Music and Motors
11 Feb 2019
Credit: Andreas Lawen, Fotandi/Wikimedia Commons
In the week that he returns to the UK as part of his ‘Living the Dream’ tour, this edition of Music and Motors looks at the car history of Slash.
The Guns N’ Roses guitarist is better known for his affinity with top hats, the Gibson Les Paul, and – to a lesser extent – reptiles, but the London-born guitarist is also a car fan.
Before Guns N’ Roses hit the big time, Slash – real name Saul Hudson – drove his mother’s green Datsun 510, but the band’s success gave him the opportunity to get some wheels of his own.
“I bought my first car to go with my first house: it was a Honda CRX, and like every car I’ve had, it was black inside and out,” he wrote in his 2007 autobiography.
“I drove my little Honda CRX down the Pacific Coast Highway high out of my mind,” he added, recounting a story about when he stayed with former-Guns N’ Roses guitarist Izzy Stradlin. “Before I went to Izzy’s, I spent a few hours speeding around some Santa Monica side streets like a maniac.”
“I remember actually jumping my car off dirt mounds on a construction site. How the car survived, I don’t know. I was literally out of my mind… I don’t know how I didn’t get busted either.”
Credit: Facebook (Julien’s Auctions)
The ‘Paradise City’ rockers quickly became the biggest band on the planet, and the little Japanese coupé was soon passed on to Slash’s brother Ash. It was replaced by a 1966 Chevrolet Corvette – with a 390 bhp 7-litre V8, it was a big step up from the measly four-pot Honda.
The Corvette was sold at auction in 2011 for $108,000 with the proceeds benefiting a charity for abused and homeless teenagers and more recently, when it comes to cars, Slash has been more closely associated with Aston Martins.
The man who’s rarely seen without his face hidden behind his trademark Ray Bans isn’t the first name you’d expect to see linked with the iconic luxury carmaker, but Slash has had a string of them over the years.
“It’s my favourite car, ever since I was a little kid,” Slash said on an appearance on Top Gear back in 2012. “When I got sober my reward to myself was to buy an Aston Martin.”
His first Aston Martin was the original V12 Vanquish of the early-2000s, but just like 007, Slash swapped it for a DBS when that came along.
Credit: Slash/Twitter (via Pistonheads)
“It was a cool car, I got a lot of tickets in that car,” he told host Jeremy Clarkson. “Then I traded that for the DBS, which I had for a little while. But then I saw the V12 Vantage and I though ‘I’ve got to have one of those’ so I traded the DBS.”
“I have more fun in the V12 Vantage. It’s just a little bit smaller and because that engine’s so big it just makes it that much scarier.”
Since then , Slash has again swapped Astons, trading the V12 Vantage in for the second-generation Vanquish in 2013.
The newer Vanquish went out of production last year, being replaced by the DBS Superleggera, but has Slash also made the change?
Well considering he’s just wrapped up the second-highest grossing tour of all time with Guns N’ Roses then immediately returned to touring with his other band, Slash Ft. Myles Kennedy and the Conspirators, there’s a good chance that Slash’s last few years have been spent in more tour buses than supercars.
He has, however, made time to visit a couple of Grands Prix during the last few years, appearing as a guest of Mercedes and Ferrari at the 2016 Brazilian and 2018 Abu Dhabi races while Guns N’ Roses were playing locally.
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Congratulations to @LewisHamilton win F1 São Paulo, Brazil! Good fn’ times! iiii]; )’
