On July 2, 1991, Guns N’ Roses brought their notorious brand of rock chaos to St. Louis, a performance that would go down in infamy as
the ‘Rocket Queen Riot.’ The band, already infamous for their unruly behavior, turned what should have been a thrilling concert into a
violent spectacle, resulting in the group being banned from the city. The incident culminated in Axl Rose’s arrest and left the city scarred by a
riot that injured 65 people, including 25 police officers. The night began without incident, but things quickly escalated during the fifteenth
song of the evening, Rocket Queen, at the Riverport Amphitheatre. Rose, noticing a fan filming the show, lost his temper and pointed the
fan out to security. “Wait, take that! Take that! Now! Get that guy and take that!” he yelled, before taking matters into his own hands. Rose
seized the camera and began physically confronting both the fan and the security team. As chaos unfolded, Rose was dragged offstage
by crew members, but not before he hurled his microphone to the ground and declared, “Well, thanks to the lame-ass security, I’m going home!”
With Rose gone, his bandmates were left in an awkward spot. Slash, scrambling to salvage the situation, awkwardly informed the crowd, “He
just smashed the microphone. We’re out of here.” The response was immediate and violent. Fans, already tense from the chaos, erupted into
a furious three-hour riot that left dozens injured. Later, Rose explained that he had spotted a local biker gang member, a member
of the Saddle Tramps, filming the show with a contraband camera, and blamed the security’s failure to act for fueling his rage. “The security
guys knew exactly what was happening and they were doing everything they could to let that guy go,” Rose said, further explaining that this
disregard only intensified his anger. Local journalist Daniel Durchholz, who witnessed the mayhem, described the absurdity of the
situation, recalling that a fire hose was rolled out to control the crowd—but with almost no water pressure. “One man jumped onstage, stepped
into the ineffective stream, then pulled down his pants and waved his penis at the cops,” Durchholz remembered. He also described fans
swinging from cables underneath the 60-ton sound rig, which dangerously swayed from side to side. “If that rig comes down, there will be
massive death,” a crew member warned. Fortunately, no fatalities occurred, unlike the tragic events at Donington in 1988, when two
Guns N’ Roses fans lost their lives. The memory of that tragedy weighed heavily on guitarist Izzy Stradlin, who later remarked, “When something
like that happens, you can’t help but think back to Donington. What’s to stop us from having more people trampled because the singer
doesn’t like something?” In the aftermath, the band was banned from St. Louis, and their disdain for the city was unmistakably clear when
they released Use Your Illusion I and II, featuring a blunt message in the liner notes: “Fuck You, St. Louis!”
It would take over two decades, but Guns N’ Roses finally returned to St. Louis on July 27, 2017, as part of their Not in This Lifetime… Tour, with the city’s ban now a distant memory.