Mike Clink: the producer behind Guns N' Roses' Appetite for Destruction
Mike Clink produced Guns N' Roses' Appetite for Destruction, G N' R Lies, Use Your Illusion I & II, and The Spaghetti Incident?, plus Megadeth's Rust in Peace and Whitesnake's Slip of the Tongue.
Reviewed by the Change Your Strings editorial team ·
Mike Clink produced Guns N' Roses' Appetite for Destruction (1987), G N' R Lies (1988), both Use Your Illusion albums (1991), and The Spaghetti Incident? (1993), then reunited with Slash in 2024 for the blues covers album Orgy of the Damned. He also produced Megadeth's Rust in Peace (1990) and Whitesnake's Slip of the Tongue (1989). Appetite for Destruction has sold over 30 million copies worldwide and was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2024.
Who Mike Clink is
Mike Clink produced Guns N' Roses' entire classic-era catalog: five studio albums in six years, starting with Appetite for Destruction in 1987. Wikipedia's account, citing AllMusic, describes the band coming to Clink after "a series of failed attempts" with other producers, including an earlier pairing with Spencer Proffer that didn't survive contact with the band. Axl Rose later explained the split plainly: Proffer's version of the record was too polished and too radio-friendly for what Guns N' Roses wanted, so they went with Clink instead.
Before that call, Clink had spent several years as a house engineer at Record Plant Studios, working sessions for Whitesnake, Triumph, Mötley Crüe, UFO, Jefferson Starship, Heart, and Eddie Money. He started producing in 1986, and Appetite for Destruction became his first major production credit. The album has sold over 30 million copies worldwide, and in May 2024 it was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame, with three of its tracks, Paradise City, Welcome to the Jungle, and Sweet Child O' Mine, each passing 1 billion streams on Spotify.
Clink's Guns N' Roses run ended with 1993's covers record, The Spaghetti Incident?, the last studio album to feature Slash before his 1996 departure. Nearly four decades later, the two reconnected: Clink produced Slash's 2024 blues covers solo album, Orgy of the Damned, the record that prompted his first new round of press interviews about the Appetite sessions in years.
The Clink-produced Guns N' Roses catalog, album by album
Clink sat in the producer's chair for every Guns N' Roses studio album released between 1987 and 1993, then came back once more the following year for a one-off soundtrack cut.
Five albums plus a soundtrack cover, 1987 to 1994
- Appetite for Destruction (1987, Geffen)
- Clink's first major production credit, recorded after the band moved on from original producer Spencer Proffer. Sold over 30 million copies worldwide and was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in May 2024.
- G N' R Lies (1988, Geffen)
- Half live tracks from the band's earlier EP, half new acoustic-leaning material. Sold over 5 million copies in the US and earned Clink a Grammy nomination for Best Hard Rock Performance.
- Use Your Illusion I & II (1991, Geffen)
- Released the same day, both produced and recorded by Clink. Combined worldwide sales of 35 million copies. Use Your Illusion I earned a Grammy nomination for Best Hard Rock Performance.
- The Spaghetti Incident? (1993, Geffen)
- A covers album drawing on the band's punk and glam influences. Clink's last studio album with the classic lineup before Slash's 1996 departure.
- "Sympathy for the Devil" (1994, Interview with the Vampire soundtrack)
- A one-off return to the producer's chair for the band's cover of the Rolling Stones song, produced and recorded by Clink for the film soundtrack.
Chinese Democracy (2008) is not on this list on purpose: it arrived after Clink's run with the band ended, built by Axl Rose over roughly fourteen years with an almost entirely different lineup and production team.
How Clink worked in the room
Clink's own account of the Appetite sessions is sparse on effects and heavy on a simple signal chain.
Reflecting on the Appetite for Destruction sessions almost four decades later, in a 2024 interview timed to his reunion with Slash on Orgy of the Damned.
Back when we did Appetite For Destruction, it was all about the Les Paul and Marshall.
Producer, Appetite for Destruction
Slash's corner of the room for those sessions also held a Roland Digital Reverb, a Jim Dunlop Cry Baby, and an MXR Analog Chorus, but Clink is clear the tone itself came from the amp, miked with a Shure SM57. Guitar World's 2024 interview also has him crediting the record with reviving the Gibson Les Paul's popularity across a generation of guitar players who wanted the same Les Paul-into-Marshall tone.
Not every production job stayed in his hands the whole way through. In 1988, Clink began producing Metallica's ...And Justice for All, but was replaced partway through by Flemming Rasmussen, who had produced the band's previous two records; Clink ended up with an engineering credit on the finished album instead. Wikipedia's sourcing traces a similar pattern two years later on Megadeth's Rust in Peace (1990), a Grammy-nominated album: Clink co-produced most of the record, then left before it was finished to start work with Guns N' Roses on Use Your Illusion.
His catalog since has run wide of hard rock too: Mötley Crüe's New Tattoo (2000), a co-production credit on Steve Vai's career-spanning anthology, Grammy-nominated Christian rock from Sarah Kelly, and, in 2025, a Triumph tribute album he conceived and produced himself, featuring Sebastian Bach, Joey Belladonna, Dee Snider, and Nancy Wilson.
Where strings fit in the Clink, Guns N' Roses picture
The string call on a Guns N' Roses record has always belonged to the band, not the producer, and Clink's interviews bear that out. He talks at length about guitars, amps, and mic placement, but not string gauges. What is documented is the instrument and amp pairing his Appetite-era sessions ran on, Slash's Gibson Les Paul into a Marshall, and Slash's own long-running Ernie Ball relationship, covered in full on his CYS profile.
Slash Signature Set (.011–.048)
Why this one: Slash's current documented Ernie Ball set, not a re-creation of the exact 1987 Appetite gauge, which Clink's own interviews don't specify. The closest sourced link between the Clink-produced records and a specific string set today.
Full breakdown of Slash's rig, including the Kris Derrig replica Les Paul used on the original 1987 sessions, lives on his full guitar-strings profile.
Related
Guns N' Roses. Band hub, Slash's guitar strings and gear, Duff McKagan's bass strings and gear.
Other producers in adjacent lanes. Rob Cavallo (Green Day), Chris Lord-Alge (mixer, Green Day and Springsteen), Andy Sneap (heavier metal).
Strings. Ernie Ball Slash Signature Set review.