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Guns n' Roses - November Rain mystery


Dark Reality

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When I first saw the video I noticed the mirror and wondered why they had it there. But reading your post on it I have now found out. Thanks a bunch for your hard research in finding the answer to the question of many.

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hami1979.....Thanx for that info, what a shame he died. I always had the hots for him, such a waste.

Thanx again.

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  • 1 month later...
  • 2 weeks later...

I have thaught about the november rain vid. i dont know why axl goes to the guns store maby it was to kill her and he had regrets which was why he was having the nightmare.

the videos seems to give a different message than if you just listen to the song without watching the video.

maby she killed herself.

i really dont kow why slash dived on the cake but i love the video

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Hi,

I think axl shot her because if you watch the dont cry vid at the start axl is walkin in the snow with a gun. Also in the same vid i think it is he is threatening his girlfriend or wife and throwing her against walls. I havent seen either videos in a while so i may be wrong but they could be linked in some way.

Yeah Axl Rose is a bit of a loser but his music is still cool. I don't let his personal life get in the way of the music. Kind of like Michael Jackson. They do good music. I also like Metallica but have only listened to their black album.

I got into GNR after watchin Slash playin the guitar in a michael jackson performance. But sadly i wasn't even born wen appetite for destruction came out and i was 5 wen illusions 1 and 2 came out.

Finally I've heard some of the new GNR material live and its ok. Not as good as their old stuff but some of it's ok. They gone a bit techno now which is poo.

pAUKY dUDE!

I WANT AXL'S BOOTS AND HATS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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I used to be a massive guns n' roses fan & used to idolise Axl(thought he was the sexiest man alive!) but thought that they lost their rawness after the 'Lies' & 'Appetite..' albums. I now think that Axl let the fame go to his head & led the band in an egotistical, selfish direction that eventually killed it. G N' R were the ultimate rock & roll band, the best around & it's a shame that Axl blew himself up to godly status, even the band eventually couldn'tt stand him towards the end. November Rain is a good video & the story is fascinating, I look forward to watching it again to look for the mirror & give you my account on what I think!

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I know this is sort of an offtopic forum, but your forum does deal with strange things, and in the realm of music and video, I think this qualifies.

November Rain was the second in a three part music video/movie hybrid series designed to portray Guns n' Roses' take on the life of a rock star, through their music. The first video is Don't Cry, and the third video is Estranged. I think most people remember the Estranged video, with Slash's guitar solo parting the seas, Axl jumping off a yacht and a dolphin saving his life, it's a pretty good video. The November Rain video, however, presented a little mystery not solved until recently, over a decade later.

If you don't quite recall the video, it starts out with Axl Rose waking from a nightmare, then goes into an elaborate wedding (Axl to model Stephanie Seymour) in a church in the middle of nowhere. After the wedding, Slash does an awesome solo in the desert... We go to a wedding reception, which is going good until it begins raining, and everyone dives for cover, presumably to get out of the rain. At the end of this scene, there is an ominous shot of red wine spilling. We cut to Axl on the piano, and Slash steps up onto the piano - this is where the song cuts to the heavy part at the end - and the scene cuts to a funeral. Axl is in tears as his bride is in a casket. At the end of the video, he's crying over her grave.

I would argue November Rain is the best music video ever made, but that's just an opinion. There's these three Guns n' Roses videos, and the Tool videos... That's pretty much the best of the best right there. Anyway, the video leaves the question of how she died, and therein lies the mystery. At the end of the video, there is a credit saying the video is based on the short story "Without You" by Del James. The problem is, "Without You" is a short story in a collection called "The Language of Fear." This book was published in 1995, but the publisher went out of business, and only a few hundred copies of the book were made. As you can imagine, those who had copies began selling them for outrageous prices on eBay. Usually the Internet is a place where no secret is safe, but for years no one would transcribe it or scan/OCR it. I assumed that the value of the collectible books would go down drastically if anyone on the Net could read the story online or download it, and thus no one who had saved up the money to actually buy the book would jeopardize the resale value of the book, once they had read it. I had regularly been searching via Google and the filesharing networks for an eBook/text dump of the story.

Well, finally I found it. It's not an OCR scan, so there are some typos. I cannot guarantee it's not edited. I can't guarantee it's authentic. I've talked to people who have claimed to read the book, so I'll have to ask them if it's real or not. I found it in MS Word format, and I've converted it to text.

What follows is a complete dump of the text file. It's the story less the header and the overstretched scan of the cover of "The Language of Fear". It's about 48kB, so it might take a few seconds over a dialup line. I considered posting it, but that's a heck of a long document.

