Duff Mckagan Quotes

Never miss an opportunity to keep your damn mouth shut.

Yes, confidence was knowing I could do anything. But, I realized, confidence must always be rooted in work. In sweat. In pain-good pain. And in honesty.

You dirty so and so.

Life is not a journey to the grave With the intention of arriving safely in a well-preserved body, But rather to skid in sideways Thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming: “Wow, what a ride!

Here’s what I believe. Shit fucking happens. That’s rule one. Everybody walking the planet knows that. Rule two: things rarely turn out the way you planned. Three: everybody gets knocked down. Four, and most important of all: after you take those shots, it’s time to stand up and walk on—to continue to live.

The music had the ability to conjure images in my head and help me drown out the tension and noise I was trying to avoid at my house.

When it comes to your values and personality, you are what you do in adverse situations.

That’s right: Duff McKagan, king of beers, viscount of vodka, count of coke. Champion of the world. Asshole.

Start every day with a clear conscience,” he said. “You should be able to wake up, go to the mirror in your bathroom, look yourself right in the eye, and say, ‘I didn’t lie to anyone I encountered yesterday,’ ‘I didn’t skirt an issue yesterday.’ If you lead an honest life, there are no regrets.

we did an acoustic set at CBGB on October 30, 1987, where we debuted “Patience.

We had no idea it would be the last time we would ever be able to walk around L.A. without feeling like we were in a fishbowl, isolated and on display.

Never move back in a straight line. Never set. Redirect. Fight your opponent as he fights you. Place your opponent where you want him.

forge ahead. try harder. do the thing that is directly in front of you, and don't think beyond that. head down. ears pinned back. move in a direct line.

Place pain in a steel box and let it float away,” Benny would say. “Pain will always be there—it’s how you deal with it that matters.

Slash was already in a league of his own and watching him play guitar was a “holy shit” moment.

Maracaña Stadium was the biggest in the world! Frank Sinatra had played there, Paul McCartney had played there, Pope John Paul II had played there. But us?

I always thought death and death alone could ever push me across that line when it came to this band. (I was wrong.)

It happens in a flash, life does. Only the ever-deepening lines on my face tell me that I have been alive for a while. I

I could hear and see exactly how rock should be: raw and fucked up with nothing held back, raw and fucked up with no boundaries left unbroken, raw and fucked up.

I did not drink any water whatsoever in my twenties, thinking it a total waste of time and stomach space—time and space better devoted to vodka.

On March 31, 1994, I went to LAX to catch a flight from L.A. to Seattle. Kurt Cobain was waiting to take the same flight. We started talking. He had just skipped out of a rehab facility. We were both fucked up. We ended up getting seats next to each other and talking the whole way, but we didn’t delve into certain things: I was in my hell and he was in his, and we both seemed to understand.

From the moment the five of us leaned into our first song, we could all hear and feel that the fit was right. The chemistry was immediate, thunderous, and soulful. It was amazing and all of us recognized it instantly.

Eventually we found ourselves in the middle of an onion field. When you’re hungry and don’t know where and when your next meal is coming, you can eat almost anything. Those were the best damn onions I’ve ever eaten. At that moment they tasted as sweet as apples.

Of all men the drunkard is the foulest. The thief when he is not stealing is like another. The extortioner does not practice in the home. The murderer when he is at home can wash his hands. But the drunkard stinks and vomits in his own bed and dissolves his organs in alcohol.

Sometimes we have to face things, face people, face situations in life that we don’t like to deal with,” he said. “It can feel like everybody is out to get you. That’s when you have to refuse to succumb, make people realize you are a force—but you also have to give and take in these situations.

One of my favorite “deep thoughts” on the topic occurred when one of my other bands, Loaded, was opening for Alice Cooper a number of years back. After one particularly successful show, we got to talking about Bon Jovi. In the song “Wanted Dead Or Alive,” the claim is made that “I’ve seen a million faces, and I’ve rocked them all.” All? Let’s ponder. I have no doubt that Bon Jovi had played to a million people by the time “Dead or Alive” was released on Slippery When Wet in 1986. But did they rock them all? Couldn’t it be that some dudes brought their girlfriends to the show and weren’t necessarily into their music? What about some parents? Or maybe some people just didn’t get rocked? Hey, it’s happened to me. I’ve gone to gigs properly prepared to get rocked and it just didn’t happen.

