Tom Morello during his Maximum Firepower podcast, asked Alice in Chains guitarist Jerry Cantrell to speak about drug addiction and recovery while listing people like Mike Starr, who died of drug overdose, Layne Staley, and Chris Cornell. All three dealt with addiction and mental health struggles. Cantrell, who is himself a recovering addict and alcoholic, has been sober since 2003. Recently, Chris Cornell’s son pictures who looks like his dad on his 16th Birthday was noted.
Jerry Cantrell opens up on the stars
Cantrell noted that the musicians have suffered and shared his own experience of recovering from drug addiction, as he feels lucky. He said that the rock and roll lifestyle was quite appealing as they leaned towards drugs.
Here is what he said [as transcribed by Alternative Nation]:
“You know it is possible to move past that, and I think that as a person who has suffered from some of those things that took a lot of our fellows down, it’s possible to work through that stuff and I feel lucky to have the experience. I don’t regret it. We’ve got the life or the craziness or the indulgence of the rock and roll lifestyle, because that all appealed to me, and I was a good kid, I wasn’t a s**t kid.”
Cantrell further added “But the whole rock and roll ethos man, that really appealed to me, you know. You read that stuff but just to focus on the positive on the time spent with them, the relationships that I had with those guys, the music that we made together and the human beings that [Chris Cornell, Layne Staley, and Mike Starr] were, it’s unfortunate that all the headline always is that [addiction].”
Cantrell noted that the way they died is not the real description of the life of the mentioned rock icons. He said that he is honored to know all those ‘fine folks’.
