by Duff McKagan
Jon Krakauer, Into Thin Air: This 1997 masterpiece sparked a fervor that drove me to read about cold, scary places high in the air.
Peter Krass, Carnegie: If you are a lover of history and the big and beefy earth-moving characters that shaped much of it, get this tome. It’s a massive but amazingly readable and enjoyable undertaking.
John D. Lukacs, Escape from Davao: I’ve read a shitton of books about World War II and have spent a lot of that time zeroing in on things in the Pacific. The Bataan Death March, and anything to do with being a prisoner of the Japanese, is right in my wheelhouse. This story of Airman Ed Dyess’s escape from a Japanese labor camp in the Philippines is as epic as Unbroken. Lukacs, a top-notch nonfiction writer, pulls the facts of warfare, distance, hunger, and fear into a fully engaging read.
Cormac McCarthy, Blood Meridian: OK, get comfy, because I’m gonna start talking about Cormac McCarthy. As I’ve already made clear, I’m a big fan of the prose and rhythm of Mr. McCarthy’s writing. Blood Meridian takes the reader through a relentless, bloody campaign of revenge between a Mexican Army/US Calvary mash-up of figures and the Comanche band they are after. This is a book for men!
Cormac McCarthy, Outer Dark: Yep. Another dark and twisted look into the American soul. Poverty. Misery. Suffering. Loss. Nothing like a little Cormac fiction to put a little spring in your step. Genius!
Christopher Moore, Lamb: If you like Jesus and adventure and kung fu and hookers, please read Lamb. If you have no sense of humor and follow religion blindly, this book may not be for you. As a student of theology at a fine Jesuit university in Seattle, I found Lamb to be brilliant, well-informed, and funny as hell.
Andrew Nagorski, The Greatest Battle: Nagorski has become the ultimate World War II historian since the passing of Stephen Ambrose, and his writing will send you to the footnotes looking for more books on war (Nagorski’s reference material has now become my de facto reading list). A lot of us think of the battle for Stalingrad as the big turning point of the Soviet/German conflict in World War II. Nagorski takes us through the (for some reason) little-told story of Hitler’s army getting to the city limits of Moscow and the great lengths that Stalin went to to save his city. It is amazing to think of the insanity of Stalin and Hitler and how so very recent in history this was. This is a must-read for any war/history buff.
Andrew Nagorski, Hitlerland: Another World War II instant classic from Nagorski. Here, he illustrates the unlikely rise of the Third Reich through the eyes of American journalists who reported on Germany from 1921 to 1941. It’s a fascinating and thought-provoking angle.
Miklos Nyiszli, Auschwitz: A terrifying eyewitness account of the most diabolical human horrors. Dr. Nyiszli wrote of his horrible experience just as the war ended. He survived for twelve months in the concentration camp by keeping his mind focused on science. This book is brutal, but for the historian and those fascinated with how far human evil can go in real life, it is essential.
Tim O’Brien, The Things They Carried: This may be the most poignant book ever written about the US involvement in Vietnam. O’Brien was a nineteen-year-old kid when he went to Vietnam as an Army enlistee with a huge talent for writing and observation—and a fear of dying in the field.
Michael B. Oren, Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East, 1776 to Present: If you are interested in America’s involvement in the Middle East—the whos, whys, and how-the-hells—then this book is a great all-in companion to Thomas Friedman or Steve Coll. Author Michael B. Oren is as good as David McCullough when it comes to making nonfiction read like an epic, page-turning novel.
Donald Ray Pollock, The Devil All of the Time: Pollock is a master. I was unfamiliar with his work until a friend who owns a hip, independent bookstore in the Bay Area gave me the heads-up. If you are from somewhere around Knockemstiff, Ohio, you may find this book too close to home. But for a good ol’ peek inside of the underbelly of America, try anything by Pollock.
Donald Ray Pollock, Knockemstiff: Once you start, you cannot stop reading Pollock. Knockemstiff, Ohio, is, according to Pollock’s storytelling, a desperate, no-win corner of America. In the same sense that Cormac McCarthy can make a reader queasy with the necrophiliac in Children of God, Pollock can do the same with his speed-sniffing, glue-huffing ruffians and sex fiends.