How peaceful death seemed, a simple and beautiful way out. Take me down. Take me home. Paradise …

Guns N’ Roses—the trademark now owned by Axl—took the stage.

(We wrote “Sweet Child o’ Mine” later, and the “where do we go now” coda of that song actually was just sort of tacked on, which is one of the reasons we didn’t anticipate it being a hit—or even a single, for that matter.)

We called the result “Welcome to the Jungle.” We played the song live for the first time when we opened a show at the Troubadour on a Thursday night in late June 1985. Also

We were never any good at communication, especially when that meant confrontation. If we could have developed those skills then, the story of GN’R might have been very different.

We rehearsed at the space twice a day regardless of anything else going on in any of our lives. Many of the songs that made up Appetite and Lies—as well as more than a few from Use Your Illusion—came together in this back-alley lair. When

Guns N’ Roses was no longer a band, but the band—our band. These are my fucking boys—they’re willing to fight through anything. I already knew this trip had set a new benchmark for what we were capable of, what we could and would put ourselves through to achieve our goals as a band. This band became a brotherhood under that oppressive Sacramento sun. Fuck yeah!

The finishing touch on my lush new lifestyle was to fill the refrigerator. I could afford to eat. This was major-label success!

On Christmas Day, 1989, I gave Mandy the Halliburton luggage Aerosmith had given me and asked her to get out. I was adamant. And I was keeping the dog. Merry fucking Christmas.

we ended up closing the show with the cover song we had tried during sound check that afternoon, “Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door.

We had a tour bus! We had a couple of real hotel rooms! And catering! Fuck, yes!

A few months prior, Axl had also come up with a great idea for “Patience,” seemingly out of nowhere, that had immediately become the story and melody of that song. The whistle part at the beginning was another ballsy and unusual move by Axl; the song just wouldn’t be the same without it. “Patience” quickly became one of my favorite GN’R songs to play live.

took something serious away from it. I told myself I would never get so deep into my cups that I wouldn’t be able to play.

a couple years prior we were hitchhiking to a gig with no gear. Now we were on a fucking tour bus. We could eat for free at a catered backstage buffet. Life was good.

The video for “Sweet Child o’ Mine” was on MTV when we set off in July, but on the first few dates we still got a tepid reaction from the crowd—polite applause. Soon, however, the song became a phenomenon, much to all of our surprise, to be honest. We had not even seen it as a potential single when we put it together.

Only later did we hear the news: two fans had died, suffocated beneath other fans in the mud. Oh, fuck, no, no, no. Those two fans, Alan Dick and Landon Siggers, had just come to see a rock concert. They had tried see us, to sing along with us. And now they were dead. All

Sweet Child” was bumped from number one by “Don’t Worry, Be Happy,” but Appetite climbed back to the top of the album charts and stayed there for a few weeks that fall. Our lives began to change irrevocably.

When it became clear that U.S. Customs was going to confiscate my camera, I hoisted it up and viciously smashed it on the ground as hard as I could. Twenty-five years later I’m still trying to get that incident cleared from my passport file.

It was a want ad for a band seeking a bass player. The name to call was Slash. With

A shake-out cruise could be just what Guns N’ Roses needed.

During those first rehearsals, the five of us started working up a new song together based on some lyrics I had brought with me in a notebook from Seattle. The song became “Paradise City,” and it started to gel in those few days before our Troubadour show and the trip up to Seattle.

Axl met me outside the rehearsal space to talk about my reservations. “You have to be part of this,” he said. “Give it another chance.

