Wow, Happy Thanksgiving Axl Rose as you may have just added to your legend as the biggest cry baby in all of rock and roll.
Apparently, Axl must have 20 million reasons to really dislike Slash, as he has filed a lawsuit against Activision Blizzard as fallout from the Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock licensing. According to the Hollywood Reporter, when Axl signed off on “Welcome to the Jungle” being in Guitar Hero III a stipulation was that Slash or his group Velvet Revolver would not have their music or images in the game at all.
Allegedly Activision gave a big old middle finger to Axl (maybe Axl isn’t used to being on the other end of one of those), as not only were Velvet Revolver songs in the game, but Slash was the official spokesperson, graced the cover and was a playable avatar. On a funny side note, Chuck and I had the pleasure of seeing Slash come out on stage to be Bill Gates “ringer” in Guitar Hero III during his farewell keynote at CES in 2008.
As far as the the lawsuit (which was filed for $20 million), Axl claims that Activision lied about Slash, the Velvet Revolver songs and also used "Sweet Child O’ Mine" in GH III promotion, despite it only being licensed for GH II. Why he waited almost three years after the game launched to file suit is a mystery. But then again, anything Axl Rose does is usually a mystery. I am sure we will hear more on this later, but it will either be another misstep in Axl’s career, or a big time gaff on Activation’s part. I am betting on the former...
