“My bad habits aren’t my title. My strengths and my talent are my title.” – Layne Staley

Alice in Chains would release their sophomore album “Dirt” in 1992. If Alice in Chains’ debut album “Facelift” represented the band’s hunger to prove themselves; Dirt stood for coming to terms with their fame and the darkness that followed it.

Dirt encompassed a time where the band, specifically frontman Layne Staley, struggled with self-destructive habits and pain following their success from Facelift. According to Sean Kinney, the drummer for Alice in Chains, “[Drugs] were taking over. We were doing whatever we could get our hands on – and as much. It definitely started working against us.”

These drugs were used as an escape mechanism for the members, most prominently seen in frontman Layne Staley. Staley had his first encounter with heroin occur during Alice in Chains’ 1991 tour with Van Halen. Following this, changes were first seen by producer David Jerden, where he would notice differences in Staley’s behaviour and mood before shows and during time spent in the studio. An addiction was developed that would slowly begin to destroy Staley and serve as inspiration for the bulk of the songs on Dirt. The most notable are as follows:

Sickman: Covers the want to be clean from drugs but coupled with the prospect of repercussions that follow from withdrawals. Layne Staley attempted rehab fourteen separate times, none were successful.

Junkhead: Simply put by Layne Staley, “this song was written about a hopeless junkie.” This junkie is an incorporation and parallel of himself.

God Smack: The shame of being addicted and the lengths one will go to in order to get their fix. During Dirt’s recording in Los Angeles, Layne would often leave after curfew in order to acquire whatever drugs he could buy.

Angry Chair: About a point during one’s addiction where you spiral and stop caring, waiting for death. Angry Chair provides the closest look into the mind of Layne Staley who began to lose himself from the stresses of fame and his addiction.

Layne Stayley used Dirt as a way to showcase the struggle that comes with addiction through the effects it imposes on oneself and the people around the user, using himself as the reference. The album is emotionally charged and filled with the projections of a struggling man wanting to free himself from his afflictions, to no avail. Dirt is not just a reflection of Layne Staley’s struggle; it was a cry for help.

Layne Stayley overdosed in his home on the 5th of April, 2002. Exactly 8 years earlier, Kurt Cobain, who similarly fought addiction and the struggles of publicity, passed away in his home.

Following his death, the album began to really be seen for what it was: a display of Staley’s pain. Many now are able to seek refuge in the comfort of the album through its relatability in not just the songs covering addiction, but also other pressing topics and whatever other meanings they create for themselves in the tracks. Additionally, many people are able to relate themselves to Staley himself as they see themselves in him, someone who wasn’t afraid to admit he had issues and was struggling to escape it.

Addiction is a disease, one that Layne Staley could not rid himself of.

By: D. M.