What makes a wildly successful rock star take up book writing, such a solitary and relentlessly difficult occupation? What rewards lie in store? Duff McKagan, the punk rocker revered as the bass guitarist (and cofounder) of Guns N' Roses, Velvet Revolver, and Loaded, and now the author of the tell-all memoir It's So Easy and Other Lies (S&S/Touchstone, Oct.), blames his newfound passion on the clarity the written word brings to his thoughts. His long descent into drug addiction lent an urgency to his appreciation.
"I found I could express myself in a more fluid and direct way than talking," he says. "I could write something, look at it, and say, ‘That's exactly what I meant.' That's what keeps me coming back. I am happy when I write something and think, ‘That's the best word I could have found.' I like goofy, nerdy stuff like that."
McKagan's writing career was launched three years ago, when Italian Vogue and then Playboy and Seattle Weekly tapped him for articles. "I had written a couple of times in the Weekly about my addiction, what it was like. People would ask me how much I drank, how many drugs I took. But I was getting blank stares, so I started writing about how I got there. People also asked how I got sober. So this is my story."
The most challenging thing about writing the book, he says, was revisiting "dark places," such as when he would look in the mirror and think it was all someone else's fault. "In my sober life I thought I had done a thorough job of taking responsibility for myself, but I hadn't been as thorough as I thought." The book, he says, should make the reader uncomfortable once in a while, as it recreates the pain and chaos of addiction.
Cormac McCarthy stands foremost among McKagan's literary influences. "He's a genius. My house is pink and fluffy all the time, with three women [a wife and two young daughters] and two dogs, and as a guy I need to get some of my dark stuff out. Cormac helps exorcise some of that. Also," McKagan adds, "Hunter S. Thompson."
BEA, book tours, readings—it's all new to McKagan. "As a musician, a tour to me means two years. I had to laugh when my publicist asked, Can you do two weeks. I look forward to it. This is really fun." McKagan will be signing a 70-page excerpt from his book at the Simon & Schuster booth (3652 ,3653) today at 11:30 a.m.