(antiMusic) Guns N' Roses "Chinese Democracy," has been released at long last but some are asking "why now?" Idolator put together their theories on why Chinese Democracy came to the world in November of 2008. Here is a highlight from their article. But two crucial events changed the course of Rose's career: Sanctuary's buyout; and Rose finding his way to the management fold of music heavyweight Irving Azoff and longtime hard-rock mastermind Andy Gould. Universal was in a position to sweep away all of Rose's disputes at once, and Azoff was keen to deal—as it turned out, the number to remember in the Chinese Democracy saga isn't 17, but 360.
Word is it was Azoff who initiated the push to resolve all the issues at once, in a negotiation led on the Universal side by the corporation's president, Zach Horowitz—though who was leveraging who depends on who you ask.
After months of back and forth, a deal was worked out to resolve all of Axl's disputes, with Chinese Democracy—and a nice "thanks for the retail exclusive" check from Best Buy—underwriting the peace agreements. - But what disputes were taken care of? find out here.