Andres Resendez, A Land So Strange: The Epic Journey of Cabeza de Vaca: I love these kinds of books. The subtitle says it all: “The Extraordinary Tale of a Shipwrecked Spaniard Who Walked Across America in the 16th Century.” Now THAT is what I call a real story!
William L. Shirer, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich: A History of Nazi Germany: I wanted to read this from the moment I finished Nagorski’s Hitlerland, which documented how bellicose toward Hitler one journalist was: William Shirer. The breadth, scope, detail, and research that Shirer pours into this book is absolutely second to none. Shirer was in Germany as Hitler took over. He stayed there and reported to the rest of the world until 1941 when America entered the war (and he was kicked out). Shirer came back for the Nuremberg Trials and combed through tons of captured Nazi and Wehrmacht documents, as well as confiscated personal diaries of many of the top German military and Nazi party brass. That Shirer could assimilate all of this material and make it such a readable story is really beyond comprehension.
Upton Sinclair, The Jungle: A lot of you probably already read this in your senior year of high school. But I didn’t have a senior year in high school and, thus, didn’t read Sinclair until just a couple of years ago. The man’s a genius. The Jungle is one of the darkest accounts we have of industrial Chicago in the early twentieth century. It’ll make you think twice before you eat another hot dog!
Upton Sinclair, King Coal: Again, Upton takes a deep, eye-opening look into industry and exposes all of the wrongs and class warfare between the haves and have-nots. Few authors have done as much as Sinclair to exert pressure to change our modern view of work conditions and inequalities. He does it all in the rubric of a page turner. Stunning.
Upton Sinclair, The Moneychangers: I’m not sure what the difference is between Goldman Sachs selling financial vehicles that are built to fail and Sinclair’s 1910 Northern Mississippi Railroad stock being sold to a public that had no idea of the bad intentions of its chairmen. The Jungle did much to change child-labor laws and food-inspection laws. I wonder why Wall Street wasn’t put on a tighter leash after it was exposed by The Moneychangers? This hundred-year-old book is suddenly very topical and relevant.
Corey Taylor, Seven Deadly Sins: I’ve known Corey (of Slipknot fame) on a personal level for the last few years and have come to know him as one of the smartest dudes out there. When he told me about his foray into writing, I had no doubt that whatever topic he chose to write about would be deep and heavy. Seven Deadly Sins is a funny yet poignant look at Corey’s dip into drugs and vice and asinine behavior in his youth. But it also studies the age-old question of whether certain personal traits are learned or bred into a person. Corey is one of those people who just seems impossibly good at whatever he chooses to pursue. I have no doubt that this tome will reflect this fact to you, too.
Rachel Trezise, Dial M for Merthyr: This is one of those books that when it spills out of my backpack at the airport or backstage, people in the know around me give me an enthusiastic thumbs-up. This is a rock-and-roll book, and it is a social study done in real time, about a young rock band from Wales and a young writer in the back of their tour bus taking notes.
Paul Trynka, Iggy Pop: Open Up and Bleed: If you lean more toward rock and roll and if you are a Stooges, Iggy Pop, or even David Bowie fan, Open Up and Bleed is the most complete and well-researched book you’re gonna find (and there have been a few)—and not just on the Stooges. Trynka’s got the goods on how Iggy got the name Pop, the downfall and return of Iggy’s solo career, and finally the triumphant return of the Stooges. I read this book on tour and it inspired some good rock moments onstage, for sure.
14
CHAPTER
BE LOYAL
WHEN I’M ON THE ROAD, SKYPE, E-MAIL, AND CELL phones are what keep me in touch with my family and allow me to juggle the half-dozen projects I have going on at any given time. And I admit that I don’t know where I’d be without them. But electronics don’t run my life.
As a grown-ass man of this modern age, I believe there are certain things we must do—and should not do—to retain some dignity in this time of social media jibber-jabber and Insta-everything. Yeah, I’ve got a Twitter account, but I don’t update it every time I pass by an ironic T-shirt. Sure, I take pictures on my phone once in a while, but I’d rather live in the great moments of my life than make sure that I get a picture of them.
