All photos by Jamie Weiland, outside of second photo in story.
“She was my muse for [Blaster]. She’s an artist as well. She’s a multi-media artist. She’s a photographer, she’s a painter, she’s just an amazing artist overall and so our relationship really influenced me.” – Scott Weiland (April 2015)
Former Stone Temple Pilots frontman Scott Weiland passed away on Thursday night, leaving behind his wife Jamie Weiland. Scott met Jamie, then known as Jamie Wachtel, in late 2011 when filming a music video for his Christmas album, The Most Wonderful Time of the Year. Wachtel, who was photographing the shoot, helped calm his nerves according to a 2012 Rolling Stone article. “I was kind of nervous because one of the songs [“I’ll Be Home for Christmas”] was a tribute to war veterans from World War II on to today. So I’m in this vintage World War II dress outfit, and she was taking stills of me,” Weiland recalled. “I was leaning against this fireplace, and she’s like, ‘You might want to tuck in your belly a little bit.’ It was around the holidays – it was after Thanksgiving, and you know how that tends to be. I was kind of caught off guard, and I started laughing and she started laughing. And I don’t know . . . something magical happened.”
The two kept talking for the rest of the day, and Wachtel gave Weiland a ride home. “I just thought, ‘I have a feeling that I am going to fall in love with this woman,'” he remembered. Scott and Jamie got married in 2013, and Scott became a stepfather to her son. Jamie inspired many of the best tracks on Weiland’s final album Blaster, released in March. In the one of the album’s most powerful songs, “Parachute,” Weiland sang about seeing through the eyes of love: ‘Catch you when you’re fallin’/Even when you’re not/I’ll see you through the eyes of love/Even when you’re crawlin’/Even when you’re fallin’/I’ll be your parachute, hold you up.’
Weiland kept seeking with the spirit of love on the bookend to his discography, the tragic “Circles.” “Circles” is a very romantic, but dark song. It is a song about all hope being lost, yet love somehow reviving that hope. ‘I’d die for you most any day/And surely every night/There’s no angels/There’s no servants to save me/Save me/Ain’t no heavens, no masters protect you/I’ll care for you.’
Jamie also served as Scott’s primary photographer from 2012-2015. I began running Scott Weiland’s social media just a month ago and was sharing some great photos from throughout Scott’s career, fan photos, quotes from Scott, and photos Jamie had released to keep fans up to date on his current tour and promote upcoming shows. There was such an outpouring of love for Scott on his social media, that it breaks my heart I never got the chance to do things like fan Q&A’s that I had planned to connect Scott with the fans that loved him so much.
Just a couple of days before Scott passed, Jamie sent me several photos of Scott that she had taken. Many of these have been seen before, but others have not. Below are the rarest photos from the beautiful collection Jamie sent me of some of the final professionally taken photographs of Scott in the final year of his life. The photos capture Scott’s essence, with his eyes being the entryway into his soul. Rest in peace Scott, and may Jamie know that fans’ thoughts and prayers are with her.
