hate frontman Jizzy Pearl for their sixth full length album Shrinking Violet. The same year they released a compilation entitled Greatest Hits and Black Beauties, which collected together a decade’s worth of hits from the Lewis albums. Following tours with Poison and Ratt, Lewis, Nickels and Cripps returned to the band in 2001, bringing together the classic line-up for the first time since Hollywood Vampires. Their first release would be the live record Live: A Night on the Strip, which captured the band performing at the Key Club on Hollywood’s Sunset Boulevard.

Nickels left once again shortly before the band entered the studio to record their first album with Lewis in seven years. Man in the Moon, produced by one-time Guns N’ Roses guitarist Gilby Clarke (who had replaced Stradlin in 1991), would receive lukewarm reviews but the band continued to gain acclaim for their live shows. Guns would remain with the band for one more album, 2002′s critically acclaimed Waking the Dead, before deciding to form the supergroup Brides of Destruction with Mötley Crüe bassist Nikki Sixx. It would also be the first L.A. Guns album to feature a line-up of only four members (although 1994′s Vicious Circle had not featured a permanent drummer), following the departure of rhythm guitarist Cripps. With Guns gone the future of the band seemed uncertain, but Lewis decided to continue and hired former Roxx Gang guitarist Stacey Blades. His first studio contribution would be 2004′s Rips the Covers Off, a collection of songs from artists that had inspired the band over the years, such as Hanoi Rocks, Muddy Waters and Aerosmith.

While yet another greatest hits package, 20th Century Masters, was released in 2005, the same year saw them return with an album of original material, Tales from the Strip, which saw them writing for the first time without the input of Guns. It would be around this time that Guns would decide to form his own band, also adopting the L.A. Guns moniker and reuniting with former singer Paul Black. This incarnation would be short-lived, however, as issues between Guns and Black were unearthed and the latter was once again fired from the band. After trying out with different singers, Guns invited Jizzy Pearl back into the group after almost a decade. Two rival L.A. Guns bands would cause confusion among fans, with Lewis fronting one and Guns the other. Lewis’ L.A. Guns recorded their second album of covers, Covered in Guns, in 2009, while Guns’ line-up continued to perform without releasing new material.