Duff McKagan is a multi-instrumentalist, singer, and composer from the United States. McKagan has been the bassist for the hard rock band Guns N’ Roses for twelve years.
In 2016, upon the band’s induction into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, he rejoined the group. In 1993, he released ‘Belief in Me’ as a solo album and joined the ensemble Neurotic Outsiders.
Bio
| Age: | 58 |
| Born: | February 5, 1964 |
| Country of Origin: | United States of America |
| Source of Wealth: | Musician |
Early Years
Michael Andrew McKagan was born on February 5, 1964, in Seattle, Washington as Duff McKagan. He grew up with his mother Marie, father Elmer, and seven elder siblings in Seattle’s University District.
McKagan has been known as “Duff” since he was a little child. Marie began working as a medical stenographer to support the family following his parents’ divorce.
Bruce, Duff’s brother, taught him how to play bass, and he polished his talents by playing along with the albums “Damaged” by Black Flag and “1999” by Prince.
McKagan attended Roosevelt High School, but he dropped out after his sophomore year and obtained his GED while working as a pastry chef for the Great American Food and Beverage Company.
In 2012, during his commencement address at Roosevelt High School, he was handed an honorary diploma.
Guns N’ Roses
Duff formed the Vains, a punk band, in 1979, and then played with the Living, the Fastbacks, and The Fartz (later known as 10 Minute Warning). He came to Los Angeles in 1983 and, in response to a newspaper ad, established the band Road Crew with future Guns N’ Roses bandmates Slash and Steven Adler.
In 1985, McKagan became the bassist for the new band Guns N’ Roses, which contained Axl Rose, Izzy Stradlin, Tracii Guns, and Rob Gardner, then two months later, Adler and Slash joined the group after Gardner and Guns resigned.
The band performed their first show at The Troubadour on June 6, 1985, following only two days of practice. Guns N’ Roses’ debut album, “Appetite for Destruction,” was released in 1987 and went on to sell more than 28 million copies, making it the best-selling debut album in history.
Guns N’ Roses released the albums “G N’ R Lies” (1988), “Use Your Illusion I” (1991), and “Use Your Illusion II” (1991) while Duff was a member of the band (1993).
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Solo and Additional Projects
McKagan, Steve Jones, John Taylor, and Matt Sorum created the supergroup Neurotic Outsiders in 1995, releasing a self-titled album in 1996 before disbanding the following year.
Duff departed Guns N’ Roses in August 1997, shortly after the birth of his first kid, shortly after having his first child. 1998 saw the reunion of 10 Minute Warning and the release of their self-titled album.
McKagan’s first solo album, “Believe in Me,” was released in 1993, and his second solo album, “Beautiful Disease,” was scheduled for release in 1999; however, Duff was dropped from his label during the merger between Interscope Records and Geffen Records, resulting in the loss of commercial rights to release his album.
He did a tour in support of the album, forming the band Loaded with Dez Cadena, Michael Barragan, and Taz Bentley.
There have been various distinct versions of Loaded over the years, and the band has released the albums “Episode 1999: Live” (1999), “Dark Days” (2001), and “Sick” (2009), and “The Taking” (2011). (2011).
Velvet Revolver was formed in 2002 by Duff, Slash, Matt Sorum, Dave Kushner, and Scott Weiland, and their 2004 first album, “Contraband,” received three Grammy nominations. They followed the success of “Contraband” with “Libertad” in 2007, and the band went on hiatus in 2008 after Weiland’s departure.
McKagan briefly joined Alice in Chains in 2006 and Jane’s Addiction in 2010 and performed with the Rock N Roll All Stars, subsequently renamed the Kings Of Chaos, in 2012.
In 2014, he performed a handful of performances with Guns N’ Roses before rejoining the group to headline Coachella in 2016 and embark on the Not in This Lifetime… Tour. In 2019, Duff released the solo album “Tenderness.”
Other Ventures
McKagan appeared in the 1988 film “The Dead Pool,” as a rocker vampire on the Fox series “Sliders” in 1997, and as himself on the IFC comedy “Portlandia” in 2014.
In 1999, he was featured in the documentary “Betty Blowtorch and Her Amazing True Life Adventures” and produced the “Get Off” EP by Betty Blowtorch. Meridian Rock, a wealth management firm that caters to musicians, was founded by Duff in 2011.
In 2015, Rainstorm Entertainment released “It’s So Easy (And Other Lies),” a documentary on McKagan. Along with the film’s director, Christopher Duddy, Duff is recognized as a screenwriter.
Duff McKagan’s Net Worth
American musician and author Duff McKagan has a net worth of $70 million. McKagan is well famous as the bassist for the band Guns N’ Roses.
Additionally, he temporarily played bass for Jane’s Addiction and has performed with Velvet Revolver and Loaded. Four years after Guns N’ Roses were inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, Duff rejoined the band in 2016.
McKagan has released five Guns N’ Roses albums, three Loaded albums, two Velvet Revolver albums, and two solo albums.
Additionally, he has written weekly columns for ESPN.com, SeattleWeekly.com, and Playboy.com. Duff’s debut book, “It’s So Easy: And Other Lies,” was published in 2011 and was followed by “How to Be a Man: (and other illusions)” in 2015.
Personal Life
Duff and Mandy Brixx were married on May 28, 1988. In September 1992, following their divorce in April 1990, he wed Linda Johnson.
McKagan and Johnson divorced three years later, and on August 28, 1999, he married Susan Holmes. Grace and Mae were born to the couple in August 1997 and July 2000, respectively.
In 1994, Duff was hospitalized at Seattle’s Northwest Hospital and Medical Center after acute alcohol-induced pancreatitis caused his pancreas to enlarge and begin spewing digestive enzymes.
McKagan, who was 30 at the time, was advised that he would likely die within a month if he did not quit drinking. In a 2005 interview, Duff revealed that he used to use “a gallon of vodka per day,” and he credited mountain biking and martial arts for helping him remain sober.
In 1994, McKagan enrolled in a finance course at Santa Monica Community College. He later attended Seattle Central Community College and the Albers School of Business and Economics at Seattle University.
Stock Holdings
As his body and mind recovered, Duff utilized his newly acquired financial expertise to investigate Guns N’ Roses’ income and losses.
In contrast to many of their contemporaries, Guns N’ Roses’ finances were managed pretty efficiently, although the band was mostly losing money on tours to promote album sales. He discovered that traveling was regarded as a “loss leader” in order to sell CDs.
Duff was one of the first musicians to recognize that he could sell tickets and t-shirts to generate significantly more revenue. He also recruited tour sponsors and initiated the sale of VIP packages and other band-profitable goods.
Each member of the band had an equal portion of the band’s revenues. Now that he wasn’t wasting his money on alcohol and drugs, Duff had a substantial amount of spare cash. In 1994, he chose to invest $100,000 for the first time in the stock market. Since he was born and raised in Seattle, he chose three companies there. The stocks he selected:
- Starbucks
- Amazon
- Microsoft
Obviously, it is unclear how many shares, if any, he still has today, but since those were his FIRST stock selections, it is reasonable to assume that Duff has been quite prudent with his stock decisions throughout the years.