I think iPhones are swell and fine, especially for my teenagers. Around 2006, I finally submitted to our era and stepped up from a simple fold-top cell phone to a BlackBerry. At first, it seemed like a lot to handle. The fact that I could receive e-mails to my phone was a bit too convenient. I felt too available. Remember before smartphones when you couldn’t really check your e-mails until you got Wi-Fi on your laptop out on the road or got home to your computer?
As I started to write weekly columns for Playboy, Seattle Weekly, and ESPN, I found the keyboard on the BlackBerry to be a godsend. Out on tour, I’d often write my columns from my trusty BlackBerry and send them off straight from there. I started to hear from my editors: “You wrote this on your BlackBerry?!” How did you know? Is it really that bad? “No! It says ‘Sent from my BlackBerry’ on the signature!” OH!
My BlackBerry became an extension of my thought processes. To write, a person has to be comfortable with whatever medium they write with, and my trusty BlackBerry became a safe place for me to express myself.
That was good enough. It did everything I wanted it to do. My BlackBerry probably doesn’t do everything that your smartphone does. And if it does, I don’t want to know about it. A BlackBerry is for business. For my business, it’s a place to check and respond to e-mails, post my gig dates through Twitter, and write my columns.
A gentleman of this modern age doesn’t play video games on his gadget nor stay glued to social media on his gadget. In fact, a gentleman of this modern age should really stay away from social media (unless you follow @DadBoner or @HenryRollins on Twitter, of course).
As iPhones and Androids came along and began to absolutely dominate the market, I started to get looked at with a bit of amusement when I pulled the old BlackBerry out of my coat pocket. “You still have a BlackBerry?!!” the kids would say. Yeah. Yes I do. I’m doing business, and I don’t play games out here in the real world. Didn’t you notice that when North Korea took down Sony Pictures, the company went back to their BlackBerries? They knew where to turn for safety, security, to get it done.
I stand up for my gadget and am constantly amazed by iPhone snobbery. But, really, this just speaks to how we deal with loyalty.
I’m a loyal motherfucker. I know a bunch of us are. Whether it’s OG punk rock or rap, Calvin Klein briefs, Pennzoil, or the girl that we love, there are men of this modern age who insist on loyalty.
No band was better than the Damned in 1977 or the Clash in 1978 or Ice T on the Power record. Period. My War and Damaged are necessary Black Flag records. You get what I’m saying here? That’s loyalty.
Loyal people grew up with a good dog. Loyal people have a mom they think is a saint. Loyal people get disappointed when others break their trust. Loyal people stay with their BlackBerry. Forever. Or at least until the company stops making them.
I run into guys my age who, like me, were part of the first wave of American punk rock. It was a risky time to be dressing punk, and there were many times we got into fights or got straight beaten up by gangs of jocks who thought we punkers should be taught a lesson. Because we were into something we thought was the most forward-thinking medium, we could see the folly in closed-mindedness and learned to adapt and to protect our punk-rock music. We were loyal to the bands, and we were loyal to each other. To this day, there is still an allegiance felt between us old-school punker dudes.
I think a lot of how I am loyal to things these days is totally informed from those punk-rock days.
The BlackBerry is a rare species to spot in the wild these days, but it’s out there. We BlackBerry users know who each other are, and I sense a whiff of dignified air when we cross paths. We nod knowingly. BlackBerry owners are the ones taking care of all of the real business that makes our world go around. And we know it.
Pilots tip their hats to us as we get on planes. Bank managers rush out of their offices to greet us. Bartenders send us free drinks. Restaurant owners give us the best tables.
You all wouldn’t know this stuff. You’re too busy posting to Instagram, while we’re busy getting it done.
15
CHAPTER
GET A DOG
I MISS MY GIRLS.
Diarrhea has set in. I’ve had to sneak into the bathroom of the diner across the street about a dozen times.
I miss Susan. Being apart doesn’t get easier. It’s worse when I’m sick. I have a fever. There’s no time to visit the doctor. We have to be in Paris tomorrow.
I miss Grace and Mae. It hurts to think of them at home, without me, getting a head start on Christmas.
