Slash says the corporate music business sucks as bands shape their sound for Top 40 radio instead of following their art.

Fresh off his appearance at Download, Slash spoke with Radio Nova about the current state of the record industry, which he claims has lost all sense of rebellion.

He says: “I think the music business itself sucks. It’s turned very corporate, materialistic. Even artists are trying to conform to the record industry now. It used to be the artist was for the artist and there was a conflict of interest between the creative artist and the record company wanting to make a lot of money, and eventually they’d sort of work it out.

“Because then, they used to develop artists, and now it’s just like Top 40 — everybody’s trying to be Top 40. Even heavy metal bands are trying to be Top 40. So it’s not a big turn-on, like it was for me in the 60s and 70s and 80s where it was exciting and there was a sense of rebellion and whatever.

Slash continues: “So I just do what I do, which is completely against the grain of what the industry is all about. But, as a whole, it’ll get better eventually. It always has its ups and downs.

“For new artists it’s really hard, and even if you have a good band, it’s like if you don’t have a Top 40 success on your first single, you’re done. And in order to get Top 40 success on your first single, you have to make compromises for your material for the record business itself.”

Still touring in support of 2014’s World On Fire, Slash recently released Live At The Roxy and already has four tracks written for his next album with Myles Kennedy And The Conspirators.

The guitarist continues to be inspired by his lifelong obsession with horror movies, telling Fandango Movieclips: “The first time I saw The Exorcist was in the back of a Volkswagen in a drive-in theater. Mike Oldfield’s Tubular Bells theme was so perfectly creepy for The Exorcist itself. A really great score like that one becomes an essential character in the movie.”

Slash produced his debut film, 2013’s Nothing Left To Fear, and its soundtrack album and his second project, The Hell Within, is set to begin production in the new year.

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