Legendary rock journalist Mick Wall tells GQ about his intimate encounters with the band, his love-hate relationship with Axl, and why he wrote his new book Last Of The Giants: The True Story Of Guns N’ Roses…

GQ: Why is this band so special?Mick Wall: Guns N’ Roses really are the last of the last of the giant megalithic rock bands. They came late to the party in 1987 and even that long ago they were a band out of time. They weren’t like the other bands of the era at all – not like Mötley Crüe, Bon Jovi or Def Leppard. The first time I saw them I couldn’t believe my eyes. I was so used to the idea that we would never find a group that would warp from 1969 or 1973. They hadn’t even had a record out. They were truly living it. Once Axl and Slash go, the book is closed on that kind of band.

Why did you write the book?This is the first time the three protagonists have been relaxed enough to talk about what went on. Axl Rose has been reborn. We now have Happy Axl. Even Axl’s never met Happy Axl before this year. The truth is always much stranger than fiction.

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What’s special about the period in which they broke through?They created the space for themselves. Record companies were looking for the new Bon Jovi – they thought they’d found it, but they didn’t know what they had. They thought Appetite would sell 200,000 copies. It sold 30 million. The first single, “It’s So Easy”, was based around a loud “F*** off!” and every song had profanity in it. They never thought they’d get played on the radio. Nobody saw it coming. Axl must get the credit for that because he wrote pop songs. There aren’t 30 million metal heads out there – most people bought it for the songs. And because they were sexy beasts.

How bad did things get for them?The Beatles and The Rolling Stones started off in suits and then came the mythology of drugs and money, but Guns N’ Roses were like that before they even got signed. Slash was in rehab before they’d recorded a note, Axl had been diagnosed with bi-polar disorder. Whitesnake and Bon Jovi and Def Leppard were drinking mineral water to preserve their voices or going down the gym, whereas Slash was drinking Jack Daniels and using heroin first thing in the morning.

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How bad did things get on the Use Your Illusion tour?The trouble was that Slash, Duff and [second drummer] Matt Sorum were so out of their minds that Axl felt it was spinning out of control. Axl isn’t an overindulged rock fiend. He’s a deeply damaged person. He was sexually abused as a child and his stepfather was a fanatical Pentecostal minister who used to beat him and make him go to church five times a week. He finds social interaction almost impossible. His levels of anxiety and paranoia are off the chart. On the tour, he’s the biggest star in the world and he’s surrounded by band members who keep dying. Izzy quits and [original drummer] Steven Adler is fired for trying to give Axl’s wife heroin and then sleep with her. In 1993, Axl got the rest of the band to sign new contracts and the whole band, and the name, is signed over to him. As Slash said to me: “That was the moment I lost Axl.”

What happened next?By the time of the next recording session Axl thinks he’s Brian Wilson or Phil Spector and he becomes a man alone for two decades. Just as they should have been at their peak they f***ed it up completely. They were the George Best of rock. I’m even more convinced now than I was then that a band like that can never happen again. In terms of a giant rock band that lives within its own world for good or ill, that’s gone and it’s never coming back.

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Were you secretly pleased when Axl mentioned you in the song “Get In The Ring”?Not at the time. I thought, “That’s not nice”. I could have punched him. But it made me one of the most famous rock journalists in America. Now I laugh about it, but I wished I’d managed it better and held out an olive branch to Axl. Last Of The Giants: The True Story Of Guns N' Roses (Trapeze, £20) by Mick Wall is out now.