Perhaps you know I’m working on a book about the long, convoluted, and absolutely crazy history of Chinese Democracy by Guns N’ Roses. In the course of my research, I had to dig up one of my favorite interview snippets of all time — Slash telling Rolling Stone that he’s really into dinosaurs.

“I’m a huge dinosaur buff. I keep in touch through the newspaper and my National Geographic and all that kind of shit. I get all these dinosaur publications, all these freaky Third World dinosaur fanzines and shit. ‘Underground dino zines,’ they call them. They exist!”

I will never forget reading that when it was published in the Fall of 2000. It was so unexpected, so funny and cool. “Underground dino zines” definitely became a non sequitur catchphrase among my friends.

Through the magic of digital library services I unearthed this entire issue of Rolling Stone. It contains an op-ed by Al Franken called “Is Bush Dumb?” as well as a review of Orgy’s Vapor Transmission. “MTV’s favorite Max Factor-ed male quintet manifests some classic L.A. virtues: trashy allure, brain-melting hooks, Anglo inspirations and billboard-size ambition.”

I also glanced at the chart page and was accosted by turn of the century ghosts like Wheatus, 3 Doors Down, and Nelly. Did you know the soundtrack to Nutty Professor II: The Klumps cracked the top 50 album chart? Amazing.