Chinese Democracy he played me these songs, asked me my ideas about them... I actually wrote some melodies and stuff.The music was eclectic and at the time that I was doing it there were no lyrics on the songs that I was working on." In February 2001, Geffen head Jimmy Iovine asked Tom Zutaut, whom the label had fired two years previously, to help Guns N' Roses complete "Chinese Democracy". Zutaut was an A&R man who had discovered the band and guided them through the recording of their previous albums. After they had resolved some personal differences, Rose told Zutaut of his
Democracy (album) 1996 by Youth's record label Butterfly Records in conjunction with Big Life, on CD and cassette. It reached number 71 in the UK Albums Chart. One single, the title track "Democracy", was released on 11 March 1996. It reached number 39 in the UK Singles Chart. The album was reissued in remastered form in February 2008 by Let Them Eat Vinyl, featuring a bonus track, a remix of "Democracy". Critical response to "Democracy" has been generally mixed. Adrien Begrand of PopMatters commented that on the album "the band sounds watered down". "Trouser Press" called the album "the wrong kind of