InGuns N' Roses' most grandiose hit,Axl Rosesings, “Nothin' lasts forever, and we both know hearts can change.” And yet, 30 years since"November Rain"hit the radio, the rock anthem PEOPLE called “larger-than-life” and “surprisingly tender” remains one of the band’s defining, fan-favorite compositions.
On the anniversary of the release of “November Rain,” we delve into the backstory of Rose’s labor of love and explore some of its more obscure pop culture connections, including the momentTaylor Swiftbecame part of the song’s history and how it ended up getting played in the Oval Office.
A DECADE IN THE MAKING
GNR fans didn’t hear officially “November Rain” until Sept. 17, 1991, when it was released as the 10th track on the double-header rock opusUse Your Illusion IandII, but Rose had started plunking away at the tune on the piano as early as 1983, according to bandmates.
An early version from 1986 “was about 18 minutes long,“Slashshared in his eponymous 2007 biography, “so needless to say we really needed to sit down and focus on arranging it.”
In one story with potentially questionable historical accuracy, when Rose was on the verge of completing the tortured masterpiece in 1991, he insisted on recording his vocals alone. “Eight days later,” according toUproxx, “they returned to [find] Axl asleep, covered in his own waste and empty pizza boxes.”
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The song ultimately clocked in at 8 minutes and 57 seconds, though in 2018 the group treated Rose lovers to two early attempts: a10-minute piano demoand a5-minute acoustic guitar rendition, both from 1986.
29 YEARS AT THE TOP
And which month did Swift chose to release her extended version? November. Oh the irony!
Will Heath/NBC/NBCU Photo Bank via Getty
“THE SOUND OF A BAND BREAKING UP”
Tom Zutaut, the A&R manager who signed Guns N' Roses to Geffen Records, was one of many people who discouraged Rose & Co. from including “November Rain” onAppetite for Destruction. He later toldLA Weeklyhe feared it was “overly complex and could alienate.”
In 2008’sWatch You Bleed: The Saga of Guns N' Roses, Slash deemed the orchestral complexity of the song “all this kind of crap we didn’t necessarily want as a band,” and drummer Matt Sorum said his gut reaction was, “I didn’t really sign up for this — all these ballads. I was hoping to join a badass rock ‘n’ roll band. I was like, ‘What’s with the piano?'”
And thoughNPR(that noted chronicler ofrawk) would go on to describe the song as “one of the ultimate hard-rock power ballads,” Slash once described “Rain” as “the sound of a band breaking up.” Though it’s worth noting that, according toThe RingerandRolling Stone, he also used that turn of phrase to describe the group’s cover ofThe Rolling Stones’“Sympathy for the Devil,“which was released in December 1994. (Around that time, the band embarked upon an extended period of lineup shifts, side projects and internal squabbles that many fans and critics believe signaled its descent.)
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GUNS & THE ‘SUN’
GNR members and those close to Rose said he had been hoping to emulate bombastic 1970s arena rock hits likeLed Zeppelin’s “Stairway to Heaven,“Queen’s “Bohemian Rhapsody” andAerosmith’s “Dream On” for years leading up to theUse Your Illusionera.
But Sorum says a less predictable artist had direct influenced the creative process: “We listened toElton Johnfor inspiration for the drum fills and overall tone,” he toldRolling Stonein 2016. “I vividly remember sitting with Axl listening to ‘Don’t Let the Sun Go Down on Me’ and Axl pointing out the style of the tom[-tom drum] fills.”
According to 2008’sW.A.R.: The Unauthorized Biography of William Axl Rose,the singer said in the lead-up to “Rain” that, “If we get that right, I can walk away from this. Because I’ve done it, man. I can work astadiumnow, you know? I’ve done it.” (Even before that, he toldRolling Stonein 1988: “If [November Rain] is not recorded right, I’ll quit the business.")
More literally — and especially personally for Rose — rock journalist Del James' “Without You” provided the narrative for the song’s 9-minute, 16-second music video. The short fiction story revolves around an addled rock star dealing with the fallout of his infidelity driving his wife to kill herself shortly after their wedding.
