This is the kind of week that’s worth waiting for: there is so much going right in the automotive world that processing it requires some kind of mania. FCA dropped a family-friendly Hellcat SUV and is getting ready to push the shiny red button on the nuclear option in the horsepower war. The New York International Auto Show is in full swing. We have racing coming to you live from Las Vegas, and that’s just the tip of the iceberg of things coming from us for you in the upcoming weeks. Life is good and in order to get this party kicked off right, I decided to dip back into an old back catalog of music for something equally manic, equally driving, and equally motivating.
Velvet Revolver was one part Stone Temple Pilots (singer Scott Weiland), one part Wasted Youth (rhythm guitarist Dave Kushner) and three parts Guns N’ Roses (Duff McKagan on bass, Matt Soren on drums and Slash on lead guitar). Say what you will about Weiland’s vocals trampling over the rest of the band (a common critique), but when the mixture was right, it was dead-on: McKagan and Kushner kept the movement going, Soren beat the drums into submission, and Slash…well, he just did his thing. And for a brief, brief moment, it looked like Weiland had managed to find his moment, his role, the spot that could keep him clean and wound up for performances.
Unfortunately, we know how this supergroup ended: Weiland left the band, and with the exception of a one-time reunion show in 2012, stayed out, instead turning his attention to a new band, the Wildabouts, before his death in December, 2015. McKagan and Slash rejoined Guns N’ Roses. Velvet Revolver wasn’t meant to be a slow-burning star that lasted forever, though…it was that bright supernova flash that grabbed your attention and didn’t let go until it burned out. “Dirty Little Thing” is the kind of song that you blast as you’re flying down the Interstate en route to one hell of an evening…and since that’s what we are looking forward to, and what we hope you are looking forward to as well, it’s only fitting, isn’t it?
