Axl Rose made a promise to keyboardist Dizzy Reed before Guns N’ Roses got signed — and he kept it.
In 1990, Reed was essentially broke and received a phone call from Rose offering him a position in Guns. However, there’s more to the story. The keyboardist was the latest guest on Dean Delray’s Let There Be Talk podcast and he recalled how he was first approached to join the band before they even signed with Geffen Records.
“I met Del [James, Guns N’ Roses’ longtime friend and tour manager] and Axl and the whole band about the same time in 1985,” Reed said.
At some point around that time, Rose heard some of Reed’s keyboard chops and apparently liked his style.
“The initial conversation [about Reed joining GN’R] was before the band got signed in like 1985,” the rocker continued. “[Rose] heard me playing Bad Company, the song ‘Bad Company,’ on my piano and he goes, ‘We’re gonna add a keyboard player one day and it’s going to be you,’ pretty much. That was the conversation.”
Reed suggested that promises like that are often made in Hollywood but are rarely kept. He expressed gratitude for the job offer and admitted he doesn’t know where he would be if Rose hadn’t kept his word.
“Many years [after he first met the band], I would see the guys come into town and every time they were just a little bit more and more successful, wearing nicer clothes and doing cooler stuff and have nice cars,” Reed remembered.
“I’m like, ‘God they’re really huge now…. He ain’t going to call me’.”
READ MORE: 10 of the Nicest Things Guns N’ Roses’ Axl Rose Has Ever Done
But Rose found out where Reed was living and called him to say, “We’re going to record ‘Civil War.’ We need you in the studio.”
After “Civil War,” they worked on “Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door” and the rest of the Use Your Illusion material — as well as some tracks from their 1993 covers album The Spaghetti Incident?.
Reed remains the longest-standing member of Guns N’ Roses after Rose. He stayed in the group throughout the lineup changes of the late ’90s and early 2000s, through the recording and release of Chinese Democracy and through the return of Slash and Duff McKagan in 2016.
Check out the full podcast episode below.
Axl Rose Made a Promise to Dizzy Reed Before Guns N’ Roses Got Signed (And He Kept It)
See every other musician that’s been an official member of Guns N’ Roses below.
All 24 Musicians Who’ve Been in Guns N’ Roses
Guns N’ Roses have had over 20 musicians in the band since they formed in 1985, so we compiled a list of all of them below.
Gallery Credit: Lauryn Schaffner
