Geoff Reading was born on February 23, 1968, in Rochester, New York and was raised in both Huntington Beach, California and Edmonds, Washington before eventually settling in Seattle, Washington.^[2] Reading, recently engaged, currently resides in Tacoma, Washington where he's raising his son, having moved from Los Angeles, California, and writes a column for WeeklyVolcano.com.^[1] Reading was previously diagnosed with colorectal cancer but successfully underwent treatment and chemotherapy.^[3]

Reading first starting playing drums in his early teens and was taught by neighborhood friend Mike Mongrain.^[4] Years later, Mongrain recommended to his former bandmate, local guitarist Scott Wade, that he invite Reading to join his band Sledge to which Wade responded by visiting Reading on his 21st birthday.^[4] He played with Sledge between 1989 and 1991, during which time they did only two recordings and shared a couple of bills with Inspector Luv and the Ride Me Babys, the group featuring the future members of Green Apple Quick Step.^[4]

In 1997, Reading joined the post-grunge group Green Apple Quick Step, replacing previous drummer Dain Hudson.^[5] Prior to joining, the group had recorded a new album with Columbia Records however it remains unreleased.^[6] He played at numerous shows with the group, including a show in Seattle where front man Tyler Willman destroyed various equipment on stage, before the group disbanded.^[7]

On March 26, 2010, Reading performed with Green Apple Quick Step, whose lineup consisted of members Tyler Willman, Dana Turner along with singer Christa Wells and Reading's former Loaded bandmate Mike Squires,^[8] at the Hell's Kitchen in Tacoma, Washington.^[9]

Following the departure of previous drummer Jack Stringham,^[10] Reading joined New American Shame^[10] who went on the sign a major-label deal with Atlantic Records.^[10] After some adjustments, as well as some new drum tracks by Reading, Atlantic re-released the self-titled album, previously released on Will Records,^[11] in 1999. The first single from the record was "Under it All",^[10] which peaked at number 35 on the Mainstream Rock Chart,^[12] and a tour of the US,^[10] with The Cult,^[13] and Japan^[10] followed however the single did not perform well on rock and alternative radio stations.^[10][14][15]

In late 1999, early 2000, McKagan decided to form a new project, with no title at this point, with drummer Geoff Reading, formerly of Green Apple Quick Step and New American Shame, and singer Mark Lanegan, formerly of the Screaming Trees. They recorded a number of songs before Lanegan left to join Queens of the Stone Age.^[16] After being convinced by Reading to take over lead vocals,^[16] McKagan and Reading continued to write and record new material. With nearly an album's worth of material recorded, they decided to re-record some of the songs from Beautiful Disease^[17] to add to the material they already had. Also for recording, they brought in guitarist Dave Dederer formerly of The Presidents of the United States of America, producer Martin Feveyear, who also performed keyboards on the album, and they recorded the album at Jupiter Studios in Seattle, Washington. McKagan performed the bass on all tracks as well as guitar and the piano on the song "Misery". Former Nevada Bachelors and Harvey Danger guitarist Mike Squires was also invited to record additional guitar parts on the album.^[18] In June 2001, McKagan announced that the album would be titled Dark Days and that it would be released under the moniker Loaded rather than using his own name for the project.^[19] According to drummer Geoff Reading, the band initially did not have a name and settled on Loaded when it came close to their first show:

In 2002, Reading formed the group The Disciples, that later went on to become The Chelsea Smiles, that signed to Capitol Records.^[34] The group's lineup was rounded up by Christian Martucci, formerly of Dee Dee Ramone's band, Todd Youth, formerly of Danzig and Howie Pyro who had also played with Danzig and D Generation. They toured Japan before securing the deal with Capitol, and played a show at the Viper Room in Hollywood, California supporting the group Metal Shop, who have since changed their name and are now known as Steel Panther. During the show, Reading met Tony Alva.^[35] Reading also performed in former Beautiful Creatures guitarist DJ Ashba's solo band as well as some session work for the group Black Chihua Hua, whose record was produced by Joey Santiago.^[34] In 2000, Reading contributed drums and backing vocals to The Pin-Ups, the group featuring former members of Green Apple Quick Step and The Presidents of the United States of America, debut album Backseat Memoirs.^[36]