GUNS N' ROSES' 'Chinese Democracy' Release Means Free Dr Pepper For All

A spokesperson for soft drink manufacturer Dr Pepper, which this past spring offered to send a free can of the beverage to "everyone in America" (excluding ex-GN'R members Slash and Buckethead) if GUNS N' ROSES' new album, "Chinese Democracy", were to arrive anytime during the calendar year 2008, has told MTV.com that full details of the company's rollout plan won't be released until GUNS N' ROSES goes on the record about the release date, despite the fact that BestBuy.com briefly began taking online pre-orders for the disc yesterday. The pre-order option was later taken off and the page now states that the CD is "coming soon." According to the site, the record will be issued on November 25, although recent reports indicated that it will surface on November 23. Two different covers will apparently be available, along with CD and vinyl versions, and what appears to be one of the covers has been posted at the page for "Cover A." The tiny image shows what seems to be a bicycle with a basket perched on it.

The Dr Pepper spokesperson told MTV.com that, while additional details will be forthcoming, the company's plan to distribute free cans of its product will involve some sort of an online coupon system. "People will go on Dr Pepper's web site and we will send them a coupon for a free one," the spokesperson confirmed. "It's going to be real easy."

No other details about the release are available at the Best Buy site. An item which appeared briefly at RollingStone.com, and was later taken down, quoted Best Buy exec Gary Arnold as saying, "The music is well worth waiting for. We've all heard the stories about this album, and now everybody gets to hear that it's real."

No official announcement has been made regarding "Chinese Democracy", but sources told Billboard earlier this month that the album will be available exclusively through Best Buy and iTunes on November 23.

The last all-new GUNS N' ROSES releases were the 1991 double albums "Use Your Illusion I" and "II". Since that time, every single original member of the band except for singer Axl Rose has departed. Former guitarist Slash told The Pulse of Radio why he finally found it too difficult to work with Rose. "Something with Axl was very insecure and it just kept the band from sort of functioning properly," he said. "Although he was wanting to do things, I never to this day really understand exactly what he was getting at, and because it took so long to ever get anything done, I always attribute it to some sort of fear factor."

"Chinese Democracy" has been in the works since the mid-'90s, with speculation and mystery surrounding the album's 13-year journey, ever-changing roster of players and spiraling recording costs.

A new song called "If The World" appears under the closing credits of the current film "Body of Lies", while another new track titled "Shackler's Revenge" will appear on Rock Band 2 at the end of this month.