Guns N’ Roses busted out the live debut of an old favorite during their Tuesday (May 27) show in Abu Dhabi, seemingly pay tribute to late New York Dolls singer David Johansen two months after the pioneering punk icon died at 75 following a long battle with cancer.
Without commenting on Johnasen, Axl Rose and company performed their take on the Dolls’ 1974 song “Human Being,” which appeared on the Johansen-led group’s Too Much Too Soon album. GNR first covered the slashing rocker on their 1993 covers album The Spaghetti Incident? but had never performed it live before. In a fan video of the performance, Rose can be heard snarling, “Well, if you don’t like it/ Go ahead, find yourself a saint/ Go ahead, now try to find a boy/ Who’s gonna be what I ain’t,” over a galloping beat and slashing guitars.
“And if I’m acting like a king/ Well, that’s cause I’m a human being/ And if I want too many things/ Don’t you know that I’m a human being,” Rose sings breathlessly on the chorus of the song.
With his gender-bending look and swaggering punk attitude Johansen was a clear influence on Rose and the Guns crew, from their early embrace of teased hair and make-up to the track list for the rest of the Incident album, which featured covers of songs by other punk legends including The Damned, U.K. Subs, The Stooges, Dead Boys, Misfits, Sex Pistols and the Dolls/Heartbreakers’ Johnny Thunders, who co-wrote “Human Being” with Johansen.
GNR are currently on the road in Europe with Public Enemy, Rival Sons and the Sex Pistols featuring Frank Carter on their Because What You Want & What You Get Are Completely Different Things tour, which will hit Shekvetili Park in Georgia on Friday (May 30).