by Duff McKagan
First published 2011
Duff McKagan flees Seattle at twenty to escape the heroin deaths destroying his punk scene friends. Living in his car in Los Angeles, he answers a bass player ad from someone calling himself Slash. This meeting births Guns N' Roses, the world's most dangerous band. McKagan watches GN'R sell over 100 million albums and pack stadiums globally. But success extracts its price. As the band fractures, McKagan's alcoholism spirals toward his own near death. This brush with mortality becomes his turning point. He finds an unconventional route to sobriety and makes surprising life choices. McKagan guides readers through the dark center of rock history's most notorious band and shows how he emerged transformed on the other side.
Genres: addiction, autobiography, biography-memoir, music
Vibes: emotional, intimate, thought-provoking
Tropes: redemption, transformation
Setting: Los Angeles, Seattle
Period: 20th-century
366 pages · Hardcover · Touchstone
Content warnings: addiction, alcohol-abuse, drug-use