tony286

But Mr. Rose's renewed energies were not being directed toward the
finish line. He had the crew send him CD's almost daily, sometimes
with 16 or more takes of a musician performing his part of a single
song. He accompanied Buckethead on a jaunt to Disneyland when the
guitarist was drifting toward quitting, several people involved
recalled; then Buckethead announced he would be more comfortable
working inside a chicken coop, so one was built for him in the studio,
from wood planks and chicken wire.

Mr. Rose was far less indulgent of his producers and label. Around
Christmas, he ousted both Mr. Baker and Mr. Zutaut (who said there had
been a miscommunication). It would be weeks before the singer would
even allow an Interscope executive to visit him in the studio,
according to people involved with the production. Interscope
dispatched a senior talent executive, Mark Williams, to oversee the
project. Mr. Williams declined to comment for this article.

If Mr. Rose appeared more remote, his vision of the project became
more grandiose, people involved with the band said. He directed that
music produced by Mr. Baker be redone again, those people said. He now
spoke of releasing not merely one album but a trilogy. And he planned
one very big surprise.

At MTV's annual awards show in 2002, publicists buzzed through the
audience whispering about a big finale. And with just minutes to go in
the broadcast, a screen lifted away to reveal the band and Mr. Rose,
in cornrows and a sports jersey, looking strikingly young. The
musicians burst into "Welcome to the Jungle," one of the original
band's biggest hits, and the crowd went wild. But on television Mr.
Rose quickly seemed out of breath and out of tune. He ended the
performance, which included the new song "Madagascar" and the original
band's hit "Paradise City" in a messianic stance, raising his arms and
closing his eyes. He left the audience with a cryptic but tantalizing
message: "Round one."

Round two never came. The band went on a successful tour, but in the
hours after their triumphant Madison Square Garden appearance, Mr.
Rose was reportedly refused entry to the Manhattan nightclub Spa
because he was wearing fur, which the club does not allow. That killed
the mood. He didn't show up for the band's next performance, and the
promoter canceled the rest of the tour.

Months dragged on as the band waited for Mr. Rose to record more
vocals. In August 2003 when label executives announced their intention
to release a Guns N' Roses greatest-hits CD for the holidays, the
band's representatives managed to hold them off with yet another
promise to deliver "Chinese Democracy" by the end of the year. But the
album, of course, did not materialize. And then the game was over.

"HAVING EXCEEDED ALL budgeted and approved recording costs by millions
of dollars," the label wrote in a letter dated Feb. 2 , 2004, "it is
Mr. Rose's obligation to fund and complete the album, not Geffen's."
The tab at Village studio was closed out, and Mr. Rose tried a brief
stint recording at the label's in-house studio before that too was
ended. The band's computer gear, guitars and keyboards were packed
away. Over a legal challenge by Mr. Rose, the label issued a
greatest-hits compilation, in search of even a modest return on their
eight-figure investment.

Released in March of 2004, it turned out to be a surprisingly strong
seller, racking up sales of more than 1.8 million copies even without
any new music or promotional efforts by the original band. The
original band's debut, "Appetite for Destruction," which has sold 15
million copies, remains popular and racked up sales of another 192,000
copies last year, according to Nielsen SoundScan. It is a sign that
Mr. Rose's audience still waits.

Mr. Rose is reportedly working on the album even now in a San Fernando
Valley studio. "The 'Chinese Democracy' album is very close to being
completed," Merck Mercuriadis, the chief executive officer of
Sanctuary Group, which manages Mr. Rose, wrote in a recent statement.
He added that other artists including Peter Gabriel and Stevie Wonder
"have throughout their careers consistently taken similar periods of
time without undeserved scrutiny as the world respects that this is
what it can sometimes take to make great art." There's certainly more
than enough material; as Mr. Zutaut says, even years ago "people felt
like the record had been made four or five times already." But of
course, rumors of the album's imminent release have circulated since
almost the very beginning of the tale, more than a decade ago.

And at the center of that tale, now as then, is the confounding figure
of Axl Rose himself. A magnetic talent, a moody unpredictable artist,
a man of enormous ideas and confused follow-through, he has proven
himself to be an uncontrollable variable in any business plan.

His involvement on "Chinese Democracy" has outlasted countless
executives, producers and fellow musicians - even the corporate
structure that first brought the band to worldwide celebrity. Even, in
fact, the recognizable configuration of the recording industry as a
whole, which since the band first went into the studio in 1994 has
consolidated to four major corporations from six, and staggered amid
an epidemic of piracy, leaving it more focused than ever on the bottom
line, and on reliable musicians with a proven track record of
consistent performance. The sort of rock stars that the original
members of Guns N' Roses, who recently submitted a claim seeking $6
million in what were called unpaid royalties from its catalog, used to
be. But which Mr. Rose, with his mood swings, erratic work habits and
long dark stretches, no longer is.

He hasn't disappeared entirely. His voice can be heard on the latest
edition in the "Grand Theft Auto" video game series, in the character
of a grizzled 70's-style rock D.J. "Remember," he advises the radio
station's audience, "we're not outdated and neither is our music."

Interscope has taken "Chinese Democracy" off its schedule. Mr. Rose
hasn't been seen there since last year, when he was spotted leaving
the parking area beneath Interscope's offices, where witnesses
reported that a small traffic jam had congealed when attendants halted
other cars to clear a path for his silver Ferrari. Mr. Rose punched
the gas and cruised into the day.

Copyright 2005 The New York Times