I miss my dogs. Sure, they destroy the furniture and take up the entire bed, and I have to apologize in public for my farting pug. But my dogs are part of what makes our house a home.
A dog named Chloe helped me become a better man.
To me, the parallels of the Marley and Me story to my life are almost uncanny. I’ve written a weekly column, as did John Grogan, the author of Marley and Me. Chloe was a naughty and mischievous girl in her youth, as was Marley. Chloe chewed up anything and everything . . . so did Marley.
Chloe helped us raise our daughters and would know beforehand when one of them was going to be sick or otherwise out of tilt. Chloe would help nurse them back to health without expectation of reward. Chloe loved us without condition, and she became the love of our lives.
When she got sick with liver cancer at the age of thirteen, we nursed her back and did everything we could to ease her pain. When the stairs at our house became too much of a hurdle for my girl, I would carry her up so that she could sleep with us, her family.
When we brought our first baby home from the hospital, we had no idea what to expect from Chloe. Until then, she had sort of ruled the roost, as it were, as our only child. Chloe had previous experience in motherhood. As a one-year-old young lass before she got spayed, she snuck out of the house and got knocked up. A few months later, she had a record FOURTEEN puppies!!! It was one of the happiest times in my life having all of those little guys in my house, and Chloe tirelessly handled her motherly duties like a pro. A few years later, as we brought our new infant home, Chloe instantly knew that her role in the family had changed. She slept underneath Grace’s crib every night and gently played ball with her as she grew.
When we had our second daughter, Chloe accepted her duties without question or forlorn, but she did start to tire more easily. In return, my girls let her rest when she needed it, and they got an early sense of responsibility. They seemed to sense that Chloe now needed them too.
When it came time to put Chloe down, my wife and I bawled as we loaded her into the back of my Ford Bronco. I called my English professor at Seattle University to tell him that I would not be able to make class that day, and he heard the pain in my voice. Professor Sam Greene was a visiting poet, and I was fortunate enough to get into his class. As I told him the reason for my absence, he began to cry right along with me over the phone. I will never forget that.
Just before the vet put the catheter into Chloe’s vein, she gave me an unrushed private moment with my girl. I told her how much I loved her and thanked her for helping me grow into a man. I thanked her for the well-being of my daughters and for all the service she selflessly gave. She told me with her eyes that she understood and that she was tired from
fighting. She was ready to rest. As the life left her body, I cried harder than I ever had before or since. I loved my girl Chloe.
Chloe was quite a swimmer, and she had been delighted when we moved to our house on Lake Washington. A beaver lived under our dock and for years played a daily and spirited game of cat-and-mouse with poor Chloe. Chloe never caught that beaver. When Chloe started to slow down and could only sit on the step that led to the water, the beaver would come in close and sort of visit Chloe. After Chloe died, that poor beaver would search for Chloe every day, but finally gave up after a few weeks—missing her friend, I am quite sure.
When my girls got a bit older, they started to pine for a new dog. My traveling schedule dictated that we would need a dog that could travel with us. I had never had a small dog and never really even been around them. Yappy little dogs are not my style. We found our new little buddy—a Cavalier King Charles spaniel—after scouring dog breeds for months. What he lacks in smarts, he makes up for with love.
Our little boy, Buckley, asks for no more than some food and to be with us. He travels pretty much everywhere we go, and if I must travel on my own, he tries to sneak into my bag before I zip it up. He is always trying to go on man trips with me. I love you too, buddy.
Watching Marley and Me for the first time made me realize somehow that I have a full and rich life, that everyone has problems and fights and issues. But a strong family and an unruly dog are privileges and not nuisances.
Sure, I see myself as a sort of wandering bandolero at times, and I am allowed that in my family. They let me be who I am and I give back EVERYTHING I have in return.
I may mumble and grumble about living in a houseful of women at times, but really I don’t know what I would do without them. I get to go out and rock like a badass (in my own mind, anyway) and ride my motorcycles like a hard-ass (again, that is how I view myself). Actually, I think I AM all of those things AND a damn good father and husband. Maybe lacking in romance at times and lacking in a general understanding of what little girls are all about. I am, however, the protector . . . and I know I have learned a lot of this from my life with dogs.