September 1991: Guns N' Roses Sold 1.45 Million Records in a Week, Then Nirvana Released Nevermind

Wed, 16 Sep 2026 14:35:49 +0000

Thirty-five years ago this week, the biggest band on the Geffen roster put out two albums on the same Tuesday. Seven days later, the same label shipped 46,251 copies of a record from Aberdeen, Washington.

Tuesday, September 17, 1991: two records, one day

Guns N’ Roses did something on September 17, 1991 that nobody had really tried at that scale. They released Use Your Illusion I and Use Your Illusion II on the same day, on Geffen Records, as two separate full-price albums. Thirty songs across the pair. A nine-minute “November Rain”, a nine-minute “Coma”, an Alice Cooper cameo, a Bob Dylan cover, a Paul McCartney cover, a Charles Manson credit, and a piano ballad written from the point of view of a man mourning his own wedding. Excess was the plan, and the plan worked.

Axl Rose on Real Rock Lab

September 1991: Guns N' Roses Sold 1.45 Million Records in a Week, Then Nirvana Released Nevermind

Tuesday, September 17, 1991: two records, one day