They had to call a bunch of people, including the accountants at Geffen. It didn’t help that Slash’s check was made out to “Stash.

we flew to England again to play the outdoor Monsters of Rock festival at Castle Donington. This was the kind of thing you heard about other bands playing—big bands, household names, not grubby kids a year or two removed from living in a back-alley storage space and treating their venereal diseases with fucking fish food.

At the end of the European leg, our lead guitar player pulled a knife on our bus driver in England. I

Izzy’s new band also featured Tracii Guns on lead guitar. They were calling the new group Guns N’ Roses.

Izzy, Axl, Slash—and Duff,” she said. “What kind of names are those?” “Well, there is a guy named Steven.

spirit—my body was so wrecked from abuse that my spirit was the only thing keeping me afloat, all I had left.

I’d done everything; I didn’t want to die, but I could be proud of not having left anything unsaid or undone. That’s what it meant to wake up with a clear conscience, to be honest.

Confidence is knowing you can do something even before you try it. Could I be a good father? Yes.

Look, we know the industry is changing,” Scott said, “but we don’t want to work with people like that.” The guy took the bait: “No way, I treat my artists like family. That would never happen with me.” Then Scott dropped the bomb: “That friend was this guy here,” he said, pointing to me, “and you’re the asshole who didn’t have the decency to make the courtesy call. Get the fuck out of here.

Yes, confidence was knowing I could do anything. But, I realized, confidence must always be rooted in work. In sweat. In pain—good pain. And in honesty.

Earlier in life, I had gauged masculinity by how tough someone was in a threatening situation. More recently I’d come to understand that such bravado was usually a mask for fear. My biggest challenge, and the core of what I now saw as true manliness, was being honest with myself and others and being forthright and true in my actions and dealings with my family, friends, and business associates.

Steven Adler was really nice, and expressed himself with an infectious, almost childlike enthusiasm. He said, “Listen, we’re going to be great—going to get the feet stompin’ and the hands clappin’.

Fortunately I never came to enjoy the effect of heroin for its own sake, but floating away on a silk pillow was infinitely nicer than grinding my teeth in a drunken, paranoid stupor at the end of a coke binge.

When I was thirty, I asked a nurse to let me die. In a couple days, I’m going to play “Cheap Sunglasses” alongside the man who wrote it.

BE THE MAN Set a good example. Even if you’ve got to fake it. Your kids observe everything you do. And even though it may not seem like it at the time, your kids want to be like you. They want to be proud of you and brag about their dad at school and to their friends. Be observant of your own actions around them kids. Listen to your girl. We men sometimes get frustrated when our ladies talk. We will try to actually converse when she is deep into a story about the boss being a dick, or some other friend of hers doing your girl wrong. Do not even try to fix this situation! Your sweetie just wants you to listen. Hell, you don’t even have to agree. Just listen. This is black-belt-level man stuff. Do the dishes. Hell, take it one level further: cook the dinner and do the dishes. Doing laundry is man’s work too, as well as cleaning up after the dogs and cuddling your kids. Having a home life where you get the opportunity to be a family man and partake in all these things is a very good thing. It means that you have elevated your man thing to the very top level. Keep it up. Don’t be a pussy. Don’t shy away from a situation just because it’s tough. If you need to protect the one you love or things are tough at work . . . pin those ears back and remember who the fuck you are. Get smart. Educate yourself on what is going on in culture and politics. Read some books about history. Don’t be a pawn, be a scholar. Evolve. Our dads and granddads grew up in a different time. Communication and tenderness were not necessarily components of their age groups’ makeup. You don’t have to be exactly like them. Even though we saw good examples of man stuff in them, the times, they are a-changing.

Finish each day and be done with it. You have done what you could. Some blunders and absurdities no doubt crept in; forget them as soon as you can. Tomorrow is a new day. You shall begin it serenely and with too high a spirit to be encumbered with your old nonsense.

loyal people have a mom they think is a saint.

