As you are no doubt aware by now, Chinese Democracy was released last week to what are generally considered disappointing sales figures. Here in the States, the album sold 261,000 copies to land at number three on the Billboard charts; that’s a little more than Velvet Revolver’s debut, Contraband, sold in its first week back in 2004, when the industry was actually in better shape – but Contraband didn’t take fifteen years and didn’t cost thirteen million dollars. So that number just ain’t really cutting it in most people’s eyes.

But the number actually strikes me as being kind of impressive, when you consider how little promotion was actually done for the record. At the Best Buy where I bought my copy of the album, not only was there no floor display or posters announcing its release, but when I couldn’t find a copy on the shelves (in either the “new release” section of the “Guns N’ Roses” section), one employee actually tried to tell me that they weren’t carrying the disc – despite the fact that Best Buy is the only store in America that are stocking the record (Another, slightly less retarded store worker was able to find the album for me no problem. As it turns out, I could have walked ten blocks to the Virgin Megastore, who are selling Canadian imports of the CD at a slightly higher price.). And if reports are any indication, I’m not the only one who experienced a Best Buy blunder.

And that’s on top of the fact that, as we’ve noted, the man himself, W. Axl Rose, hasn’t come out of hiding to grant interviews, shoot a music video, tour, or in any way acknowledge that his masterpiece is finally seeing the light of day after years of waiting. I think this fact struck most Axl fans as a typically bizarre/enigmatic/just plain dumb move on Rose’s part – I don’t think it actually occurred to anyone that Rose might be, y’know, actually missing, as Music-News.com is now reporting.

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Speaking of Bob Lefsetz, he reported awhile back that his GN’R source told him the that the plan to sell Chinese Democracy exclusively at Best Buy was a done deal. The rumor has been picking up steam and with the band’s new song, “Shackler’s Revenge,” currently making its debut on video game consoles everywhere as part of Rock Band 2, it seemed like maybe there was a legit chance of the album finally coming out; then again, that’s what GN’R fans thought in 1999, when the song “Oh My God” appeared on the End of Days soundtrack.

Now Rolling Stone is adding fire to the flame, going so far as to announce an unofficial release date for the hotly anticipated album:

“[R]umor is that the long-awaited album will be released exclusively through Best Buy on November 25th. The source of the multi-tiered rumors is a supposed ‘vendor convention’ that Best Buy had on Wednesday in Dallas, Texas. Reportedly, Guns manager Andy Gould told the 900 employees the news about Chinese Democracy before previewing three songs from the album.”

Gould also allegedly told convention goers that a new song, “If the World” – which actually leaked back in June – would appear in the upcoming Ridley Scott film Body of Lies (Oddly enough, Scott had wanted to use GN’R's “Welcome to the Jungle” in his earlier film Black Hawk Down, and was denied the rights by Axl Rose.).

As with all things GN’R-related, this should all be taken with a grain – no, a half-grain – of salt until someone with more authority than a Best Buy employee who may or may not have actually been in the room when Gould may or may not have actually made these announcements confirms the rumors. In the meantime, if you’re interested, here’s the trailer for Body of Lies:

UPDATE: Billboard now confirms that Best Buy will be the exclusive retailer for Chinese Democracy, but does not have a set release date.

-AR