If Guns N’ Roses frontman Axl Rose upholds the band’s sense of chaos, and lead guitarist Slash is behind its flair, bass player Duff McKagan brings the attitude. He was born in Seattle and his musical roots are indebted to punk from both sides of the Atlantic; this summer, GNR have covered the Stooges’ TV Eye on tour, McKagan snarling through Iggy Pop’s vocal parts as all six-foot-plus of his wiry, tattoo-covered frame bounds around.
McKagan’s recent solo music channels the same outlaw spirit, but instead through acoustic twangs and a weathered voice – a lively meeting of reflective Americana and sonorous rock’n’roll. Lighthouse, his third solo album in 30 years, comprises 10 songs carefully selected from a batch of 60 recorded during the Covid-19 pandemic, and that title holds multiple meanings. “I have an amazing wife – she’s always been a real beacon of hope, beauty and excitement, and I would go through anything for her,” he says
. “She’s got me through so much shit. She is my lighthouse, but on the grander scale of the record, we’re all searching. It’s about hope and wondering what’s next.McKagan is adept at this kind of robust metaphor, and even Bob Dylan has singled him out for praise. Speaking to the Wall Street Journal, Dylan was complimentary about Chip Away – a song from McKagan’s previous album, 2019’s Tenderness – likening its message to Michelangelo’s sculpture of David and an artist’s innate prerogative to overwrite and chip away at themselves, mining for creative gold. His interpretation is testament to McKagan’s own transformation, from struggles with drugs, alcohol and mental health towards sobriety and a measure of stability.
McKagan’s solo career stretches back to 1993’s Believe In Me, its cover depicting a skeletal cartoon of him bathing in a martini glass, wine bottle in one hand, cigarette in the other. Months later, McKagan was admitted to a Seattle hospital with alcohol-induced pancreatitis. Doctors warned him that he was weeks from death.
“I was so fucked up when I made my first solo record,” McKagan says. “It’s a great snapshot of where I was at in 1992. I could still play. I played drums and all the shit on there, but I couldn’t sing. I had so much cocaine in my throat, and you can hear it all in my sinuses. Tenderness was a great snapshot of how I’d progressed, and this album is another progression for me.”
Lighthouse follows an EP called This Is the Song,
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