Plan is in place for new Guns N' Roses music, says Duff McKagan

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By ( Classic Rock ) published

Guns N' Roses have been talking about a new album for some time – and now Duff tells fans to stay tuned

Duff Mckagan press shot
(Image credit: Charles Peterson)

Guns N' Roses bassist Duff McKagan has confirmed that the band will release new music.

GNR haven't put out a new album since 2008's Chinese Democracy. Earlier this year, guitarist Slash let slip in an interview that new music was on the cards.

Now in an interview for Trunk Nation With Eddie Trunk on Sirius XM, McKagan has been more direct in confirming the news.

He says: "There's definitely a desire and a plan for new music. Yeah, for sure."

The hard rock giants have released "new" singles Absurd, Hard Skool and The General in recent years. All are re-workings of tracks from the Chinese Democracy era.

Since the GNR reunion of Slash and Axl Rose was confirmed in 2016, the band have toured long and hard. They are currently enjoying a break, which McKagan says he badly needed.

He adds: "I know I had to rest. I had to rest my body. A lot of hours on stage. A lot of traveling. And I've gotta listen to my body these days. I've gotta listen.

"So I had to rest. I think we all need to rest. Slash, he'll go out and tour, like, four weeks later and do it all over again. I'm, like, 'Okay, dude. More power to you. I'm gonna go to Hawaii.'

"You can go on a tour and you can have peaks and valleys on the tour. And we never do. Every gig is super special. Even when we extended our tour after touring for so much, extending it for another four weeks, that can destroy a band.

"I've seen it happen. That's too long. You went too long. And everybody's starting to snap at each other and the crew and all that stuff. But it doesn't happen with our band or our crew."

Stef Lach

Stef wrote close to 5,000 stories during his time as assistant online news editor and later as online news editor between 2014-2016. An accomplished reporter and journalist, Stef has written extensively for a number of UK newspapers and also played bass with UK rock favourites Logan. His favourite bands are Pixies and Clap Your Hands Say Yeah. Stef left the world of rock'n'roll news behind when he moved to his beloved Canada in 2016, but he started on his next 5000 stories in 2022.