Oh, Sweet Child O’ Mine – it seems that we are in for a true classic! It is Scuzz Sunday!

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It’s that time again! Good Morning, I’m Jacob Braybrooke and it’s time for us to dig out an ancient relic from the Pop-Punk and Emo-Rock movements of the late-1990’s up to the mid-2000’s to see whether they can hold up to value and quality in a contemporary setting, named in tribute to the disabled TV channel known as Scuzz TV. This week’s entry in our ongoing feature series falls a little earlier than our specified window, but it does give me very good memories of seeing those cheesy music videos for theme songs of an Action movie, with imagery of the band playing the single being intersected with a series of short clips taken from the movie. In all honesty, I don’t think I have seen it at all in recent times. They were often pretty random too – I vaguely recall Simon Webbe performing one for 2007’s “Fantastic Four: Rise Of The Silver Surfer”, of all combos. Case in point – 1991 was Guns ‘N’ Roses turn as they created the theme song of “You Could Be Mine” for the game-changing blockbuster, “Terminator II: Judgment Day”. Guns ‘N’ Roses don’t need much of an introduction – and that makes my job a bit easier. Spearheaded by the iconic Vocalist Axl Rose and the legendary Guitarist Slash, the US Hard Rock phenomenon have a long list of accolades including record sales of over 100 million worldwide, a well-deserved place on the Rock and Roll Hall Of Fame, and international fame, which includes 7 albums to chart in the UK Top 40. Let’s listen to “You Could Be Mine” below.

“You Could Be Mine” was originally released as the theme song for James Cameron’s Sci-Fi epic, “Terminator II: Judgment Day” in June of 1991, before it was later re-released as part of Guns ‘N’ Roses’ “Illusion II” album later on, in September of that year. It was packaged as a physical single release, with “Civil War” as the B-side, and it went on to become a huge commercial gain – with a top five chart position in more than ten countries globally, including the #3 spot on the UK Top 40 Singles Chart. The long story goes that Arnold Schwarzenegger himself even invited the band over to his house for dinner to negotiate the deal for their involvement. “You Could Be Mine” is probably one of the band’s most straightforward offerings, with a one-minute intro of Glam-ish guitar riffs and a steady drum beat leading to lyrics that play off of toxic relationships and on-purpose heartbreak, as Rose chimes: “I’m a cold heart breaker, Fit to burn, and I’ll rip your heart in two” to fit the old-school action themes of it’s associated movie. Rose sustains his high notes for a big, hook-led chorus where he chants: “‘Cause you could be mine/But you’re way out of line” and “You get nothin’ done/I bet you could be mine” as Slash gets to his trademark Jamming, and Steven Adler delivers some fast drumming. The signature solo from Slash is easily the biggest takeaway from this, as he gets to shredding some heavy bass guitar riffs at a chaotic pace, and the part feels beautifally placed as well. The lyrics are standard stuff for Rock & Roll, with nothing that feels too textured or thematically complicated, but it suits the aggressive tone of Rose’s Glam-driven vocal delivery pretty well. It is pretty cheesy and conventional of it’s time as an overall package, but it hasn’t aged badly at all with the expertly crafted guitar solo from Slash and the sense of fun and nostalgia that it evokes when we’re looking at it from a present-day perspective. After all, Guns ‘N’ Roses are a classic – and I cannot dispute that. Overall, I feel this is still a lot of fun.

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Thank you for reading my latest blog post! As per usual, please feel free to join me again tomorrow – where we’ll be saying adios to November with an in-depth listen to brand new music from a popular Alternative Rock group who are from my native country of England. They had crossover hits with “Our Velocity”, “Girls Who Play Guitars” and “Books From Boxes” back in 2007, and their first two albums were certified as Gold in sales in the UK. If you really liked what you just read, why not follow the blog to get notified when every new daily post is up and why not like the Facebook page here?: https://www.facebook.com/OneTrackAtATime/