Clearance Alert: Scott Gagner Turns “Sweet Child o’ Mine” into a Gentle Lullaby

Clearance Alert is a joint series with Limelight, “the simplest way to clear any cover song.” It spotlights new cover songs licensed through the company. Find out more at Limelight.

Slash pops up everywhere these days, appearing to play his “Sweet Child o’ Mine” lick whenever you say his name three times (see: Super Bowl). Thankfully, jolly old Vunter Slaush stayed dormant when Scott Gagner recorded his cover of the Guns n’ Roses classic. This delicate acoustic ballad would most certainly not benefit from top-hatted heroics.

“The idea came to me in a dream: covering Sweet Child O’ Mine as a soft acoustic lullaby, not unlike Nick Drake or Elliott Smith,” Gagner said. “In so doing, I was interested in taking an incredibly popular, muscular, ’80s metal anthem and stripping it down until it revealed something new and beautiful in the lyric. When I tracked the vocal, I had my unborn daughter in mind, thus a more literal take on the song title.”

Drift off to sleep to his Drake-ish “Sweet Child o’ Mine,” available on his new album Rhapsody in Blonde.

Scott Gagner – Sweet Child o’ Mine (Guns n’ Roses cover)

Buy Gagner’s ‘Rhapsody in Blonde’ at Amazon or iTunes.