Sadly, Staley would only make a handful of live appearances after this. It’s almost as if, at least for a moment, he was once again able to tap into the internal fire that powered his vocals in the early days. Staley looks considerably worse for the wear, and his vocals on “Again” – a single from 1995’s Alice in Chains, which the band was performing live for the first time – seem tentative, but the way he rips into the Facelift classic “We Die Young” is absolutely goosebump-raising. One month after taping Unplugged, Alice in Chains fired up their amps for a guest appearance on The Late Show with David Letterman. Mad Season, “River of Deceit” (Seattle, 1995).Just the way they address their melodies and harmonies – and his vocal style in general was so different than anything that anyone was writing … you couldn’t help but be influenced by it.” This live version of the song shows that Staley and Cantrell had no problem at all duplicating that same magical blend onstage. “Jerry Cantrell and Layne Staley were the coolest team to me since Joe Perry and Steven Tyler. “He was single-handedly the guy that got me to start singing,” Godsmack frontman Sully Erna told MTV News following Staley’s death. The song was also an excellent example of Staley and Cantrell’s unique vocal arrangements not only did the timbre of their voices mesh beautifully, but their droning harmonies were part of what gave the band such a striking sonic presence. Written by Jerry Cantrell, “Would?” – inspired by the guitarist’s friendship with Andrew Wood, the late Mother Love Bone frontman who died of a heroin overdose in 1990 – became one of Alice in Chains’ signature songs, distilling the very essence of the band into three-and-a-half minutes of killer riffs, haunting hooks, foreboding vibes and an air of utter defiance in the face of addiction.
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