METALLICA, MASTODON and KORN pay tribute to Alice In Chains.
Rock’s big hitters pay tribute to Seattle’s grunge pioneers MUSEUM OF POP CULTURE, SEATTLE
IT MIGHT NOT HAVE the worldwide name recognition of Cleveland’s Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, but Seattle’s Museum Of Popular Culture (MOPOP) is arguably America’s most impressive institution that celebrates music. Founded in 2000 by former Microsoft bigwig Paul Allen, the museum has suffered considerably in the wake of COVID-19, which forced the nonprofit to shutter indefinitely. As a result, MOPOP turned its principal annual fundraiser, the Founders Award ceremony, into a free worldwide livestream open to all, not just deep-pocketed patrons – a wise move that yielded more than £500,000 in donations.
The 2020 recipient of the Founders Award – which previously honoured the likes of Jimmy Page and The Doors – are Seattle’s own ALICE IN CHAINS, who are now 15 years into an improbable second act. Tonight, however, the spotlight shines firmly on their past. Described by guitarist/co-vocalist Jerry Cantrell as a “hootenanny of love”, the livestream – half fundraising telethon/infomercial, half tribute concert – opens with the quartet performing an unplugged rendition of 2009’s Your Decision.
Though seated apart, they sound effortlessly locked in, their haunting harmonies resonating even deeper in the acoustic setting. The direction, meanwhile, is slick and impressive, a far cry from static and amateurish singlecamera living room broadcasts.
The hosts subsequently yield to their guests for the next two hours, during which they’re saluted by peers, fellow Washingtonians and a handful of younger acts they’ve influenced. Live, such tribute concerts are notorious for train wreck-like performances due to poor chemistry, a lack of familiarity with the music and/or liquid or chemical over-indulgence, but because tonight’s stream is pre-recorded and professionally produced, most participants hit their marks. Better yet, a few even manage to leave their fingerprints on the source material.
For example, ANN WILSON’S take on Rooster
sees the Heart vocalist give the song a different flavour via her ageless soprano, which lacks Layne Staley’s grit but nonetheless carries the performance with grace and power. It’s an interesting contrast to Alice In Chaney, composed of COREY TAYLOR, Foos drummer TAYLOR HAWKINS and Jane’s Addiction bandmates DAVE NAVARRO and CHRIS CHANEY. During an energetic yet safe soundstage rendition of Man In The Box, Corey sounds uncannily like Layne, but without a harmonising partner, the chorus falls a bit flat.
Still, the quartet have undeniably been filmed while playing live, a sharp contrast to the taped, studio-polished performance of Down In A Hole by DUFF MCKAGAN and SHOOTER JENNINGS. Video footage shows Duff alternately playing drums, bass and acoustic guitar while Shooter – who produced the GN’R bassist’s 2019 solo album – gives his best impression of Layne’s vibrato. Although equivalent to a music video premiere, it’s a standout tonight nonetheless.
Surprisingly forgettable, however, is KORN’S take on Would?. Performing from a decked-out recording studio, Jonathan Davis fails to channel the angst of the original and – though he growls the final words for added impact – it’s a missed opportunity for the band to put their own stamp on the song. The same cannot be said for FISHBONE, who – for better or worse, depending on how you feel about ska and saxophones – make Them Bones their own. What the song loses in heaviness, it gains in quirk, yet it retains its harmonic magic.
Later, viewers visit a Georgia jam room for MASTODON’S faithful but raucous interpretation of 1995’s Again. With its borderline prog rhythms and angular riffs, the song might seem too obvious, but the group nonetheless capture its percussive, hypnotic chug to perfection. Vocally, meanwhile, Brent Hinds and Troy Sanders nail the Staley/cantrell harmonies, with drummer Brann Dailor adding anguished cries in the song’s chorus.
Seattle luminaries such as Nirvana’s KRIST NOVOSELIC, Pearl Jam’s MIKE MCCREADY, Screaming Trees’ MARK LANEGAN and the surviving members of SOUNDGARDEN
subsequently tackle various songs from the AIC canon, but oddly, none of their performances resonate afterward. Still, they all put in more effort than Smashing Pumpkins’ BILLY CORGAN, who delivers an unaccompanied and uninspired acoustic take on Check My Brain
while filmed by a solitary stationary camera.
And then there’s METALLICA, who not only perform a song that’s already been aired (Would?), but don’t even bother finishing it. Playing acoustically from separate locations, it’s strange to see Kirk Hammett shirtless and sporting a straw beach hat, and odder yet to hear Papa Het actually singing and toning down his usual gruff enunciations-suh. Still, the most bizarre part of their performance is the unidentified mystery lead guitarist, who’s filmed only from the neck down.
AIC then return for No Excuses, the final full-fledged performance of the evening. Loose and free-flowing, with irresistible harmonies and lush, jangly open chords better suited for the sun-drenched hills of LA’S Laurel Canyon than the overcast gloom of the Pacific Northwest, the song makes a compelling case for the group’s inclusion in that other music museum 4,000 km east.
CLAY MARSHALL