RING SIDE: Axl Rose, who has punctuated...

RING SIDE: Axl Rose, who has punctuated several recent Guns N’ Roses concerts with petulant tirades against the rock press, has finally found an equally outraged adversary--Bob Guccione Jr. The Spin magazine publisher is one of the unlucky media types savaged in “Get in the Ring,” one of the new songs on GNR’s “Use Your Illusion I & II” (see review on Page 7). Dismissing the press as “punks,” the song offers obscenity-laden attacks on Hit Parader and Circus magazines, British writer Mick Wall and Guccione, whom Axl disses by saying: “Are you (upset) because your dad (Penthouse publisher Bob Guccione) gets more (expletive) than you?” Axl adds: “I don’t like you, I just hate you, printing lies, starting controversy, get in the ring, and I’ll kick your bitchy little (expletive), punk.”

Guccione had embarrassed GNR by printing an ill-advised contract the band had attempted to force journalists to sign earlier this year that would have given GNR total control over its interviews. “If Axl wants a fight, he’s got it,” Guccione says. “I’m willing to get in the ring with him, anyplace, anytime.” Guccione has already enlisted the aid of promoter Don King’s son, Eric, who has offered to book the bout. “Either Axl should back up his threat or he should stop singing the song,” says Guccione, who weighs in at 170 pounds and 5-11, which as he puts it, “makes me 11 inches taller than Axl.”