"Savage Animal" forges metal alliance with Guns N' Roses

No kidding: Sebastian Bach has officially trademarked the name "Savage Animal."

"People yell it at me everywhere I go now: 'Hey, Savage Animal!' " Bach said. "I thought it was too good to pass up, so I made sure I owned it."

As is fondly remembered by guilty-pleasure TV watchers, the former Skid Row singer tried to push that moniker on his band mates in this year's VH1 series, "Supergroup."

"Because rock 'n' roll is like a savage animal," he growled.

To his credit, Bach never has lost that Spinal Tap-like faith in heavy metal and all its glory. That's probably why the 38-year-old Canadian-born Sebastian Bierk has become VH1's go-to guy for all things metal. (He also hosted its "40 Greatest Metal Songs" and helped Hal Sparks nail Skid Row's "18 and Life" in "Celebrity Duets.")

Bach's unflinching enthusiasm also might explain why he was enlisted for his current role as Guns N' Roses' opening act — a job that requires a lot of love for rock-'n'-roll high jinks.

Bach has been on tour with the ever-erratic GNR since the summer. He filled in for Axl Rose at a European gig, and he has been one of the few people to stick up for Rose and his long-delayed "Chinese Democracy" album.

"Listen, the guy hasn't lost his mind," he said by phone recently from Hollywood, where he taped an episode of "Gilmore Girls" (not one to turn down a TV offer, he has a recurring role as a musician on the show).

Bach sounded eager to rejoin the GNR tour. "I've been waiting a long, long time to get back on a big arena tour like this," he said.

Bach's old band opened much of Guns N' Roses' 1991 "Use Your Illusion" tour. But like most people who knew Rose in his heyday, he lost touch with the reclusive singer. That changed early this year when Bach got a text message out of the blue from Rose, inviting him to hang out.

"I thought, 'Who is this idiot messing around with me pretending they're Axl Rose?' " he remembered. "But I pressed 'call sender,' and it actually was him, and it was like talking to Howard Hughes."

Bach soon found out that "the guy hasn't changed all that much. He's still a fun guy who likes to party."

Bach has been equally smitten with the recordings that would be "Chinese Democracy," which probably won't be out by year's end as promised.

"I've heard some incredible music," he said. "He's pulling from a wealth of material. He's got like 30-some songs."

So why can't he just get them done?

"He doesn't explain that to me because he doesn't need to. It's his album and his art," Bach said, turning philosophical. "Rock 'n' roll is filled with stories of musicians that have gone crazy trying to live up to expectations, like Syd Barrett. At the end of the day, Axl has managed to stay pretty damn level-headed. But he is trying to create a record that lives up to 'Appetite for Destruction,' one of the best albums of all time, and that's taken a long time."

Coincidentally or not, Bach was in line to have Scott Weiland's job in Velvet Revolver, the real supergroup featuring Slash and two other ex-GNRers. After his experiences in the "Supergroup" TV series, though, he said, "I'm extremely happy being a solo artist."

Bach is putting out his second solo album, "Angel Down," next year, his first disc since 1999's "Bring 'Em Bach Alive." The singer split with the rest of Skid Row in 1996, and the band continued without him.

"I could never go back," he said. "That band name is damaged for good."

Still, he hasn't lost faith in Skid Row's music, saying he believes metal is due for a resurgence.