I was surprised that the new Guns N’ Roses CD Chinese Democracy came out before I died of old age. You would think Axl Rose, the only remaining member of the original Guns N’ Roses, would be in a good place right now. After working on “Chinese Democracy” for 14 years, Rose seems to have done the impossible – garnered decent reviews on an album whose expectations were naturally overblown.
But, happy he is not. The guys at Dr. Pepper apparently thought they would get in on the hoopla of the release by issuing a statement that “if” Chinese Democracy were actually issued in 2008; they would buy everyone a Dr. Pepper.
(Bertie Basset, the copyright holder of this work, has released this image into the public domain.
I doubt it was actually this challenge that prompted Rose to release the album on November 23, but apparently, he was very serious about Dr. Pepper living up to their offer. In my previous blog about this, I wrote that the folks at Dr. Pepper said fans had to log into their web site on the 23rd and register to receive a coupon for a free 20 ounce bottle of their refreshing soft drink. The offer was only good for the first 24 hours of the release.
I figure it was Dr. Pepper’s promo and their product, so that sounded good to me, but Axl, oh, Axl is not happy. He got lawyer Alan Gutman involved (are you seeing now why it took 14 years to release this album?). Gutman wrote a letter to Dr. Pepper stating that the company was not ready for the onslaught of fans who tried to connect to their site, which reportedly killed their server.
Dr. Pepper extended the offer another 24 hours, but Gutman said in his statement that “Dr Pepper was completely unprepared for the traffic to its site” while calling the promo a “complete disaster.” Gutman went on to say that the promo was used to promote the sales of their drink (gee, ya think?) and that it was a “raw and damaging commercial exploitation of our clients’ rights.”
Rose apparently feels that somehow his “legendary image” (Gutman’s words, not mine) was tarnished. Because of this, Rose wants Dr. Pepper to extend the offer AND place a full page apology in newspapers such as The New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, USA Today, and Wall Street Journal.
What if Dr. Pepper doesn’t cave in to the Roses’ demands? Gutman threatened a lawsuit on the grounds of unauthorized us of “intellectual-property rights.”