N.W.A. Partied with Guns

REVOLVER: You have been sober since 1994. Why did you write a song called "Cocaine" now?

DUFF McKAGAN: It's just this tongue-in-cheek song about me in 1993 when I quit cocaine. Of course my alcohol intake went up. Everyone would be like, "Dude!" and I'd be like, "Well, at least I quit cocaine." So that song is about my state of mind: "Empty bottle of Vicodin, the dirty clothes I slept in ... I hid a gun in a darkened place, a simple short arm's length away." I was paranoid.

Is that true?

Yeah, man. I had guns everywhere.

Did anybody ever ...

Ever get shot? No, I was just paranoid. It was the '80s in L.A. We hung out in the seedier underbelly. Then add drugs to that, and hanging out with the N.W.A. guys, Ice-T, and stuff like that. There were always guys around ready to protect my house and stuff. And it fed into my paranoia. They were like, "Fuck ... are you strapped? "I'm like, "Uh?" They're like, "Well, we can hook you up." And I started buying guns.

Did you hang out with N.W.A. often?

Yeah, all the guys. They were, like, the other band like Guns N' Roses in L.A., to be quite honest. They were telling the same story we were telling, and we both recognized that. We were fans of each other's bands. Were we the tightest budddies, hanging out? No. But we had parties and stuff together and hung out.

Speaking of that time in your life, you played with Guns N' Roses in London last year. What did it mean to you personally?

That's what it meant: It was a personal thing. And what happened personally between Axl shall remain personal and private. And if we had never played a show, it might have been a little better.

What do you mean?

Well, 'cause now everybody knows about it. People ask me now. I've known the guy since 1984. We became men at the same time. We witnessed this really fucking weird thing that happened to us. It was amazing and beautiful, but dark and fucked up, but we were the only ones in the fishbowl. So there are certain things I can't share with my wife or people who are really close to me, 'cause they just weren't there. They weren't part of the band. So there's going to be that, which bonds us forever. In London I was like, "I'm gonna go see my friend." And that's it.

-KORY GROW, REVOLVER