What's going on everybody and welcome to Rock N' Roll True Stories
And I had previously done a video on Alice in Chains as MTV Unplugged episode from 1996 but that
one was more just about the performance itself This video I want to talk about what happened
behind the scenes and maybe talk about some stuff that you guys haven't heard before
especially from some of the MTV people who were involved with the actual show
So there was a guy named Alex Coletti and he was a producer at MTV and he
was involved pretty much with the whole MTV Unplugged series since its inception in 1989
So when it came time to go after Alice in Chains to do the show he said they have the songs they
have the depth and they have the emotion where you basically strip it down you really find
something there There was just something going on and according
to Coletti it was MTV who approached the band Even though the show took place in New York the
rehearsals actually began in Seattle but they didn't go well initially
So Sean Kinney would tell journalist Greg Prato that it became more apparent that unless things
seriously changed then the band couldn't go out and play to their potential at this level at
least and he said we can't even get through a week and a half without drama and scary stuff going on
That's about right when I mentally started preparing that it's done
The same thing with MTV Unplugged they kept asking if we'd do it up to the
moment it was a real nail-biter So barely any rehearsing at all
The guys not showing up Same stuff
We rolled out there and everything worked Coletti corroborated Kenny's comments
saying that there clearly was more going on behind the scenes than he was aware of
So Coletti claimed that one factor that was working in the band's favor
was that at the time Alice in Chains wasn't touring so it wasn't a huge
inconvenience to have them on tour and then do an MTV Unplugged show
Now this was a huge advantage because for a lot of bands who did MTV Unplugged they were
used to playing giant stadiums or even playing arenas and to go from playing that to scaling
down their show and their set to something that's TV friendly and that's friendly to
like a much smaller venue is often difficult for a lot of bands and requires a lot of time
Now Coletti recalled flying to Seattle and actually checking in on rehearsals and meeting the
band and talking about the parameters of the show Now the band had enlisted the help of a second
guitarist which was Scott Olson who also worked with Heart as well
Now Coletti recalled going to rehearsals and he remember seeing Layne energetically walking
into a room eating a bucket of chicken and greeting him saying hey man and his
hands were covered in fingerless gloves and were greasy from eating the chicken
Now the band would travel to New York City in early April to prepare for the show which was
scheduled to take place on April 10th 1996 at the Brooklyn Academy of Music
So Toby Wright who produced Jar of Flies as well as the band's self-titled album would return once
again and according to him rehearsals went great Now Coletti recalled a last-minute request
to add lava lamps to the set from the band It was a difficult request because the lava
lamps needed to be heated and then turned on for quite a while before they're used
So if you guys pay particular attention to the show you'll notice that some of the lava
lamps aren't really moving a whole lot and in coletti's own words they were very grungy
looking giving the set its proper appearance so it ended up actually working out in their favor
Now there were several issues that the band was dealing with behind the scenes
So a guy named Randy Biro who worked with the band as a guitar and bass tech stated that both him and
Layne were going through withdrawals at the time So Biro had somebody bring some to him at the
actual show while Layne already had his own precooked supply which he tended to carry in an
old glass pill bottle covered with a cork top So according to Biro Layne hadn't done enough
to the point where he was nodding off or drooling but he was right there before
Layne went on the set and he did some just before he went on but he didn't do a lot
and he said he had enough and no point did I see him run down to the bathroom or anything
Also adding complications was that Layne had dyed his hair pink which forced the lighting
director to match the background to his hair color One thing the band did do that a lot of other
bands were delayed in doing was that they did provide MTV with a setlist ahead of time making
the lighting cues much easier to deal with Also adding to complications were that Jerry
Cantrell had food poisoning from a bad hotdog he had eaten earlier and they had to place a
wastebasket next to him during the show Biro recalled that once the band hit the
stage and launched into Nutshell a lot of people from the band's management team were in tears
Layne would also script the lyrics to sludge factory numerous times because the song is
written about his conflict with the record label who was Sony and the heads of the
label just happened to be sitting in the front row of the audience so maybe Layne was nervous
