Alice In Chains Have Message For Layne Staley ‘Purists’

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Alice In Chains bassist Mike Inez discussed moving on from Layne Staley in a new Metal Wani interview. You can watch the full interview below.

“With the first two records, the first one, ‘Black Gives Way To Blue’, we didn’t know what to expect and if people were going to accept us again. We had a full world tour planned at that point, so we were just kind of saying goodbye to Layne [Staley] in a way and kind of discovering where we were on the ‘Black Gives Way To Blue’ record. The second record we did with William was just big sounding, pummeling tones. On this record, we kind of stripped it back a little bit. We recorded it in a little bit of a different way up in Seattle. I thought it was a more organic feel of an album.”

He later said, “I think it just comes down to the music. If the music is good, people are going to dig it. Of course you’ve got your Layne Staley purists, and they just want to hear those records. The cool thing about that is that those records are out there, and you can always have those records. That’s the special thing about music — certain songs are timeless and mean certain things to certain people. I always say that when we finally release a record, it’s not our record anymore — it’s your record. It turns into your life story too, and the soundtrack of your day driving around in your car, or listening at work or at home.

People come up to us — ‘I made my baby to the ‘Jar Of Flies’ record!’ I don’t know how to react when people say stuff like that. In fact, last night, me and my wife were coming home and I stopped at a 7-Eleven. I walked in and there was an old guy buying a 30-pack of beer, and he had his son with him, and his son had a ‘Rainier Fog’ shirt that we only sold at our concert. He came to the Hollywood Palladium show that we played about two months ago here in L.A., so he recognized me and it was weird – I’m talking to two generations of Alice In Chains fans just in line at the 7-Eleven, and they were just super-positive. I told my wife it was a good reminder for me that it’s not just us in the studio, it’s everybody else, too. It really affirmed that our lives’ work is actually reaching some people.”

Jerry Cantrell discussed the song “All I Am” in a new Music Radar interview.

“That’s a cool song, man. When we recorded it, all of us knew it was the song to end the record on because it’s that big seven-minute kind of epic thing and also it’s a tear-jerking lyric.

“It’s written from the perspective that every one of us has at some point in our life, especially as you get older and you’ve been around for a while you’re going to see some shit and go through some shit. You’ll have to question your faith moments throughout life and that’s what that song speaks to I guess. Not in a bad way, this is what I am for better or for worse.

“The character asks, ‘Is this all I am?’ The drudgery of doing something for 31 years. But it’s also a beautiful thing to have been committed to do that. Everything has costs. No matter what you do in life, there’s a price for everything. Maybe [it’s] questioning the prices and whether it’s still worth it. But obviously it is because I’m still here doing it!”