It's been nine years since Axl Rose gave a substantial print interview. For all that time and more, he's been working on the album "Chinese Democracy," which finally arrived in late November.
The album came out in the United States as a Best Buy retail exclusive and debuted at No. 3 on the Billboard 200 with first-week sales of 261,000, according to Nielsen SoundScan. To date, it has sold 537,000 copies in the States, far fewer than the 1.3 million that Best Buy bought upfront, according to the Wall Street Journal. But the album has sold 2.6 million copies worldwide, according to Universal -- a number that counts only retail purchases
Some people thought "Chinese Democracy" would never come out. Were there times during the making of the album when you felt that way yourself?
Axl Rose: Not so much that it wouldn't come out but that we could in some way legally be forced to release it either incomplete or with so many business areas unresolved that the beginning would be the end as well.
clipped from: www.billboard.com 