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Ex-Guns N’ Roses bassist Tommy Stinson discussed DJ Ashba and Ron ‘Bumblefoot’ Thal’s exits from the band in a new interview with Hard Rock Haven.
Hard Rock Haven: Obviously writing for a hard rock website, it would be remiss of me to not ask any Guns questions. Did you ever see this happening…Axl reuniting with Slash and Duff?
Tommy Stinson: If you asked me if it would happen I would have said, “Definitely wouldn’t be happening.” But I think that…I think that due to some of the things that happened towards the end when I was in the band…from my part in it, I wasn’t able to tour for a while because of my family situation at home was very unstable. I had to take care of some shit. So I had basically had to turn down I think it might have been as many as 5 different tours that they wanted to do. And this that and the other thing, I just couldn’t do it. And then DJ (Ashba) quit…when DJ made it official he was “quitting Guns N’ Roses” or whatever. I think that was pretty, “Okay, well, guess we’ll move on from this chapter and get back with the old guys.” I mean, seems to me there might have been some other weird stuff going on in there that I wasn’t party to, but I’m glad they did it. I think it was important that they did. They’re having a ball and fucking killing it. I’ve seen 2 shows, they’re great. They’re all really happy and it seems to be drama free.
HRH: I’m envious, I haven’t made it to any of the reunion shows yet. You mentioned DJ quitting…was that an unusual situation to be in. Were you privy to that at all at the time or did you find out with the rest of us?
TS: (laughs) You know, he called me up on the phone and told me that he was gonna quit, you know, and this that and the other thing. I just kinda got to thinking … it was funny that he made such a big deal about it because there wasn’t really anything going on. He seemed like it was kind of inevitable that there was going to be a reunion happening, so I think he…I don’t know if he (laughs) tried to get in front of the curve to, you know, drum up some extra fucking press for himself. I don’t really know what the deal was, but I thought it odd. I thought it an odd time to make a big stink about quitting, you know?
HRH: Honestly, I didn’t find it anywhere near as odd as Bumblefoot’s whole “not talking about it” thing that went on for a while in his interviews. That time had to have been an unusual situation for everyone in the band.
TS: It was. It was comical actually. (laughs) I was laughing about it. You know, I mean I felt bad for Axl because I think he kinda got side-swiped a bit by some of the stuff that was going on. He knew…they all knew…what was going on with me and there was nothing I could do about it. I didn’t have any backup plan to help me with my 8-year-old kid or any of that, so it got to be pretty rough quick. But you know, whatever led to them doing this reunion, I think a lot of people are really happy about it. Like I said, I saw 2 of the shows. They were great. Looked like they were having fun. The only one out of them I don’t really know is Slash and all those guys are my buddies. I’ve talked to them and they’re all having a good time as long as they keep doing it.
