... from the blurb for a production of Aufstieg und Fall der Stadt Mahagonny aka Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny by Kurt Weill and Bertolt Brecht:
"Three fugitive criminals found the city of Mahagonny in the desert, which is really a snare and money pit. Goal: make as much money as possible off other people and gather a fortune without working. Mahagonny wants to be "paradise city", a place of unbridled enjoyment, a symbolic caricature of absolute freedom..."
Could Guns N' Roses have possibly got that phrase from Brecht/Weill?!?
If so, the missing link, or even the conduit, might just conceivably be
As described above, Mahagonny sounds rather like Los Angeles (or Las Vegas)
And "caricature of absolute freedom" sounds a lot like Sunset Strip metal in the 1980s...
"For if we don't find
The next whiskey bar
I tell you we must die..."