Select Page

Image: Kevin Mazur/Getty Images for Live Nation

Donald Trump played “Sweet Child O’ Mine” by Guns N’ Roses at his West Virginia rally on Friday. Axl Rose is not cool with that.

The GNR frontman clarified the band’s stance on Trump in a Twitter thread on Saturday. Turns out, they’ve “formally requested” that the Trump campaign stop using their music, but there’s only so much they can do.

“Unfortunately the Trump campaign is using loopholes in the various venues’ blanket performance licenses which were not intended for such craven political purposes, without the songwriters’ consent,” he wrote.

Basically, this means that even if a band requests that Trump doesn’t use their work, he can still get away with using it if a rally venue does have it licensed.

Anyone who sings along enthusiastically to GNR at a Trump rally is… probably not aware of Axl Rose’s politics. He’s been openly and staunchly anti-Trump since the president was elected, even declaring in September that “we don’t have a president.” During GNR’s 2016 Coachella set, the band invited fans to smash a Donald Trump piñata onstage.

Read Axl Rose’s full thread below.

Read more: https://mashable.com/article/axl-rose-trump-music-licensing/