But there's more.  As many times as you may have seen the video, you may have missed a small detail that hints to the gunshot suicide answer.  Watch the video again but pay special attention to the casket.  Try to see the side of her face that is the farthest from the camera.

user posted image

Is that...?  Yes, there is a mirror there.  A mirror cut to fit her shape and attached to the lid of the casket to give the illusion she's all there, when in reality (of the fictional event, not the actual filming) there is extensive trauma to that side of her face.  Anyway, I didn't see this until someone pointed it out, and wouldn't have found it otherwise, even with the Del James story.

476836[/snapback]

Thanks for pointing out the mirror, I never noticed it before. Some things I wanted to say. For 1: about 5 and 1/2 min into the video he walks by a gun shop. So there is more on guns. 2nd of all: as a child, I thought the scene at the wedding reception, when everyone is running, I thought not only was there rain but a shoot out, perhaps a drive-by. I assumed she was struck at that point. This was my child version, so don't think I'm stupid. About the suicide she does look upset when they are getting into the vehicle after they leave the cathredral.

Anyway let me know what you think of my intake. I'm going to check out the short story. See if I can find it myself.

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The "mirror story" is the consequence of the strict censorship set up against Guns n' Roses by the music television association. In the initial video, there was a mask covering half of Stephanie's face which would have been scary for the young viewers (Axl was quite p***ed off because of the "narrow minded" thinking of the media representatives). This is why the videomakers were forced to use the mirror effect in the final version of the video. The original cut was like this:

user posted image

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  • 2 years later...
I can see all that. i'm learning to play the electric guitar myself. And so for that fact alone I like any music with a good solo and most GnR songs have them. Slash is one of the best.

But one point I dont really see is this.

I've had people very close to me die before. My ex girlfriend died in my arms. And it hurt like hell but I never had any nightmares about it.

One thing I thaught about when I saw the nightmares and him waking up sweating would be some kind of guilt. And as for him being tore up at the funeral, Thats a given if he was starting to regret it afterwards. Or maybe he did kill her but by accident. Then he would have instantly regretted it, still been tore up about it, and had the nightmares of doing it.

As for the book itself, I've never read it or seen it.

But i have read and seen books that say based on another book. And when i read it, it had nothing to do with each other. Basicly the author read a book and got inspiration for his own book and put based on it. i dont know if that made since but it could also be another possibility as to what happened here.

I also have another question,

it doesnt really have to do with the topic of her death but it is part of the video.

When slash gives the ring to them at the wedding, he slowly walks outside. I know he goes into a solo but for some reason i get the feeling he was walking outside for a different reason, for example he was unhappy about something or other. What did you get out of that part ??

Hi...regarding...Slash giving the ring and then walking out leaving everyone else at the wedding...made me wonder as well....i mean why does he go out ALONE?? and then the way he plays the guitar, and the raging winds et all..sure adds a lot of drama to the video...Must say..i simply LOVE this video...such songs are only made once in a century....

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Hi...regarding...Slash giving the ring and then walking out leaving everyone else at the wedding...made me wonder as well....i mean why does he go out ALONE?? and then the way he plays the guitar, and the raging winds et all..sure adds a lot of drama to the video...Must say..i simply LOVE this video...such songs are only made once in a century....

OOOh a thread where my idol is openly talked about. As its already been covered in this thread many times the original story had the bride commiting suicide...shotgun wound to the head.

When Slash walks out of the tardis church (huge inside, tiny on the outside) and starts his solo...if you're a slash fan have your DVD remote to hand. You will notice his jeans are split :P pause it at the right time and hey presto! Heaven.

I was a massive Guns N Roses fan from the age of 11 or 12 (had the honour of listening to Appetite long before it was big in the UK) was lucky enough to see Guns N Roses Mk2 in the 90's. And since Velvet Revolver 6 times (and counting- new European tour early next yr...watch this space) and (new) Guns N Roses 4 times.

I went off Axl when he started acting like a knob. Although I think he has redeemed himself so far with the leaks I have from Chinese Democracy.

But for the most part Slash is the only person who I can say I have followed for nearly 20 years. Still an amazing guitarist...still as sexy as ever...still the only man my other half has given me the green card to cheat on him with LMAO.

For classic Slash...go listen to Messages (VR song about 911- if you can't find it PM me and I'll arrange it!!) And for funky Slash get on youtube and look for him playing ''In the summertime''...coolness personified.

Amen.

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