Guns N' Roses: Collector's Edition Box Set
(Chrome Dreams)

What we hoped for with the emergence of cheap digital-media technology was an unprecedented democratization of creative expression. What did we get? Yay-hoos aping Jackass on YouTube, and pointless DVDs shat out by everybody with a camera, computer, and archived footage.

This pair of unauthorized GNR docs doesn't reveal anything unfamiliar to anyone who's even halfheartedly followed the group's career arc. The Axl-specific feature is almost bearable, but the band-history disc is an amazingly thorough example of everything a documentary shouldn't be. Cliché title? You know it: Sex N' Drugs N' Rock N' Roll. (Unsurprisingly, there's none of those things in it, either.) Shitty computer graphics? Check. Horrible, generic metal as incidental music? Oh, yeah. Uninteresting interview subjects who are only barely related to the story? Right on. A bored narrator who can't even be bothered to learn a member's name? Naturally. Less than three minutes of actual band interview? If that.

If you ever get the urge to watch these abortions, do yourself a favor:
Instead, put on Appetite and try to remember half of what you've read about GNR over the last 20 years. Then, whack yourself in the crotch with a ball-peen hammer a couple of times. It'll be more informative, and less painful.—Scott Harrell

LINK
• Chrome Dreams' bootleg empire