Layne Staley: 1967-2002
 

Layne Staley, lead singer for Seattle grunge rockers Alice in Chains, was found dead at his home in Seattle on Friday.

Alice in Chains were among the front-runners in the early-90s Seattle sound, along with bands such as Nirvana and Soundgarden. They were among the first to sign a major label recording deal, signing to Columbia in 1989.

The band's last standard studio release was their self-titled album, released in late 1995. However, the band made an appearance on MTV's "Unplugged" in 1996, and had released "Get Born Again" for 1999's Nothing's Safe compilation. Staley also provided vocals for the 1995 release by Seattle "supergroup" Mad Season, which featured Mike McCready (Pearl Jam) on guitar and Barrett Martin (Screaming Trees) on drums.

The band had not toured since headlining 1993's Lollapalooza festival, and rumors had swirled for years of Staley's drug addiction.

I listened to AIC religiously in high school and college, as they were one of my favorite bands. Staley had a haunting vocal style that was very distinctive from other singers. The fact that this comes only 2 weeks after the anniversary of Kurt Cobain's death (April 5) is rather saddening.

Such a waste of talent. :(

For your listening pleasure:

Facelift (1990)

Sap (EP) (1992)

Dirt (1992)

Jar of Flies (EP) (1994)

Alice in Chains (1995)

There is also an "Unplugged" CD and 2 compilation/greatest hits CDs.

(Some of the info here has been provided by VH1.com)

Holy fuck.

Here are a couple of stories from the Seattle Times:

Click and click.

It really hit me this morning, whilst listening to all my AIC CDs.

Listening to all those CDs brought back a lot of memories...good memories, mind you. Layne Staley's voice was amazing. It was just so damned distinct...as I mentioned previously, haunting. You see the influence of it today in bands like Godsmack.

I was a bigger fan of AIC than I was Nirvana, so maybe that's why this makes me sadder than the death of Kurt Cobain.

Apparently, he scrawled a note on a grocery bag scrap--"What else is there to say? Say hello to heaven." A rather ominous reference, IMO. It was the title of a Temple of the Dog song. The Temple of the Dog project (Chris Cornell and Matt Cameron of Soundgarden; Mike McCready, Jeff Ament, Eddie Vedder, and Stone Gossard of Pearl Jam) was formed to honor Andrew Wood, the lead singer of Seattle-based Mother Love Bone--who died of a heroin overdose in 1990, shortly before the release of the band's major label debut, Apple.

Staley had a nasty smack habit...it was pretty well-known for years. Rho and I had been talking about AIC a while back, and I was like, "If Layne Staley would kick the smack, maybe we'll see another record." Dham and I just talked about Dirt recently, and what a great record it was. I still remember running to Streetside Records in Webster Groves, MO to buy it the day it came out--September 29, 1992.

They haven't released a new song in almost 3 years, or a new studio record in over 6 years, but hopefully Alice in Chains will be remembered as one of the great bands to come out of the "Grunge Invasion."

It sucks like hell that Layne Staley is gone. It sucks like hell that he couldn't beat a horrible addiction. But I'm fortunate to own a good chunk of their musical collection, and fortunate enough to have seen them on their last tour--Lollapalooza 1993. Great performance: I was moshing during "Would?" and got knocked down the grassy slope at Riverport Amphitheatre in St. Louis...I slammed into a concrete wall, nearly breaking my hand.

Good times. :)

man. the music and the vocals kill me on "junkhead" every time... his voice sounds so tortured... and the guitar fits perfectly...

///
are you happy? i am man
content and fully aware
money, status, nothing to me
'cause your life's empty and bare, yeah

what's my drug of choice?
well what have you got?
i don't go broke
and i do it a lot
i do it a lot
///

the "yeeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah" and the second "i do it a lot"... man.

he's missed.

SEATTLE, May 8 — An autopsy has determined that Layne Staley, lead singer of the grunge band Alice in Chains, died of a heroine and cocaine overdose, medical examiners in Washington state say. Staley’s body was found at his Seattle home on April 19.