SO HOW THE HELL DO 12 YEAR-OLDS KNOW ABOUT GUNS AND ROSES ANYWAY?

I know how I did when I was 12 — because Appetite had just come out a year or two earlier, dude!

But with the infamous Chinese Democracy sitting in limbo, and Axl busy butt-buddying Baz instead of finishing up his long-awaited “masterpiece”, I can’t help wondering how the current youth of America could possibly have a firm, present pop culture grasp on the sleaze-lustrious stylings of G N’ R.

I was sitting in my local pizza shoppe recently, furiously jerking off under the table eating a pepperoni slice, when I overheard a nearby conversation from a small group of Manhattan rapscallions, aka the new new disenfranchised. One kid was telling his dogz how they should’ve seen the sweet-ass Axl costume he was gonna sport for Halloween, and the others were half-listening, but I was all ears; I found it pretty fascinating that these kids were sitting there having the exact same conversation I might have had with my friends at the same age, about the same fucking band. In the same pizza shoppe, no less. Does that date me too much, or does it legitimately earn me a nod as having “timeless” taste in music?

I mean, don’t get me wrong — when I was in 8th grade, I devoured the Led Zeppelin catalog as I’m sure 8th graders in bloody Birmingham had 20 years earlier, but this was a first: the pop culture kaleidascope had spiraled inward on me, and sadly I couldn’t help but somehow feel like I was a little bit more of an old man.

Again.

-KW