Behind the songs: Guns N' Roses - Sweet Child O' Mine

GUNS N' ROSES' ballad "Sweet Child O' Mine" has surpassed one billion streams on both Spotify and YouTube. The song was included in the famous debut album of the band, Appetite for Destruction, released in 1987, one of my favourite debut albums of all time, as you can see from my personal top 10.

After the video, some quotes from the band, explain the song a little deeper.

The lyrics to "Sweet Child O' Mine" were written by Axl Rose in a very short amount of time. Inspired by his then-girlfriend Erin Everly, Rose scribbled down the lyrics quickly while the band was working on the music. The heartfelt lyrics about love and admiration perfectly complemented the upbeat and energetic music.

'Sweet Child O' Mine' is a true song about my girlfriend at this time. (...) It's the first positive love song I've ever written. I never had anyone to write anything that positive about  Geffen Press Kit, 1987

"If we did any kind of ballads, it was bluesy. This was an uptempo ballad. That's one of the gayest things you can write. But at the same time, it's a great song - I'm not knocking it - but at the time, it just did not fit in with the rest of our, sort of, schtick. And, of course, it would be the biggest hit we ever had." - Slash

"The 'blue sky' line actually was one of my first childhood memories - looking at the blue sky and wishing I could disappear in it because it was so beautiful." - Axl Rose

Slash: "I came up with that. Yeah, and then Izzy came in with the chord changes behind it or the chords that back it up, and then Axl started singing. It was just one of the songs – it’s really not that complicated when you listen to it as far as structure goes, but it just sort of evolved until it was finished. And then we went into rehearsals as a sort of pre-pre-production type of thing and just wrote the whole thing out, and I got the solo, you know - and, just like, that was the first solo I felt comfortable with, so I just did that – and it just evolved into something. It was real spontaneous, like most of the material on the record is real spontaneous. Guns N' Roses Interview Disc, June 1988