10 Greatest Hard Rock Guitarists Of The '80s

Glam rock in the ‘80s was certainly a ton of fun, but it really needed to die by the end of the decade. Even though the Sunset Strip scene was still going strong, every other band felt like a carbon copy of the last one, with no real substance to be found underneath the pretty faces. Guns N' Roses may have grown up in the same area, but they had the one thing no other band could muster: soul.

Every single song on Guns N' Roses’ debut Appetite for Destruction has that aggressive power of rock and roll, with tracks that felt like a punk update on the glam rock formula. Most of the band was the real deal, but Slash exuded rockstar charisma from the moment you laid eyes on him. Clad in a leather jacket and bullet belt, Slash’s tone was everything great about rock music, with leads that were as much a part of the song as Axl Rose’s melody.

There was certainly a glam aesthetic with the band at first, but you could hear rock’s history through Slash’s licks, with traces of the old guard like Jimmy Page and Joe Perry being revitalized for a new generation. He might not have said much, but there was no question that there was an impressive music mind hiding underneath that top hat.