Layne Staley Quotes

From song to song, the album [Dirt] changes from glorifying drugs to being completely miserable and questioning what I thought once worked for me. By the end of the album, it's pretty obvious it didn't work out as well as I thought it would.

Los Angeles Times: And is Staley’s temperament as dark as his lyrics would suggest?
Staley: Most definitely, at least from noon to 11 p.m. It’s a product of our generation. People are angry. But I seem to do OK between 11 and midnight.

Yeah, it was crazy that it's called "The Day Seattle Died" because I didn't mean it to be that. I meant it to be as far as those two losses in Seattle [Kurt Cobain and Layne Staley's deaths] - to me that's the day Seattle died. I wasn't putting that together and thinking about the exact dates.
I had met Layne Staley before when he was really sick. We were on tour with Jerry Cantrell, and Jerry knew I was a giant fan of Alice in Chains. It was Halloween night, we were in Seattle, and all of a sudden, a little dude comes up and he's got an old fishing hat on and he's kind of dressed up like an old dude - he is dressed for Halloween. I guess he didn't want people to see him because he's Layne Staley walking into a club in Seattle, and that would draw a lot of attention, so he got a little costume.
He came backstage with me, and it impacted me so deeply to see him in that condition, because he was one of my biggest idols of all time. We opened a bottle of Jack Daniel's and drank it, and I just talked to him about everything for a long time. But the condition that he was in at the time affected me deeply - to see him look years older than what I thought he was. I knew when he left that night, that was the end - that he was going to go. I'm so thankful I got to spend that time with him.
So that affected me, and I was like, "That's my hero, I'm going to write a song for him." And then the Kurt thing came in too. He was just as influential, but Layne I just felt more of a connection to - he was way darker, and I've always gravitated towards that stuff. Layne Staley's mom actually reached out to us to thank us for the song, and it was really beautiful. So, it had some impact. People really feel that song.

I know that the guys in this band [Alice in Chains] would do anything for me and I'd do the same for them. I know that I can trust them, and I think now they know that they can trust me.

Layne Staley was a lovely guy. It’s such a shame that he couldn’t overcome his demons.

It's good to be with friends and family as we struggle to deal with this immense loss... and try to celebrate this immense life. We are looking for all the usual things: comfort, purpose, answers, something to hold on to, a way to let him go in peace. Mostly, we are feeling heartbroken over the death of our beautiful friend. He was a sweet man with a keen sense of humor and a deep sense of humanity. He was an amazing musician, an inspiration, and a comfort to so many. He made great music and gifted it to the world. We are proud to have known him, to be his friend, and to create music with him. For the past decade, Layne struggled greatly — we can only hope that he has at last found some peace. We love you, Layne. Dearly. And we will miss you... endlessly.

I was sitting with a friend one time, and I blanked out for about a minute. I had no control over my muscles, and it scared the shit out of me because I experienced what I guess could have been hell or, you know, purgatory or whatever. It was freezing cold, and I was spinning like I was drunk and trying desperately to take a breath. There was chest pain like I was gonna explode. If you gotta feel pain here, you gotta feel it somewhere else. I believe that there’s a wonderful place to go to after this life, and I don’t believe there’s eternal damnation for anyone. I’m not into religion, but I have a good grasp on my spirituality. I just believe that I’m not the greatest power on this earth. I didn’t create myself, because I would have done a hell of a better job.

I don't think any drug that can cause brain damage, failing kidneys, hardening arteries, pain, and suffering should be made available. Drugs are not the way to the light. They won't lead to a fairy-tale life, they lead to suffering.

The facts are that I was shooting a lot of dope, and that's nobody's business but mine. I'm not shooting dope now, and I haven't for a while.... I took a fucking long, hard walk through hell. I decided to stop because I was miserable doing it. The drug didn't work for me anymore. In the beginning I got high, and it felt great; by the end it was strictly maintenance, like food I needed to survive. Since I quit doing it, I tried it a couple of times to see if I could recapture the feeling I once got off it, but I don't. Nothing attracts me to it anymore. It was boring.

I wrote about drugs, and I didn't think I was being unsafe or careless by writing about them. Here's how my thinking pattern went: When I tried drugs, they were fucking great, and they worked for me for years, and now they're turning against me - and now I'm walking through hell, and this sucks. I didn't want my fans to think heroin was cool. But then I've had fans come up to me and give me the thumbs up, telling me they're high. That's exactly what I didn't want to happen.

Man in the Box" hit in the middle of the "Clash of the Titans" tour — you talk about a tough fucking tour, opening up for Slayer, Megadeth, and Anthrax. They had a revolving headlining set, but still, Slayer's fans would out-chant any of the other fans in the arena. "Slayer, Slayer, Slayer!" I remember playing Red Rocks, and the place is built 'up' — you could hit the stage with pretty much anything you throw from a certain distance. That was one of those landmark moments for the band. We got fucking massacred, dude. They started throwing stuff from the moment we came onstage. It was un-f*cking-believable. We were playing just looking up — watching shit come down, trying to avoid it, without running off the stage. After a while of getting pelted with all this shit — I don't know how someone did this, but they snuck a gallon jug of some liquid, and they hocked this thing. It came down and crashed on Sean [Kinney]'s set.
Layne got fucking pissed. He started grabbing shit and throwing it back at the audience. He jumped the barricades and started spitting back — throwing shit and flipping people off, just like they had been doing to us. So, we all did the same thing — we all followed Layne's lead. We got right in their face, started kicking the shit they were throwing at us right back in their faces. And we finished our set. We're like, "Fuck man, we better get out of here — we're going to get killed." After that show, there were a bunch of Slayer fans out by the bus. We're like, "Oh shit, here we go." We walk up to the bus — they were blocking us from getting to the bus — and they're like, "You guys are alright. You guys didn't puss out."

Los Angeles Times: In a more recent phone interview, however, Staley proved more forthcoming, saying he isn’t at all surprised at the speculation inspired by the lyrics.
Staley: I figured as much. People decipher our lyrics and take things too literally. It won’t change the way I write, though.

He was a one-of-a-kind singer. A lot of guys nowadays try to sound like him, but nobody can sound like him.

God bless Layne. He was my favorite vocalist. I've never heard of a vocalist that had that much soul.

At the end of the day or at the end of the party, when everyone goes home, you’re stuck with yourself. There was a time when I couldn’t deal with that, and I couldn’t go places by myself. I needed to call up a friend to go to a 7-Eleven. I just couldn’t approach people when I was alone. Getting a place on my own was a step toward learning how to do that.