Now Biro claimed that in between songs there was a lot of clowning around with the audience
and even the band picked on Biro himself referring to him as an effing Frenchman
Now Coletti would look back at unplugged and said that drummer Sean Kinney was the unsung
hero of the show because according to him the thing about unplugged especially with rock
bands is that you live or die by the drummer If the drummer gets it and tempers his playing
then everyone can kind of play at a lower volume and play acoustically and when the drummer just
plays like a rock show everyone turns up their monitors and then what's meant to be this
pretty acoustic thing just sounds like really loud electric guitars
So following the show about two weeks after it happened the band was finally sent a
first cut to review and Layne wasn't happy So he got producer Toby Wright to watch the
unplugged set from start to finish and according to Coletti Layne thought that
MTV had edited the whole performance in the worst possible light to make Layne look bad
Coletti would take the notes back from Layne and Alice in Chains and re-edit
the performance and finally get Layne's approval So Coletti would recall he was paying attention
but he looked like he was falling asleep at certain points or he'd nodd out and
then all of a sudden his part will come up and boom he'd be there but they'd show him
sitting there with his eyes closed for several bars of music and then they wouldn't show him
until it was time to sing and then they cut to Jerry or Mike and it just looked like he was
sleeping through the whole thing during the songs So producer Toby Wright would provide MTV with
the list of suggested changes until they finally made the corrections and Layne gave his approval
So I want to leave you guys with an interview that Jerry Cantrell did recently with Lars Ulrich
I used it in my other video but I thought it was relevant to this one
So that concludes this video guys Thanks for watching
Let me know your thoughts in the comment section below and as always be sure
to hit the like button and subscribe and let me know which stories you like to see
featured in future episodes on my channel And we're doing that unplugged in New York
They all showed up All four of the guys
They're all sitting in a row and they all have these new
short haircuts and stuff it was pretty funny So Mike wrote some stuff on his base about friends
not letting friends give friends haircuts cause they are all GQ looking and cleaned up and stuff
Metallica is all about music not the length of our hair
We've heard the word sellout you know from way back
Nowadays I welcome it Come with me with what you got
Yes we sell out every seat in the house every time we play anywhere we play
Get friends haircuts Yeah
So all joking aside that was the back of Mike's bass the night you guys
played your unplugged gig in I think it was the front.
I think it was the front of the base Was it the front?
I think it was the front of the bass. So that was in '96
That was a Metallica haircut era Yes and but that night the unplugged
night that was apart from I guess one show where you guys did a Kiss thing you opened for Kiss
That was the end Yeah that was it was like a one-off
That was the end That unplugged session is one
of the most legendary Yeah
Of those unplugged's It's at that time they were a big deal
Everybody was doing them and you guys I guess maybe along with Nirvana and
and one or two other bands had the very very cream of those sessions from MTV
What do you remember about that night about playing and just being together and giving those
songs the acoustic treatment in front of people I remember being surrounded by friends
like you guys You guys were all
there and we had a lot of other friends there too and you're right that and the Kiss shows
I think that was it So for a period
Was there a sense of that Yeah absolutely
I mean for a period of time and you know this knowing that my bands probably over and you
know knowing that one of my friends might be committed to going out that way that's that's
a tough thing to live with and still try to keep that internal and support the group and also none
of us really wanted to control one another We just wanted to exist and if that's where
somebody's gonna go then that's what they're gonna do and we all went through that to some degree and
I don't think I was in great shape either I think I was not feeling too hot either
by my own hand for that gig I think that that's why all of
that is in there because all of that background that I just described we were all living in that
and knowing that we're coming to the end of it here unless something really drastically
changes we're coming to the end really quick and I think part of that is in that
performance As an outsider there is it the
celebration of the strength of the songs Yeah for sure
When they're stripped down because as you know when musicians know this
Yeah it better be there When you play an acoustic instrument
there better be a song there and a vocal melody and a lyric that can stand on its own without the
volume and without the weight of the electric instruments and I just remember sitting there
Every one of those songs were so moving in their simplest form