Use Your Illusion II

Guns N' Roses 在1991年9月17日推出的双专辑《Use Your Illusion I》和《Use Your Illusion II》显示了这支一夜走红的乐队的野心，乐队为了这套专辑整整准备了3年的时间，专辑录制的难度可想而知。工作一开始乐队成员关系就非常紧张，Izzy Stradlin（guitars）希望专辑的风格能更靠近乐队原来的那种带有强烈的 Blues 的 Hard Rock，而 Axl Rose 则希望能像Queen和Elton John那样的多样化，还好最后两者都达成拉了共识。这儿有五个都很有个性的小伙子，在最后总是能够很好的相容，如果说专辑有什么不足的话那可能就是专辑作得太艺术化了，热爱《Appetite for Destruction》的歌迷显然无法消化。专辑中不仅有他们传统的冲动的快歌，也有象《Don't Cry》这样的慢版抒情经典，还有气势宏大的《November Rain》，同时还翻唱 Paul MaCartney的《Live and Let Die》，素材复杂，曲风多变，编排精心，值得歌迷用4年的时间来等待它。特别是其中的Guns N' Roses最出色的两首歌《Novermber Rain》和 《Don't Cry》。有这两首你已经又赚了一张专辑。
by Stephen Thomas Erlewine

Use Your Illusion II is more serious and ambitious than I, but it's also considerably more pretentious. Featuring no less than four songs that run over six minutes, II is heavy on epics, whether it's the charging funk metal of "Locomotive," the antiwar "Civil War," or the multipart "Estranged." As if an attempt to balance the grandiose epics, the record is loaded with an extraordinary amount of filler. "14 Years" may have a lean, Stonesy rhythm, and Duff McKagan's Johnny Thunders homage, "So Fine," may be entertaining, but there's no forgiving the ridiculous "Get in the Ring," where Axl Rose threatens rock journalists by name because they gave him bad reviews; the misinterpretation of Dylan's "Knockin' on Heaven's Door"; another version of "Don't Cry"; and the bizarre closer, "My World," which probably captures Rose's instability as effectively as the tortured poetry of his epics. That said, there are numerous strengths to Use Your Illusion II; a couple of songs have a nervy energy, and for all their pretensions, the overblown epics are effective, though strangely enough, they reveal notorious homophobe Rose's aspirations of being a cross between Elton John and Freddie Mercury. But the pompous production and poor pacing make the album tiring for anyone who isn't a dedicated listener.