Bassist Duff McKagan played a key role in Guns N’ Roses getting back together for their big reunion tour, according to his wife, model and swimsuit designer Susan Holmes-McKagan.
“He was a major part of the crew that helped pull this [tour] together,” Holmes-McKagan told Page Six, describing her husband as a “good team player” who solves problems in “the most businesslike, peaceful manner.”
The “Not In This Lifetime…” tour, which hits the New York area this weekend, took “a lot of love” and hard work to come together over the last several months, she added.
A concert in Los Angeles this spring was the first time that original members McKagan and the famously feuding singer-songwriter Axl Rose and guitarist Slash had performed together in two decades. Last year, Slash said in an interview that “a lot of the tension … has dissipated” between himself and Rose. “We don’t have all those issues anymore. There’s not a lot of controversy. It’s something that’s more perpetuated by the media than anything,” Slash said on “CBS This Morning.”
Holmes-McKagan, who has been married to rocker Duff since 1999, also spoke about what the tour means to her and the couple’s teenage daughters, Grace — who sings in the band The Pink Slips — and Mae: “It’s really exciting for all of us. Our family’s grown up with this band in and out.”
Some details from the McKagan family’s life may end up in print very soon.
The former Vogue and Glamour covergirl, who has been showing her writing chops in pieces for the Huffington Post over the past four years, is now working on a novel set in the 1990s New York music and fashion scenes. It’s expected to hit bookstores in summer 2017.
“Hopefully this time next year you’ll be poolside in a Susan Holmes swimsuit reading the novel,” she said with a laugh. We’ll take it.