TRY TO LOOK AT YOURSELF IN THE MIRROR AT HOME BEFORE BED. DID I DO EVERYTHING TO THE BEST OF MY ABILITY TODAY? WAS I HONEST ABOUT EVERY ACTION AND WORD SPOKEN TODAY? REALLY? WHO YOU LYIN' TO? YOURSELF? THAT'S PRETTY LAME. I'LL TRY HARDER TOMORROW. JUST DON'T USE! DON'T. USE.

Axl introduced me—as usual—as Duff “the King of Beers” McKagan. Soon after this, a production company working on a new animated series called me to ask if they could use the name “Duff” for a brand of beer in the show. I laughed and said of course, no problem. The whole thing sounded like a low-rent art project or something—I mean, who made cartoons for adults? Little did I know that the show would become The Simpsons and that within a few years I would start to see Duff beer glasses and gear everywhere we toured.

don't be a pussy. don't shy away from a situation just because it's tough. if you need to protect the one you love or things are tough at work... pin those ears back and remember who the fuck you are.

(we had added an unruly pug somewhere along the way)

Helicopters—“ghetto birds,” as the other residents called them—

In 1988, MTV aired a concert in which Axl introduced me—as usual—as Duff “the King of Beers” McKagan. Soon

I had grown up idolizing Prince, who played over twenty instruments on his debut album, which featured the amazing credit line “written, composed, performed, and recorded by Prince.

Grace has already told me and her mom to stay completely invisible. Her exact words: “You’re not invited.

Far fewer people know that Slash is also a world-class Russian crouch-down-and-kick-your-legs-out dancer. And

I swiped the Communion chalices to use as pimp cups for my cocktails. That

endangering someone else was unacceptable. I was not going to participate in any situation where an innocent third party was being harmed.

a production company working on a new animated series called me to ask if they could use the name “Duff” for a brand of beer in the show. I laughed and said of course, no problem. The whole thing sounded like a low-rent art project or something—I mean, who made cartoons for adults? Little did I know that the show would become The Simpsons and that within a few years I would start to see Duff beer glasses and gear everywhere we toured.

Then I decided to sign up for a marathon. I ran my first one the next year in three hours and forty-five minutes.

I guess we can all look back and see things in our lives that we could or should have done differently—and better—and

In 1994, former Guns N Roses bassist, Duff McKagan, decided to invest $100,000 in local Seattle companies, including an expanding chain of coffee shops, a software company and an online book seller; Starbucks, Microsoft and Amazon.

Initially I rode my heavy old mountain bike just to stave off the shakes, but I quickly realized riding made me feel better. And it was something to fill the time. Those first few days I just rode around aimlessly and only realized I’d been out for a long time when darkness gathered. Without ever thinking about it, I soon found myself riding around for eight hours a day—slowly, in flat areas, but all day long. My muscles ached each morning. I hadn’t exercised for years. But the soreness lifted my spirit. Not spirit as in mood, but my actual spirit—my body was so wrecked from abuse that my spirit was the only thing keeping me afloat, all I had left. After about a week of long flat rides, I began to challenge myself on the bike. Seattle is hilly and I had no trouble finding steeper and steeper climbs to test my endurance and my tolerance for pain. These increasingly hard rides came to represent a form of self-flagellation, a way to punish myself for all the damage I had done to myself and others. I could feel this healthy new kind of pain searing every muscle fiber and neuron in my body.

One of the best and most simple edicts in Benny’s teachings was his definition of confidence: “Knowing you can do something even before you try it.” Imagine that. Imagine being asked whether you can run a marathon and answering yes even though you have never done it. Ukidokan was about having full confidence that you were capable of anything.

Benny placed a lot of importance on honesty. “Start every day with a clear conscience,” he said. “You should be able to wake up, go to the mirror in your bathroom, look yourself right in the eye, and say, ‘I didn’t lie to anyone I encountered yesterday,’ ‘I didn’t skirt an issue yesterday.’ If you lead an honest life, there are no regrets.

You should be able to wake up, go to the mirror in your bathroom, look yourself right in the eye, and say, ‘I didn’t lie to anyone I encountered yesterday,’ ‘I didn’t skirt an issue yesterday.’ If you lead an honest life, there are no regrets.