New songs from old masters

We preview two new singles for download this week – and judging by these tracks, the albums should be flying off the shelves!

—Chinese Democracy by Guns 'N' Roses: Against all odds, Axl Rose has at last released Chinese Democracy – the title track off the first album of new GNR material since 1991. Already getting massive early airplay, it is a hard-rocking cyberpunk drama complete with an action-movie intro, neurotic multitrack vocals and plenty of spaced-out guitar solos to make up for Slash's absence.

Over an industrial riff with shades of the Scorpions' Rock You Like a Hurricane, Axl wails about "Real time visionaries sitting in a Chinese stew" and more.

—A Change Is Gonna Come by Seal: Time for homecoming for fans of majestic, cultured melodies. Seal's seventh studio album Soul, due this month, is a study in soul classics, led by a cover of Sam Cooke's 1964 classic, A Change Is Gonna Come.

Once an anthem for the civil rights movement; its message in the wake of the 2008 US presidential election is particularly relevant. Production from David Foster is decidedly retro, brimming with silken strings and Seal, as ever, is smooth as velvet and passionate.

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