By DJ Monk
Guns N’ Roses bassist Duff McKagan has announced two solo shows at the end of the summer.
He will play the Islington Assembly Hall on Thursday 29 August and Manchester Academy 3 on Sunday 1 September. In between, he will appear at the Electric Picnic festival in Dublin on Saturday 31 August.
McKagan will release his new solo album, ‘Tenderness’, on 31 May. The album was produced by, and features, Grammy winner Shooter Jennings.
Many of the songs on ‘Tenderness’ were inspired by the two and a half years McKagan spent on Guns N’ Roses’ ‘Not In This Lifetime’ reunion tour. Speaking about some of the album’s themes, he adds:
“We’re becoming divided at a time when we need each other most,” says McKagan. “When huge industries get replaced because of modernization, it’s time to retrain and bolster up those who get swept aside. Homelessness and drug addiction are avoidable in this country if we come together and get private and public cogs turning together in a positive direction. We can at least try to tackle mental illness while we’re at it. But alas, we stump and lie, point fingers and divide. We’re way better than this.”
The album has been preceded by a single, ‘Don’t Look Behind You’:
Duff says of ‘Don’t Look Behind You’:
“[It] was truly inspired by a sense of peace that washed over me after a few months of turning off the TV and social media. It was also inspired by the sense of real community I felt while traveling and talking to people around the world on tour during this somewhat tenuous time. This period of sturm und drang will indeed pass. The song seemed to be the final summation that rang loudly from the topics on ‘Tenderness’.”
“The recording sessions for this album also saw us re-assemble, for the first time since the Use Your Illusion recordings, The Suicide Horn Section, featuring my brother Matt McKagan on trombone, the great Chuck Findlay on trumpet, and the impossible Brian Scanlon on sax. On the very last day of recording, they came down to the studio and laid down the amazing horn lines for ‘Don’t Look Behind You.’ I’ll never forget the culmination of Matt and The Suicide Horns mixed with the Waters singing group sending this song and album out, as Shooter and I just watched it all with goosebumps.”