Slash (album)
Slash is the debut and, so far, only solo album by American rock and roll musician Saul "Slash" Hudson, best known as the lead guitarist of Guns N' Roses. Released in 2010, the album was produced by Eric Valentine and features multiple musicians, including four of the five members of the "Appetite for Destruction"-era Guns N' Roses lineup: Slash himself, Izzy Stradlin, Duff McKagan and Steven Adler. History and recording. In his 2007 autobiography, Slash mentioned he was planning a solo album, and listed some of the vocalists with whom he would like to work. He stated that  the album would be called "Slash & Friends" (although "& Friends" was later dropped from the title). Slash's wife Perla mentioned in a 2008 interview that the album would include "everyone from Ozzy Osbourne to Fergie". The song "Crazy" featuring Chester Bennington was recorded for the album but was blocked to avoid conflict with a pending release by Bennington's group Linkin Park; "A Thousand Suns" was released a few months later after Slash's album was issued. Slash re-rerecorded the song with Lemmy on vocals as "Doctor Alibi". Slash reported rights to "Crazy" were owned by Bennington's family  after his 2017 suicide, with any possible release of the song needing their approval. On November 11, 2009, preceding the release of the album, Slash released the Japan-only single "Sahara", featuring Japanese vocalist Koshi Inaba (from B'z) who contributed Japanese and English lyrics. It charted at number four on the Oricon Singles Chart, as well number six on the Billboard Japan Hot 100 and number four on the Top Singles Sales chart. It has been awarded Western "Single of the Year" award at the 24th Japan Gold Disc Award by RIAJ. On January 16, Slash made an appearance at  the NAMM (National Association of Music Merchants) show. On January 19, 2010, Slash teamed up with Linkin Park's Music for Relief, along with Alanis Morissette, The All-American Rejects and others, and donated a previously unreleased track, "Mother Maria" featuring Beth Hart, to aid the victims of the earthquake in Haiti. The song was later featured as an iTunes bonus track for the record, and appeared on a Platinum Deluxe Edition. Just prior to release, the song "Back from Cali" featuring singer Myles Kennedy was added to the album's track listing, making Kennedy the only person to be  featured on more than one song on the album's standard track listing. Slash also announced that Izzy Stradlin is the only other person who played guitar on the record, performing rhythm guitar on the song "Ghost", featuring singer Ian Astbury. "I Hold On" was featured on the season one episode of "Hawaii Five-0", "Malama Ka Aina", which aired on October 4, 2010; it was featured as characters Steve and Danny drive to a pizza shop. The album was made available in the United States via EMI, and in the U.K. via Roadrunner. The cover art was produced from a  painting by Ron English, a prominent Pop Surrealist artist and friend of Slash. Best Buy released an exclusive version including the album and a Slash T-shirt. Best Buy also sells an exclusive digital version of the album that includes two bonus tracks: "Baby Can't Drive" (featuring Alice Cooper/Nicole Scherzinger/Steven Adler/Flea) and a cover of Guns N' Roses' "Paradise City" (featuring Fergie/Cypress Hill). In an interview following the release of the record, Slash revealed that he would have wanted Thom Yorke to sing "Saint Is a Sinner Too" but that he was too nervous to  call the Radiohead singer. In a later interview with the Finnish "Soundi" magazine, Slash stated that he would have wanted the record to feature his friend, former-Hanoi Rocks lead singer Michael Monroe, but there was not a song that Slash thought fit him. As of April 18, 2010, the album has gone gold in Australia. A music video for the remix version of "Gotten" featuring Adam Levine, released in March 2012. The video was part of the donation for the Los Angeles Youth Network. 2010 World Tour. On February 4, 2010, Slash announced via a MySpace blog that "Myles  Kennedy is going to be fronting the band for the upcoming tour. Something I'm really stoked about. Myles sang a killer track on the record and I think he is by far one of the best rock and roll singers out there today. I'm really honored and proud to be working with him." Prior to the tour, Slash confirmed that his own solo material and songs from Guns N' Roses ("Civil War", "Sweet Child O' Mine", and "Nightrain" among others), Velvet Revolver, and Slash's Snakepit, as well as Alter Bridge material ("Rise Today") would be played. The  touring line-up for the initial tour, besides Slash and Myles Kennedy included Bobby Schneck (Slash's Blues Ball) on rhythm guitar, Brent Fitz (Alice Cooper) on drums and, initially, Dave Henning (Big Wreck) on bass, though prior to the start of the tour Todd Kerns (Age of Electric, Static in Stereo, Sin City Sinners) took over bass duties instead of Dave Henning. Slash performed "By the Sword" on "The Tonight Show with Jay Leno" on April 6, and on "The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson" on April 9. While performing the song on Jay Leno's show, Slash  was wearing an "I'm With Coco" pin, to show support for former "Tonight Show" host Conan O'Brien. There are very few close-ups of Slash during the song, but TMZ caught one second where the pin was displayed on camera. Slash also played "By the Sword" on "Lopez Tonight" on April 9, 2010, and performed "Back from Cali" on the show on April 12. Slash and Adam Levine performed "Gotten" on "The Ellen DeGeneres Show" on May 11. Release and reception. Upon release, "Slash" entered the "Billboard" 200 charts at number 3 (also at number one on the Rock , Hard Rock, Digital and the Independent Albums Chart) with 61,000 copies sold during the first week. The album also debuted at number one in Canada, Austria, New Zealand and Sweden while it also broke into the top 20 in Germany, Finland, Australia, France, Norway, Poland and Switzerland. The album's first single, "By the Sword" featuring Andrew Stockdale, peaked at number 41 on the Rock Songs Chart and number 78 on the Canadian Hot 100. "Beautiful Dangerous", featuring Fergie, charted at number 11 and number 58 on the Heatseekers Songs and Canadian Hot 100. The cover of "Paradise City" featuring  Fergie and Cypress Hill also charted on the Canadian Hot 100 at number 75. The album has received generally mixed-to-positive reviews, scoring a 56 out of 100 ("mixed or average reviews") on Metacritic. MTV News writer Kyle Anderson called the album "a tremendous collection of hard rock songs that center around the axe man's signature chunky, swirling riffs... On balance, it's an excellent album, and it feels good to have that classic Slash sound back." Writer Shelby Powell took note of Slash's precision on guitar, rating the album 3.5/5 thumbs, but took off points for  a little too much reverence paid to the 90s and some of the feature selections may have old head purists poking their bottom lips out and putting their lighters down, but concludes that "the assortment of genres blends well." Track listing. Notes:***