Guns N' Roses joined onstage by Wolfgang Van Halen for Paradise City performance

Guns N' Roses are back out on the road, as well as releasing new / old songs, and they currently have Wolfgang Van Halen's Mammoth WVH solo band out with them as support. So it makes sense they should invite the young multi-instrumentalist out onstage to run through a a classic. 

Van Halen and his Sunburst Gibson ES-335 joined Axl, Slash, Duff, Richard Fortus and the gang for a riotous Paradise City. He also joined in on backing vocals too. 

In our interview with Wolfgang Van Halen earlier this year to mark the release of his debut solo album, he explained his choice of the 335 as a go-to electric guitar onstage and in the studio.

"I really wanted to carve my own rather than just exclusively play Wolfgang guitars and 5150 amps," he said. "I felt it would be fun to explore different tones instead of trying to stick with what my family are usually known for.” 

Guns N' Roses also debuted their new single Hard Skool live at their Baltimore show on 26 September. You can see footage above.  

The song dates back to at least the pre-2008 Chinese Democracy demos era of the band – and the video below suggests the music may be even older – when a version went under the working title 'Jackie Chan'. 

Wolfgang Van Halen interview: "I really think I found my own way, I never tried to replicate anyone”

Rob Laing
Guitars Editor, MusicRadar

I'm the Guitars Editor for MusicRadar, handling news, reviews, features, tuition, advice for the strings side of the site and everything in between. Before MusicRadar I worked on guitar magazines for 15 years, including Editor of Total Guitar in the UK. When I'm not rejigging pedalboards I'm usually thinking about rejigging pedalboards.