Alice In Chains bassist Mike Inez called out the characterization of Layne Staley as just a ‘dark’ and ‘depressed’ guy as a falsehood in a new Chicago Sun-Times interview.
The article states that Alice in Chains has its own beleaguered past, of course, having dealt with the incredible loss of former frontman Staley in in 2002 and original bassist Mike Starr (who played with the band from the early days until Inez took over in 1993) in 2011, both from drug overdoses.
When Alice in Chains kicked off its latest tour in Boston April 30th, Cantrell admitted to the crowd, “We like to take a minute most every night to think about Layne and Mike as well,” before playing one of the band’s most gut-wrenching tracks, “Nutshell,” made famous in a 1996 MTV Unplugged performance.
“Layne put everything he had into that song and the lyrics,” says Inez, who remembers first meeting Staley when Alice in Chains opened for Ozzy Osbourne on the initial No More Tours tour in 1992. Inez was Osbourne’s bassist at the time.
“People always talk about Layne as this dark, brooding, mysterious, depressed dude, and there’s so much more to him than that. He was always such a happy guy and his laugh was one of my favorite things I ever heard in my life.”
