Search Results for: seattle

While Alice in Chains – whose singer, Layne Staley, was found dead Friday – influenced an incalculable number of bands, perhaps no one echoes their legacy like Godsmack. From Tony Rambola’s jarring bursts of guitar to Sully Erna’s angry, impassioned vocal delivery, Godsmack have sonically followed Alice in Chains’ lead while adding their own distinctive edge. To Erna, Staley was more than just part of the grunge foundation on which bands like Godsmack, Creed, Tantric and Puddle of Mudd built their sound. The Alice in Chains singer’s raw urgency vaulted the former drummer front and center before one of today’s… Read more »

Of the many fans and musicians devastated by Layne Staley’s death, his former Alice in Chains bandmate Jerry Cantrell was perhaps most affected upon receiving the news. The pair formed the backbone of the seminal Seattle grunge band in 1987, and it was their dichotomy – the tension of Cantrell’s hardened riffs that plodded along as Staley’s sinister vocals crept behind at a skulking pace – that gave the band its appeal to metalheads and grunge punks alike. Cantrell and Staley remained the group’s creative force until their swan song, 1995’s Alice in Chains. In the wake of Staley’s death,… Read more »

Starting next month, the Goo Goo Dolls will take their gig out of the gutter. Fresh off of their top five debut on the Billboard 200 albums chart, on which the band’s latest effort, Gutterflower, entered at #4 with over 100,000 copies sold, the Goo Goo Dolls will go on a 30-date tour in support of the LP. Information about opening acts is still forthcoming. The album, fueled by the first single, “Here Is Gone,” finds Johnny Rzeznik and company ridding themselves of the power ballads they have come to be known for – see 1998’s Dizzy Up the Girl… Read more »

With the passing of Layne Staley, those who knew him best remember him as deeply troubled yet immensely talented. Described as a caring person, he made great strides to elevate an underground genre to the mainstream. In the early ’90s, Alice in Chains, along with Pearl Jam and Soundgarden, were directly behind Nirvana on the grunge wave that began in Seattle and cascaded throughout the country. The singer’s Alice in Chains bandmates – guitarist Jerry Cantrell, bassist Mike Inez, drummer Sean Kinney and former bassist Mike Starr – their manager and Soundgarden’s Chris Cornell gathered Saturday, a day after police… Read more »

Alice in Chains’ Layne Staley was found dead in his Seattle home on Friday evening. The King County Medical Examiner positively identified Staley’s body on Saturday (April 20), following an autopsy. Exact time and cause of death are pending, as laboratory results could take several weeks, a spokesperson said. Staley was 34. Police responded to a call to check on a person’s well-being at Staley’s address in Seattle’s University District at 5:41 p.m. PT on Friday, according to the police report. Upon discovering the body, which is presumed to have been there for several days, officers called investigators from the… Read more »

Dave Grohl and Krist Novoselic are hoping a judge makes Courtney Love have her head examined. The former Nirvana members and partners in Nirvana LLC, a business entity they established with Love in 1997 to handle such Nirvana-related issues as the release of recordings, filed a motion on April 11 to compel Love to undergo a psychiatric evaluation as part of the two parties’ ongoing dispute over the company, according to a spokesperson for the King County Superior Court in Seattle. When Nirvana LLC was established, a provision was written into the contract that gave any of the partners the… Read more »

A judge in Seattle says he’ll decide in seven to 10 days whether to order Courtney Love to have a psychological examination. Lawyers for Dave Grohl and Krist Novoselic want a judge to make Love submit to an evaluation. The two former members of Nirvana have been battling Love over the partnership they formed to administer the Nirvana catalog after Kurt Cobain died. Love is looking to dissolve the partnership, claiming her judgment was “significantly impaired” when she signed the agreement. Lawyers for Grohl and Novolesic argue that a provision was included in the contract to be evaluated because of… Read more »

A body was removed tonight (4/19) from the University District residence of Layne Staley, lead singer and guitarist for the Seattle grunge band Alice in Chains. KOMO-TV, citing an unidentified source, said the body was that of Staley, 34. A King County medical-examiner’s investigator said his office removed a body from the Staley address and planned an autopsy today, but he refused to confirm the identity of the person. He said it appeared the person had been dead for some time and would have to be identified scientifically. Staley had a history of substance abuse, and in the early 1990s… Read more »

XM Satellite Radio today unveiled its state-of-the-art digital sound technology, featuring customized CT-aacPlus audio encoding with Neural Audio optimization, which provides superior sound quality remarkably close to Compact Disc. “XM Satellite Radio, Fortune Magazine’s 2001 ‘Product of the Year,’ succeeds because of its superior digital sound technology, unparalleled signal coverage, proven chipset technology and outstanding programming,” said XM Executive Vice President Steve Gavenas at a news briefing today in New York. “The technologies that define XM Satellite Radio sound quality have been auditioned and endorsed by leading audio experts from around the world.” CT-aacPlus Audio Compression The superior XM sound… Read more »

After lending her rich voice to all four Chemical Brothers studio albums, Beth Orton is finally getting her favors returned. Daybreaker, the techno-folkie’s third full-length album, due July 30, features beats from Brothers Tom Rowlands and Ed Simons on the title track. Other guests on the record include alt-country alchemist Ryan Adams harmonizing on “Concrete Sky” and composing on “OK,” veteran Emmylou Harris contributing vocals to the ballad “God Song,” and ex-Smiths guitarist Johnny Marr playing on several tracks. “Paris Train,” “Ted’s Waltz,” “Mt. Washington,” “Anywhere,” “Carmella” and “Thinking About Tomorrow” round out the album, which Orton’s spokesperson described as… Read more »