Tag Archives: Alice in Chains

Layne Staley: Fever Dreams, Cold Sweats


Layne Staley sings two of my five favorite songs. 

I have no idea what the other three songs are; the list changes so. But Layne has two spots locked up with ‘I Stay Away’ by Alice in Chains and ‘River of Deceit’ from his side project, Mad Season.

It’s not that he has a classically limber voice; mom would liken his growl to a cat being pissed off in an alley. It’s nasally, hollow, sad.

But I find it haunting. And not just because the songs are apocalyptically prophetic.

There’s something about Staley’s voice that burrows under your skin, sets up camp in your bones. It’s not pretty, not in the conventional sense. But Staley never seemed interested in sugar-coating that particular pill.

‘I Stay Away’ hits you like a fever dream. The way Staley’s voice weaves through those lush, unsettling strings – it’s like watching a man navigate a minefield while high on ether. You’re transfixed, waiting for the inevitable explosion, but it never comes. Instead, you’re left with this lingering sense of unease, a reminder that sometimes the anticipation of pain can be worse than the pain itself.

Then there’s ‘River of Deceit.’ If ‘I Stay Away’ is a fever dream, this is the cold sweat that follows. Staley’s voice here is quieter, more introspective, but no less potent. When he croons “My pain is self-chosen,” it’s not just a lyric – it’s a confession, a realization, a surrender. It’s the sound of a man staring into the abyss and finding it uncomfortably familiar. 

That abyss, which swallowed my sister, would claim him in April 2002, when he was found dead in his Seattle apartment after years of battling heroin addiction. His body, withered to just 86 pounds, wasn’t discovered until two weeks after his death – on April 5th, ironically the same date Kurt Cobain had died eight years earlier.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

Mom might hear an angry alley cat, but I hear a prophet of doom, singing hymns for the damned. There’s a raw honesty in Staley’s delivery that makes even his most despairing lyrics feel weirdly comforting. 

And maybe that’s why these songs have such a death grip on my top five. In a world that often feels like it’s spinning off its axis, there’s something reassuring about Staley’s unflinching gaze into the void. 

His voice isn’t classically beautiful. But neither is a storm, and we still find ourselves staring in awe at lightning-torn skies.

In the end, isn’t that what great art does? It makes us find beauty in the unconventional, comfort in the uncomfortable, and meaning in the chaos.

And if that sounds like the yowling of a pissed-off alley cat, well… meow.

A Jar of Flies, A Bottle of Lightning


This year marks the 30th(!) anniversary of Alice In Chains’ seminal EP “Jar of Flies,” and a haunting question still echoes through the halls of rock music:

What the hell happened to rock music?

In 1994, grunge was king. Kurt Cobain’s anguished howls and Eddie Vedder’s impassioned growls dominated the airwaves. Alice In Chains’ “Jar of Flies” proved that even unplugged, grunge could top the charts. The future of rock seemed assured, a brave new world of flannel and feedback.

Fast forward three decades, and we’re left with a genre-shaped hole where rock’s next evolutionary step should be. Grunge, it turns out, was less a beginning than an ending – rock’s last great gasp before slipping into a coma it has yet to wake from.

Sure, we’ve had pretenders to the throne. Green Day could thrash. Black Keys too. Trent Reznor was no dandy. But none managed to capture the zeitgeist – or the charts – quite like grunge did.

Today’s musical landscape is dominated by hip-hop, pop, and whatever genre-bending pablum is currently trending on TikTok. Rock, once the voice of youth rebellion, now feels like your dad’s music – comfortable, familiar, but hardly revolutionary.

The irony is palpable. Grunge, with its disdain for commercial success and music industry machinery, inadvertently killed the very machine that had propelled rock to cultural dominance for decades. In rejecting the star-making system, grunge stars became the last real rock stars.

It’s not that great rock music isn’t being made. It is, in basements and bars across the country. But it no longer drives the cultural conversation. Rock, like jazz before it, has become a niche interest – respected, occasionally brilliant, but no longer essential.

I know we’re still angry as a people; rock just no longer seems to be the medium to express it.

As I revisit the raw emotion and haunting melodies of “Jar of Flies,” I’m reminded not just of grunge’s power, but of its finality. There’s a reason so many of its talismen have tombstones.

In exploring disillusionment, detachment and drug abuse, Alice In Chains captured lightning in a bottle – or perhaps, more fittingly, a jar. And in the 30 years since, no one has managed to replicate that magic.

Rock isn’t dead. It’s just irrelevant. Nothing a little Layne Staley couldn’t fix.