Alice in Chains story is one of tragedy marked by drugs and death. Half of the band’s original
lineup would be lost to drug addiction and while a lot of the focus has been put on late frontman
Layne Staley, today we’re going to take a look at the life and career of bassist Mike Starr.
Born in Hawaii in 1966, bassist Mike Starr was the eldest of two having a sister who was three years
younger. His parents would split at a young age and Mike would move to Florida with his father.
At the age of 9 his father would relocate himself and his son to seattle and it was
around the age of 11 or 12 Starr got a job at ihop as a dishwasher and used the money he saved to buy
his first bass guitar and started his first band called Cyprus whose name he took from the bible.
Starr would end up playing with drummer Sean Kinney in that band.. Starr’s early influences
would be Van Halen and Jimi Hendrix with a childhood friend of Starr named Jim Hacker
revealing to author David De Sola how the future alice in chains bass player was single minded with
his focus in life becoming a rockstar like Van Halen. In fact his high school yearbook
would have him predicting that at some point in the future he'd be on tour with Van Halen,
which ended up happening and that is something we’ll talk about later in the video.
Starr would admit that by the age of 12 or 13 he was already was growing facial hair
and had a mustache and would spend a fair bit of time in Atlantic City with his father. Starr’s
older looking appearance made bartenders think he was 18 and so he was allowed to buy drinks.
In high school around 1982 starr would play in a band named S.A.T.O taking it’s name from an
Ozzy Osbourne song with one flyer promoting the band saying “Don’t Say No SATO” The band
was reasaonbly successful around Seattle playing shows at the Seattle Arena and the Moore Theater
and was even featured on a compilation album called Northwest Metalfest. In 1984 Starr
would end up meeting guitarist Jerry cantrell and play in a band with him called Gyspy Rose,
which was a precursor to Alice in Chains. I wanna let you guys know i’ve done a whole video on Alice
in Chains glam metal days in the 80's. The link is below in the description box. Prior to the classic
lineup of Alice in Chains forming in the late 80's guitarist Jerry cantrell played some demos
he was working on for drummer Sean Kinney. Also in the room at the same time was Kinney’s girlfriend
a women named Melinda. Jerry would mention to Sean that he knew a bass player named Mike Starr
to which Kinney replied “that’s weird because this is his sister and pointed at Melinda” and
told Cantrell he had previously played with Mike in a handful of bands since his early teen years.
Starr for his part had already met frontman Layne Staley a few years prior telling author Mark yarm
how they met “i guess i met layne a couple of years ago, but I don’t remember it”. I was so
high i couldn’t dress myself.so i wore my bathrobe with underwear on and my sunglasses and cowboy
boots on my honda motorcycle on my way to the beach. Layne would recall that meeting telling
an interviewer “when i met mike starr he was on a honda motorcycle in his bathrobe and sunglasses.
I said to myself right there. That’s the kind of guy i want to be in a band with ”
Prior to managing Alice in Chains, Susan Silver would hear a cassette from the
band see them live as well as hang out with the band. Silver loved Alice in Chains,
but noticed the person they had appointed as their manager at the time was dealing illicit substances
and could not be trusted and could possibly land the group in jail. The band would concur and ditch
their manager and sign with Susan Silver, as well as Pearl jam's manager Kelly Kurtis and Ken Deans.
Deans would reveal in the book Everybody Loves our Town how Mike Starr posed the biggest headache to
the band’s future recalling “Overall the guys were terrific human beings. The biggest problem
by far was Mike Starr who did anything he could for himself.This is a guy who would
sell spots on the guest list and get people to buy him drugs and beer because he was Mike
Starr from Alice in Chains. You never knew what problem Mike was going to cause next" he'd say.
As the band started to record their debut album Facelift
all the members needed to be sat down and told that they had a limited budget to work with.
In the book Everybody Loves our Town manager Susan Silver would recall “With alice it was just balls
to the wall enthusiasm. I had to bring it down a little bit because Alice didn’t have straight jobs
and didn’t have a sense of budget and producer Dave Jerden just came in and said just go buy
what you need which is like telling a kid in a candy store that there’s no limit.
So I said look Dave you have X amount of dollars to spend on this record.
Three of the guys understood that really well and Mike Starr he understood it ultimately it just
took a little more conversation with him because in his mind he was already a huge rockstar."
The band’s first album facelift was a slow burn, but by the spring of 1991
MTV finally picked up the video for Man in the box and put it in heavy rotation. Facelift would
become the first so called grunge album to go gold selling in excess of 500,000 copies. Side
note guys i’ve done a whole video on the making of facelift the link is down below. The band got a
prime slot opening for Van Halen and it was during that tour that Starr was found by Van Halen’s crew
to be scalping tickets and backstage passes to the shows to buy illicit substances. It was this
type of behavior that likely contributed to his departure from the group several years later.
