Duff McKagan’s Loaded Confirmed as Openers for Two Guns N’ Roses Shows

Talk is always cheap where Guns N’ Roses are concerned, so if you’ve taken the rumors about Duff McKagan‘s Loaded serving as a support act on GN’R's current tour with a grain of salt, we definitely don’t blame you. But in this case, it turns out that the rumors were true: a little over a year after he made a surprise appearance at a Guns gig in London, McKagan’s crew will be hitting the road in support of the band he quit 14 years ago.

McKagan broke the news yesterday, revealing that Loaded will open for Guns N’ Roses in Seattle on Friday (Dec. 16) and Vancouver, Canada, on Saturday (Dec. 17).

We’ve seen a flurry of GN’R activity lately — between reports of the epic set lists that Axl Rose and company have been delivering on the latest Guns tour, the band’s classic lineup being inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and subsequent rampant speculation about the old gang getting back together to perform at the induction ceremony, it’s almost like 1991 again.

Of course, Duff supporting Guns on tour isn’t exactly the full-on reunion that fans have been clamoring for since the mid ’90s, but it’s certainly a step in the right direction — and it proves that no matter how bitter things have been between Rose and his former bandmates since GNR suffered its post-’Use Your Illusion’ implosion, rapprochement is never impossible.

Who knows? If the Loaded/GN’R shows go well enough, maybe ex-Guns guitarist Slash will even be inspired to pick up the phone and try mending fences with his infamously mercurial former partner. As original drummer Steven Adler recently put it to Rolling Stone, the Axl/Slash feud has gone on “for 20 years, because of some stupid grudge, which I guarantee you that neither of them could even tell you what it was. They don’t even know! … 20 years of great music wasn’t created because of some stupid grudge.”