Rose wrote in his 1995introduction to James’The Language of Fear: “For years, we’ve been thinking about making either or a full-length movie based on ‘Without You,’ and that kept me focused on not wanting to become the character, Mayne, although I basically was that person.”
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“After about a half-hour [Anton] said to me, ‘Andy, this is incredible. You’ve got five cameras, cranes, helicopter, this big crew. Is this the whole video?’ I said, ‘No, it’s about 27 seconds of it.'”
For his part, Slash toldHuffPostin 2014, “I just showed up for my scenes.”
Fun fact: Through Morahan, the video has artistic connections toGeorge Michael,Mariah CareyandBryan Adams. He also helmed Wham!’s"Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go,“Michael’s"Faith,“Carey’s"Vision of Love"and Adams’"(Everything I Do) I Do It for You"before stepping in to guide GNR’sIllusiontrilogy of"Don’t Cry,““November Rain” and"Estranged.”
In July 2018, it also became the first video from the ’90s tosurpass a billion views on YouTube, nearly doubling that achievement just before the single’s 30th anniversary in February 2022.
Still, Slash wasn’t especially personally invested in the “complex” video-making process. “I never paid attention to the rest of the whole production. So at the end of the day, I never really knew,” he told HuffPost. “I knew there was a wedding in there somewhere, and I was not into the concept of the wedding.”
UN-BRIDALED
The supermodel is widely seen as a proxy for Rose’s exErin Everly. Their volatile marriage had been annulled in January 1991, and the rocker hasdescribedthe song as being about “not wanting to be in a state of having to deal with unrequited love.”
Seymour had previously appeared in the video forIllusion’s lead single, “Don’t Cry,” and was slated to finish out the trilogy, but when her relationship with Rose ended rancorously, she “had other plans so we had to change ours,” the frontman wrote in his introduction toThe Language of Fear.
Another perennially confusing element of Seymour’s role in GNR’s videos and “November Rain” in particular:Why does the bride have a mirror over half her face at her funeral?
Either way, the custom casket was just another expensive element of the production, adding $8,000 (nearly $16,000 today) to the bill, according to theWashington Post— interestingly, that’s the samereportedprice tag for Seymour’s Carmela Sutera “waterfall” wedding gown, also known as a “mullet dress.”
CHANGE OF A DRESS
Nearly a decade after the video for “Rain” dropped, the video and its style’s enduring impact was once again on show via the rapid-fire dialogue of theGilmore Girls.
In the season 2 premiere,Lorelai(Lauren Graham) quipped to daughter Rory (Alexis Bledel) that she envisioned a gown like “the one Stephanie Seymour wore in the Guns N' Roses video” for her wedding to Max (Scott Cohen).
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Coincidentally, Seymour’s bride changed into a black velvet number for the rained-out “November” wedding reception, so it’s not a massive stretch to say Lorelai’s wedding still had a hint of the video’s rock ‘n’ roll aesthetic.
A YUUUUGE FAN
For the wildest connection of all, look no farther than America’s most renowned residence.
In her 2020 memoir,Speaking for Myself, former White House Press SecretarySarah Huckabee SanderssaidDonald Trumptold her and Communications DirectorHope Hicksin 2018 that he considered “Rain” “the greatest music video of all time,” thenqueued it upin the Oval Office so the three of them could watch.
The former President’s appreciation for the song had crystallized decades before when, according toNew Yorkmagazine, Trump wanted to finance aTruth or Dare-style documentary about Guns N' Roses and became friendly with Rose the year “November Rain” was released.
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Though the film was never produced, Trump held onto his love of the band and had a habit ofplaying “Rain” at his rallies— despite the fact that Roseexplicitly stated his disapproval.
Early on in the same year Sanders and Hicks had been called into the Oval, Rosetweetedthat the Trump White House was “the current US gold standard of what can be considered disgraceful.”
As Rose famously sang, “nothin' lasts forever, even cold November rain” — not to mention famous friendships.
source: people.com
