“Sweet Child O’ Mine” is a song by American rock band Guns N’ Roses, released on their debut studio album, Appetite for Destruction (1987). In the United States, the song was released in June 1988 as the album’s first single, topping the US Billboard chart and becoming the band’s only US number-one single. In the United Kingdom, the song was released in August 1988, reaching number 24 on the Singles Chart the same month. Re-released there in May 1989, it peaked at number six.
During a jam session at the band’s house in Sunset Strip, drummer Steven Adler and Slash were warming up and Slash began to play a “circus” melody while making faces at Adler. Rhythm guitarist Izzy Stradlin asked Slash to play it again. Stradlin came up with some chords, Duff McKagan created a bassline and Adler planned a beat. In his autobiography, Slash said “within an hour my guitar exercise had become something else.” Lead singer Axl Rose was listening to the musicians upstairs in his room and was inspired to write lyrics, which he completed by the following afternoon. He based it on his girlfriend Erin Everly and declared that Lynyrd Skynyrd served as an inspiration “to make sure that we’d got that heartfelt feeling.” On the next composing session in Burbank, the band added a bridge and a guitar solo.
When the band recorded demos with producer Spencer Proffer, he suggested adding a breakdown at the song’s end. The musicians agreed, but were not sure what to do. Listening to the demo in a loop, Rose started saying to himself, “Where do we go? Where do we go now?” and Proffer suggested that he sing that. An alternate version featuring half a live version, half a newly recorded 1999 version plays during the credits of the movie Big Daddy.
A music video was made for the song in 1987. The music video depicts the band rehearsing in Mendiola’s Ballroom at Huntington Park, California, surrounded by crew members. All of the band members’ girlfriends at the time were shown in the clip: Rose’s girlfriend Erin Everly, McKagan’s girlfriend Mandy Brix, from the all-female rock band the Lame Flames; Stradlin’s girlfriend Angela Nicoletti; Adler’s girlfriend Cheryl Swiderski; and Slash’s girlfriend Sally McLaughlin. Stradlin’s dog was also shown. The video was successful on MTV, and helped launch the song to mainstream success.
To make “Sweet Child o’ Mine” more marketable to MTV and radio stations, the song was edited down from 5:56 to 4:58, for the radio edit/remix, with much of Slash’s guitar solo removed. This drew the ire of the band, including Rose, who commented on it in a 1989 interview with Rolling Stone: “I hate the edit of ‘Sweet Child O’ Mine.’ Radio stations said, ‘Well, your vocals aren’t cut.’ My favorite part of the song is Slash’s slow solo; it’s the heaviest part for me. There’s no reason for it to be missing except to create more space for commercials, so the radio-station owners can get more advertising dollars.