2) Anybody else feel stupid for supporting the CD era? 
In the early years of the saga...no. It had tons of potential. He could've had an Audioslave type situation on his hands had it turned out differently.
The main thing the CD era had going against it is its duration.....it was simply dragged out too long. When it reached the point that replacements of replacements of replacements were touring under the CD banner(yet mainly focusing on AFD) and still acting like another album is right around the corner....it jumped a school of sharks and should've been put out of its misery.
In hindsight, fans should've said "enough is enough" in 2006. Yeah I know quite a few hardcores loved that lineup and various shows but it was a huge sign that the train to China had been derailed. The unique group of 2001-02 is gone, in its place a more marketable group to push to casuals(including a Finck-Pitman image change) and what was clearly an officially sanctioned leak to appease the hardcore base begging for Chinese stew. The promotional tactics used to promote this lineup/tour was insane and actually an insult to that lineup(and fans). Other than the hybrid logo seen once in a blue moon, AFD logos and even pics of the old band were used to promote that tour, especially in Europe and Australia.......yet they pretended to be surprised when there were Slash chants. I guarantee the only reason Slash and Duff didn't sue over this is because the tour was essentially just promoting the old material and they were earning royalties off the increase in album sales.
Another thing that soured the Chinese era was the Slash obsession by Axl and his inner circle. They talked more about Slash 1999-2014 than they did CD and/or CD members. What makes this funny and pathetic in hindsight is we now know he was always open to a reunion but the timing wasn't right. So why the fuck did we have to endure all those rants about Serpico, cancer, one will die before a reunion, not in this lifetime, etc.? I'll tell you why......it helped promote the "CD" tours and it also kept his hardcore fan base in a state of agitation and their eyes off the ball(new albums). Get your fan base whining about Slash the media whore and how Axl would never prostitute himself for fortune and shame and they wont talk about how there's no GNR album on store shelves.
The media was a few steps ahead of the fans which is why they stopped giving a shit long before fans started checking out.
2009-14 was an abomination. After not promoting his own album before, during, and after release(I don't blame him. Nobody cared about it generally speaking) the fan base had to endure another round but this time absolutely senseless never ending Chinese Democracy tour. Ashba was the final nail in the coffin of "new GNR".....everything that made the early 2000s era unique was obliterated and with a handful of Asian shows the exception, a complete nostalgia head trip that didn't even bother pretending it was moving forward. They were just running in circles and Axl was just waiting for the right time to cash in the reunion chips and decided to make a nice chunk of cash while waiting it out. How on earth any fans actually believed CD II was coming out in that time frame is beyond me. One of my first posts after the hiring of Ashba was that no new music would ever be released by that lineup. People said I was crazy......but I was right.
Had the CD era continued on past 2014, its next US tour would've been in bowling alleys and pizza parlors. New GNR had simply run out of road and it was reunion or bust after that last Vegas show. Its why they "left it in Vegas". They had to because there was nowhere else to take it.
edit: I knew it was only a matter of time before a nerd photoshopped that pic....
