"Knockin' on Heaven's Door" is a song by American singer-songwriter Bob Dylan, written for the soundtrack of the 1973 film Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid.
In 1987, American hard rock band Guns N' Roses started performing the song. A live version of the song was released on the 12-inch single of "Welcome to the Jungle" the same year. They recorded and released a studio version in 1990 for the soundtrack of the film Days of Thunder that reached No. 18 on the US Billboard Album Rock Tracks chart and No. 56 on Canada's RPM Top Singles chart.
This studio recording was slightly modified for the band's 1991 album Use Your Illusion II, discarding the responses in the second verse. Released as the second single from the album, it reached No. 2 on the UK Singles Chart and the New Zealand Singles Chart. Elsewhere, the single topped the charts of Portugal, Belgium, and the Netherlands; it was the best-selling song of 1992 in the latter country.
In Ireland, where the song also reached No. 1, it became Guns N' Roses' third (and to date last) number-one single as well as their ninth consecutive top-five hit.
Their performance of the song at the Freddie Mercury Tribute Concert in 1992 was used as the B-side for the single release and was also included on their Live Era: '87–'93 album, released in 1999.[28] Another version was released on the video Use Your Illusion World Tour - 1992 in Tokyo II.
The music video for this version of the song was directed by Andy Morahan.