Slash did not leave because of artistic differences or any of those other crap stories you hear about it in the media. It was Axl who wanted Slash to leave. But it was not out of Axl's wanting for control of the band, it was out of a fear. Axl had this recurring nightmare about being on stage with the band and Slash's hair would start to engulf everything. For 40 nights he had this dream, then he finally decided to do something about it...
He called up Slash to jam and rehearse some stuff over at his studio. Slash was cool with it and they jammed that night. Axl started making things hard on Slash on purpose to make him want to leave. But Slash figured Axl was maybe having a bad day and needed to get that stress out, so nothing bad really came of that rehearsal. Axl knew he's need to take this to more extreme measures before it was too late....if he didn't act soon, Slash's hair would get him too!!!!!