Pro(to)motion

As the release date crept closer, the amount of stateside promotion was put into question.

"'The release of Chinese Democracy marks a historic moment in rock n’ roll,' said co-managers Irving Azoff and Andy Gould. 'We’re launching with a monumental campaign developed by Gary Arnold and the Best Buy team that matches the groundbreaking sound of the album itself.'" (Best Buy, Press Release, 10/22/08)

"The new Guns N' Roses album, "Chinese Democracy", has been streamed nearly two million times on the band's official MySpace page since it was first uploaded early this morning (Thursday, November 20). The stream will be available until the LP is released on Sunday, November 23." (Guns N' Roses, MySpace, 11/20/08)

"Thus far, Best Buy has run a relatively restrained marketing campaign for “Chinese Democracy.” Just a few days before its release, there were no signs announcing the album inside the West Hollywood location (there was a sign outside the store). The album is now up for streaming on MySpace, but not playing into the hype was the design, says Arnold. 'It all starts this weekend,' Arnold says. 'We're trying to time everything for the grand release this Sunday. There wasn’t a giant buildup, in terms of over-promising. We wanted the music to stand on its own.'" (LA Times, 11/20/08)

All n' all, pre-release promotion was scant, aside some thirty-second advertising clips, consisting of text, album artwork and a brief sound clip from one of the songs. Stateside listening parties were held in nine cities, in between November 17th and 20th. On November 23rd, the album was featured as the official soundtrack of the 2008 Grey Cup, the Canadian equivalent to SuperBowl.

Out for Cover

The mythical bicycle album art, previewed by Axl in 2002.

"BestBuy.com is currently taking pre-orders for the long-awaited Guns N' Roses album "Chinese Democracy" at this location. According to the site, the album will be released on November 25 and will be made available on CD and vinyl format. Furthermore, fans have a choice between three different CD and LP covers, although exact details have not yet been revealed." (Blabbermouth, 10/15/08)

The third cover may possibly be the 'Sorry' automatic rifle, another visual design mentioned by Axl.
"There are two more covers/bk cover combos and the real booklet, that is all artwork, that will be out shortly in some form. It's been an ugly battle that hasn't made any sense to anyone, and whether anyone cares about such things, the booklet or artwork has always been something I've been passionate about." (Axl, HTGTH, 12/12/08)

The additional covers never reached wholesale. Axl himself commented the matter later on.

"To release the album with unapproved and unseen final artwork with a first work-only error-filled draft, when others, more recent, were readily available still has not been explained, but is finally getting cleared up. My fave is the 'How Are You' grenade cover." (Axl, HTGTH, 12/12/08)

"According to industry scuttlebutt, the negotiations for the Best Buy deal were frantic and down to the wire. 'These guys didn't have finished music until a month before,' says one source. 'It was insane. In all honesty, Axl was working on everything - the art, everything - right to the end.'" (Nashville Scene, 01/29/09)

"Atlas Shrugged, I was going to tell a little story about that song. Right now on my laptop, I actually have the old guitar solo that I played for that song, when, two days before the album was going to be mastered, I was like, let's see if we can squeeze it on to the album. I busted out some guitar tracks for it, I have my own studio...

But, because the CD could only be 74 minutes max, and it would've taken it past the limit of what a CD can store, we couldn't put Atlas Shrugged on Chinese Democracy. It wasn't worth making a two-CD album with just one song on the other CD, so hopefully, on ChiDem 2, it'll have Atlas Shrugged on there. Interesting song." (Bumblefoot, Eat More Heat, 03/02/13)

BUY Product

On September 14th, Rock Band 2 was released. The accompanying GNR track, Shackler's Revenge, was the first piece of officially released new music from the band since Oh My God. OMG was premiered at the Video Music Awards event on 09/09/99, nearly nine years prior to date to the Rock Band 2 release.

"[Shackler's Revenge on Rock Band 2] is the beginning of what is expected to be a series of announcements about Guns N' Roses, the main point being that the album will be finally released and before Christmas.

[...] By getting the album out in November, Guns N' Roses will have a chance to claw back some of the control of the distribution [in response to the recent leaks] and finally put this long overdue release in the hands of the fans." (Undercover Press, 09/13/08)

First of the announcements was the big one.

"Today at the Best Buy media holiday kickoff event in Dallas, TX, it was apparently announced that the Best Buy exclusive release was official! The deal was done within the last 48 hrs. [Andy Gould of] GNR management was on hand, they played the group three songs, Chinese Democracy, [If The World and There Was A Time.]

But management stated [If The World] would play for the credit roll in the new Di Caprio flick Body of Lies [opening wide on 10/10/08.]. The album will be released on Nov 25, only at Best Buy." (MyGNR, 09/25/08)

"Best Buy is set to be the exclusive retailer for Guns N' Roses decade-plus-in-the-making new album "Chinese Democracy" before year's end, sources close to the situation tell Billboard. Some details of the deal are still being worked out, including the release date." (Billboard, 09/26/08)

"The retailer paid $14 million for 1.6 million copies of the GUNS N' ROSES album, according to Hits." (Blabbermouth, 12/11/08)

And so, Irving Azoff succeeded in covering both major US sales for Chinese Democracy, as well as Axl's monumental studio bill - both Axl and Geffen were now set to profit.

The Antiquiet Nine

A few days from the Shackler's Revenge announcement, versions of nine songs from the album were leaked.

"Nine purported 'mastered, finished' tracks from Guns N' Roses' 14-years-in-the-making album 'Chinese Democracy' were leaked online yesterday (June 18) by the Web site Antiquiet.com, prompting a quick cease-and-desist from the band's handlers and the removal of the links.

Six of the songs have already leaked in one unfinished form or another: 'Better,' 'The Blues,' the title track, 'Madagascar,' 'IRS' and 'There Was a Time.' [...] The three previously unheard songs are 'Rhiad and the Bedouins,' 'If the World' and a track whose title is unknown." (Billboard, 06/19/08)

The unknown track was later revealed to be Prostitute, a song worked on since 1993.

The leaks were outstaged only by the showmanship with which the leaker was brought in.

"The FBI busted into the California home of one Kevin “Skwerl” Cogill at 6:59 yesterday morning, hauling the blogger off to U.S. District Court over charges that the 27-year-old violated copyright laws by posting nine tracks from the catastrophically-delayed Guns ’n’ Roses album Chinese Democracy to his blog, Antiquiet, back in June." (The New York Observer, 08/28/08)

Apparently, media attention was guaranteed on the get-go.

"We weren’t going to make a big spectacle of this, since it’s obviously a pretty serious situation, but the plankton hacks over at the Los Angeles Times managed to pick up on the story and run it a highly suspicious impressive two hours after the incident went down." (Antiquiet, 08/27/08)

"'Guns N' Roses representatives have been made aware of the arrests and are leaving the matter to the authorities,' said band spokesman Larry Solters." (GunsNRoses.com, 08/27/08)

Shackler's Revenge was leaked roughly a month after the 'Antiquet Nine'.

"Basically, for us [the leaks are] devastating across the board. And when you have such a majority openly justifying their actions and throwing out nonsense such as it's not actually stealing as the original is still with whomever, it's unbelievably insane." (Axl, Chinesedemocracy.com, 12/13/08)