📍Lafayette, IN, USA
1962 – 1982“William Bruce Rose Jr. was born in Lafayette, Indiana, a small Midwestern city on the Wabash River, home to Purdue University, in February 1962, the eldest child of Sharon, then sixteen, and William Rose, who left when he was two. His mother married Stephen Bailey, and his name was changed to William Bruce Bailey; he grew up believing Bailey was his real father until he was seventeen. He has a younger sister, Amy, and a half-brother, Stuart. He grew up in a strict Pentecostal household, where he had to go to church several times a week and was not allowed to listen to rock music, and he has described an unhappy, difficult childhood. He sang in the church choir from the age of five, and he took piano lessons, and he was a talented singer from an early age, singing in school choirs. At Jefferson High School in Lafayette he befriended Jeff Isbell, later known as Izzy Stradlin, who shared his love of rock music. When he discovered his real father's name, he began calling himself W. Rose, and after many run-ins with the local police for minor offences, he decided to leave Lafayette, taking a Greyhound bus to Los Angeles at seventeen. In Los Angeles he joined Izzy, and in 1985 they formed Guns N' Roses with Slash, Duff McKagan and Steven Adler. Their debut album, Appetite for Destruction, with Welcome to the Jungle and Sweet Child o' Mine, became the best-selling debut album in American history. With his extraordinary vocal range, he became one of rock's great frontmen. He legally became W. Axl Rose in 1986, choosing a name of his own.”
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