how soon is now? || w. a rose [i/v]

EXTRACT III: ROLLING STONE FEB 1990

ROLLING STONE INTERVIEW WITH ANDY BERNOW

FEBRUARY 19th 1990

WRITTEN BY KIMMIE HERNEZ

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January 20th - The crowds are still cheering when Mind the Gap lead singer Andy Bernow returns backstage to her dressing room. Her dark eye makeup is fully smeared under her eyes and her signature black curly hair is wild and free, strands clamped down over her temples.

She cheery as she says her greetings, even if fatigue is evident across her body. She immediately removes her heeled combat boots, showing the large diamond ring on her left hand. She continues to talk about mundane things from her smudged lipstick to a microphone issue that needed sorting. She's easy to talk to, rolling with quick wit and comebacks. Frantic eyebrow movements only seem to enhance her confidence and character.

It was at that moment that I asked how she could be marrying Axl Rose, a man notorious for his difficulty around journalists and high temperament making conversations resemble war zones. A woman who was politely apologizing as she took out her contact lenses and replaced them with her glasses.

But at the same time, she was also the woman that had lit America on fire as the face of the controversial run of Levi's Jeans advertisements broadcasted last year. It was difficult to miss the TV ads (or the blow up that followed) popping up all over in June 1989.

She was declared possibly the most beautiful woman alive, or at least the sexiest, compared to the likes of Brooke Shields and Cindy Crawford through her provocative yet sleek ads. If anybody learnt anything, it was that she had quite the runway walk. (Even if she is only 5' 2")

The ad was banned in Alabama, Texas, Indiana, Louisiana, South Carolina, Georgia, Mississippi, North Carolina and severely edited in Tennessee, sermons were written across Churches around the country for her to be removed and yet here she remains. Performing to a near 80 000 people in a fully sold out show with her rock band, it is clear she will be difficult to shift from this scene.

Mind the Gap's debut album 'Hooliganism at Home', a direct reference to Bernow's own relation to British hooliganism, never made it big in the US but was a smash hit in the UK, gaining them a spot at No 1 on the album chart and a No 2 single debut, quite impressive stuff for a three person band scraped from the London gutters.

Not that Bernow, or her drummer Eric Henderson, would say so. Both members come from above the UK's North-South Divide are adamant that their band is not a London one, even if guitarist Miyoko Nakahashi descends from there, but they still haven't come to the conclusion if it's home is Sheffield or Manchester.

Though their second album has been fully recorded in Los Angeles, still untitled, mostly due to Bernow's want for a different studio sound, and now because she has moved in with her fiance.

Earlier this month, it was announced to the world that Axl Rose, the notorious singer of world famous band Guns N Roses, and Andy Bernow were engaged after just over five months of dating after meeting at a Las Vegas with an exclusive Rolling Stone article. Rose is here tonight but is nowhere to be found.

The singer told me that I could ask her anything and she'd answer how she pleased, so I started there.

Is your fiance here tonight?

Axl? Yeah, he's around here somewhere. He's probably just waiting for me to be done, then we can go home.

Does he come to a lot of your shows?