A lesson in relevance

There’s no getting around how odd this is going to sound, so I’ll just put it out there: former Guns n’ Roses guitarist Slash’s solo debut rocks.

The album has a skull with guitar-shaped crossbones wearing a top hat against a garish red background with a graffiti-style logo on its cover, but it rocks. It has guest appearances from Fergie, Kid Rock and Maroon 5’s Adam Levine, among others, but it rocks.

Slash is undoubtedly one of the most legendary guitarists in the history of rock, but on paper, his solo album seems too gimmicky and insincere to be any good. He defies the odds by letting his phenomenal blues-based licks guide the fourteen songs, each of which features an appearance by a different guest singer (excluding Alter Bridge’s Myles Kennedy, who appears twice).

Shaking off accusations of irrelevance and suggestions that he’s merely a nostalgia act, Slash has given us a solid new set of songs that can sit comfortably next to his work in Guns n’ Roses.

It might be shocking, but Slash still has it.