Dr Pepper issues challenge to GNR

In what surely is not some covertly orchestrated PR stunt, Dr Pepper issued a challenge to Axl Rose: Release the mythically delayed Chinese Democracy–the first album of new Guns N' Roses material since 1991's Use Your Illusion I and II–by the end of 2008, and the company will give a free can (is that redundant?) of its ambiguously fruity soft drink to "everyone in America." Chinese Democracy, of course, has become a black pit of money and band members–most notably Slash and virtuoso weirdo Buckethead–that Rose has been trying to dig himself out of since 1994. In response, Rose posted the following brief and apparently bewildered press release on the GNR website: