GUNS N' ROSES Kicks Off Las Vegas Residency; Video Footage Available

GUNS N' ROSES launched its first-ever residency in Las Vegas last night (Wednesday, October 31) at The Joint inside the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino. Each night, the band is performing an electrifying show featuring a setlist created exclusively for The Joint. Appetite For Democracy spans the band's biggest hits from their debut album "Appetite For Destruction" (1987) through their platinum-selling record "Chinese Democracy" (2008).

The setlist for last night's concert was as follows:

01. Chinese Democracy
02. Welcome To The Jungle
03. It's So Easy
04. Mr. Brownstone
05. Estranged
06. Better
07. New Richard Fortus Solo
08. Live And Let Die
09. This I Love
10. Rocket Queen
11. Motivation
12. Dizzy Reed Solo
13. Street of Dreams
14. You Could Be Mine
15. Ballad of Death (DJ Ashba solo)
16. Sweet Child O' Mine
17. Another Brick In The Wall (Jam)
18. November Rain
19. Glad To Be Here (Bumblefoot Solo)
20. Don't Cry
21. Don't Let It Bring You Down (NEIL YOUNG cover)
22. Civil War
23. Knockin' On Heaven's Door
24. Jam/Nightrain

Encore:

25. Jam/Madagascar
26. Patience
27. Paradise City

Fan-filmed video footage can be seen below.

GUNS N' ROSES singer Axl Rose told USA Today in a new interview that the band's 2008 album "Chinese Democracy" took so long to complete — 13 years, to be exact — because he was being mentally abused by former members Slash and Duff McKagan during the initial songwriting stage.

Rose explained, "[Slash and McKagan] did more damage to my ability as a writer . . . It beat me down so much. At the time of the ['Use Your Illusion'] tours, Slash and Duff said, 'You're an idiot, you're a loser.' I didn't write for years. I felt I was hindered for a very long time. I was also trying to figure out what I wanted to say, when it's right to be venting and when you're digging a bigger hole. Lyrics on 'Chinese' took a long time."

Rose said that the success of the band's classic 1987 debut, "Appetite For Destruction", was what began to tear the group apart. He explained, "I thought the success of that record would bring everyone together more. It did the exact opposite. They got success and wanted to run in their own directions."

Slash had his own take on what happened in the band, as he told The Pulse Of Radio a while back. "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."

On the inevitable question of whether he could ever make peace with his former bandmates, Rose said, "I feel that ball's not in my court. I'm surviving this war, not the one who created this war."

Rose said that the current edition of GUNS, in which he is the sole original member, is writing music for a follow-up to "Chinese Democracy", hinting, "[The next album] will come out sooner."