China National Publications Import and Export Group, the state-owned monopoly responsible for importing all music, has warned shops not to import the new Guns ’N‘ Roses album, which also is reported to have been censored from Chinese search engines. Baidu, the Chinese version of Google, is said to be self-censoring any searches for the album, and the album’s official website, www.chinesedemocracy.com, has been blocked by the government censors.

The album includes tracks with names such as Helpless Chinese under an iron fist, and in an article headlined ‘American band releases album venomously attacking China’, the Global Times wrote that unidentified Chinese Internet users had described the album as part of a plot by the West to “grasp and control the world using democracy as a pawn.”

Tiananmen Square
Guns N' Roses became hugely popular in China in the late 1980s, when its music was associated with the rebellious student movements that flowered before the massacre in Tiananmen Square.

The new album reportedly cost over nine million pounds to make. It contains provocative lines such as:

"Blame it on the Falun Gong
they've seen the end
and you can't hold on now"

The Chinese government has outlawed the spiritual movement as an ‘illegal cult’ and there have been repeated accusations of the cruel treatment of Falun Gong members.

However, according to The Telegraph, the Chinese Ministry of Culture said it did not know whether the album was banned or not. "This is the first time we've heard about it," said a spokesman, adding that the ban “might just be a rumour”.