As the band hit the studio to record their follow up album Dirt the recording sessions were fraught
with in fighting between the band members over drug use and songwriting. Starr had a song
called Fear the Voices that he had writte nthat he wanted the band to record. But according to Starr
,Jerry wanted nothing to do with the song since he didn’t have a big part in writing it
While the band would record Fear the Voices Starr was unhappy with how layne sang the song
and it would be shelved and wouldn’t be released
as a single until years later when Alice in Chains issued the music bank box set.
Alice in CHains sophomore album Dirt would propoel the band to new heights selling over
4 million copies. Released in October of 1992 Starr would leave the group while on the road.
The final straw seemed to happen at Hollywood Rock Festival in brazil in 1993.
Starr would suffer a near fatal overdose and be brought back to life by layne staley.
Susan Silver would recall Starr’s firing from the band in early 1993 recalling in the book Everybody
Loves our Town “There were continual positions of jeopardy that Mike Starr put the band in. He had
a fantastic mom who did everything to help him, but he got in a lot of trouble. He was completely
putting the band in legal jeopardy whether it was drugs or selling backstage passes outside
the venue things that he did with his dad could have created a lot of ill will for Alice. Ahead of
the band playing Brazil in early 1993 apparently the decision was made to move on without mike. ”
In the same book starr would defend himself saying he only sold backstage passes because layne was
going through withdrawals and needed the money so he could get well enough to play the show. He
would claim that drummer sean kinney witnessed him selling hte tickets , but he was only doing Layne
a favour. He would also go on to claim “Also Jerry was getting jealous cause I was getting a lot of
attention I was in a magazine sexisest babe of the month, when that came out I was walking to the
bus and Jerry had the magazine ripped up at his feet and i was kicked out two months after that.”
To replace Starr, the band would hire Ozzy bassist Mike Inez who would stay with the band to
this very day. Following his dismissal Mike Starr would be interviewed where he gave his reason for
leaving the band here in 1993. Yeah I'm gonna take a break for a little while. Why is that.
I haven't had time to spend enough time to spend with my family lately. I feel like i
need to spend some time with my family. Layne took a little break last year for a little while
and i just feel like it's necessary for me to spend some time with my family. I haven't been
able to do that. My Dad's a little sick right now so i feel like i should do it right away.
Following his departure from Alice in Chains, those close to Starr claimed the bassist never
got over his firing and soon ran into trouble with the law throughout the 90’s and 2000’s. By 1993 he
would play bass in the short lived group Sun Red Sun with former Black Sabbath frontman Ray Gillen,
but Gillen would pass away in December of 1993 putting an end to the group.
Alice in Chains meanwhile would be active without Starr until about 1996 when they stopped touring.
They’d cut a few more songs in the late 90’s but by the later part of the decade and early 2000’s
the band was pretty much inactive due to frontman Layne Staley’s debilitating drug addiction.
Fast forward to April of 2002. One of the last people who allegedly saw Layne Stlaey alive
was Mike Starr. Starr would admit he was visiting layne and offered to call 9/11
because layne was complaining about not feeling well. But Layne would end up threatening Starr
that if he called 9/11 he would never talk to him again. Starr would end up leaving layne’s
apartment after their discussion with Layne's last words to him being “Not like this, don’t
leave like this.” were layne’s last words to him. Shortly after that exchange layne’s accountants
sounded an alarm to his manager and mother that the frontman hadn’t withdrawn any money from his
bank account in several weeks and the police should do a wellness check, which they did.
He would be found dead in his apartment. and it was estimated that Staley passed away a
day after seeing Starr. This moment weighed heavily on the former ALice in Chains bassist
and he told Staley’s mother Nancy about it during the taping of Celebrity Rehab years later.
Layne's mother meanwhile urged Mike Starr not to feel guilty about anything
because Layne would have forgiven him.
By the late 2000’s Starr would end up on the show celebrity rehab.and sober house.
His former bandmates Jerry Cantrell and Sean Kinney criticized the show for exploiting people
while also wishing Starr the best with his recovery.
After his appearance on the show sober house, it seemed like things were looking up for the
bassist who was getting back into music. By early 2011 he soon moved to salt lake city
and started spending time with days of the new frontman travis meeks
with whom he was planning on starting a band with. It was around February of 2011 Starr was
arrested after a traffic stop for possession and an outstanding warrant charge from a decade prior.
Then a month later Starr was staying at a house with Meeks and his wife and was found unresponsive
his death would be ruled an accidental overdose from prescription medication.
His funeral would be attended by both jerry and sean from alice in chains. As a tribute
to both layne and mike alice in chains have their initials on sean kinney's kick drum
while the band plays live shows. That does it for today's video guys thanks for watching. Be sure
to hit the like button and subscribe and we'll see you again on rock n' roll true stories. Take care.