Guns N’ Roses bassist Duff McKagan revealed that he spent a crazy amount of time preparing to perform Led Zeppelin material in front of Jimmy Page a few years ago, spending ‘six to eight hours a day’ for weeks studying John Paul Jones’ bass playing. McKagan recently revealed how many new songs he’s written, that could end up being in contention for the new Guns N’ Roses album. He revealed the wild story in a new Music Radar interview.
So you’re still improving as a bass player?
“Yeah, I’m super into it. When Guns started that’s when I really became serious about playing bass, and then fast-forward a bunch of years to Velvet Revolver when I started taking bass lessons, I got into playing Led Zeppelin shit.
“I did a gig a while back with Kim Thayil and Jerry Cantrell. Barrett Martin [Screaming Trees/Walking Papers] played drums, and a bunch of guys sang, and we did a Led Zeppelin thing in front of Jimmy Page in Seattle.”
No pressure…
“Yeah, no pressure! We had to be fucking amazing, so everybody woodshedded on their own. I took three weeks over it, six to eight hours a day watching YouTube and trying to play exactly what John Paul Jones played. That brought me to another level of appreciation of James Jamerson and the classic Fender bass players.”
Jimmy Page told an interesting story himself on Instagram on Tuesday, “On this day in 1965, I went to see @johnmayallofficial & the Bluesbreakers at the Pontiac Club in Putney, London. It showcased @ericclapton magnificent mastery of the blues guitar.
Eric came to stay at my home in Epsom that night as I had told him about the recordings and guitar sound I was getting from my Simon recorder. We played together and tracks surfaced on the ‘Blues Anytime’ series on Immediate Records. I went on to produce ‘I’m Your Witchdoctor’ and ‘Telephone Blues’ with Mayall and Clapton, as well as ‘Sitting on Top of the World’ and ‘Double Crossing Time’.”
