Grunge pioneers Alice in Chains kicked off their North American tour with Breaking Benjamin and Bush last night in Burgettstown, Pennsylvania. This was their first performance in front of a live audience since a 2019 show in Seattle, so they made sure to play classics like “Them Bones,” “Would?” and “Down in a Hole,” among others.
In June, Alice in Chains guitarist and vocalist Jerry Cantrell said the following about the band’s three-and-a-half-decade career: “I guess the thing that means the most is I took that trip with my brothers and we all banded together and we found each other somehow and we were supposed to find each other and we have a sound that is unlike anybody else. And that’s the whole point — trying to create some sort of a sound that’s uniquely yours. And I was able to find that with my family there, with Layne [Staley, vocals] and Mike [Starr, bass] and Sean [Kinney, drums]. And throughout the years of changes and things that life throws at you, we’ve continued on and continued to navigate all of those changes and continued to grow — up to the last record [2018’s ‘Rainier Fog’]. I think that record’s kickass. [Laughs] I think we’re still creating at a top level. Inez [bass] and William [DuVall, vocals] coming into the band, it’s all good.
“I guess the main thing, probably, is that it still means something to people. We play some of those songs in [my solo] set as well, and it’s always exciting and trippy, man, to see people react when you start playing those songs. They’re not just yours anymore; they’re everybody’s. And I don’t mean that in just some generic way. They have just as much ownership in it as I do. So it’s pretty cool to share those moments.”
In an April 2022 interview, DuVall said this about the prospect of a new Alice in Chains album: “Right now we’re just coming out of the lockdowns, and we’ve all been busy doing our own thing. Jerry is out on tour at the moment for his solo album, and I’m doing my thing. We have plans for some live shows in September/October, and I’m sure that will blow off the cobwebs and we’ll start looking at some new ideas for the next Alice in Chains album.
“We had a lot of time imposed on us and I think we’re going through this period of catching up on things that we had planned for 2020 [and] 2021, and we’re all finally getting to do that now. So, it’s kind of like a stopgap and we’re just dealing with all of these stockpiled projects that we had planned a few years back. So once we get back up to speed with things and we get these dates underway in late summer, I’m sure it will spark a whole bunch of ideas for the next Alice in Chains studio album.” (Blabbermouth)
Photo Credit: Marv Watson
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