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Originally Posted by floatingslowly
Starr hadn't been with the band since Dirt.
that said, if the loss of Layne Staley wasn't enough to stop them from making music using the name...
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Supposedly, they didn't want him in Alice In Chains when they signed their contract with Columbia Records, but someone in their management thought he was a handsome dude or something, so he stayed based on his looks rather than on his musical abilities and despite other factors that a band would take in consideration for dumping someone out.
He was finally kicked out after that performance in Brazil in 1993. I didn't know he overdosed after that show, i found out recently. According to his own words, he was dead for eleven minutes, and it was Layne Staley who brought him back to life. According to Susan Silver, one of the main reasons he was fired from the band was that he was more involved in the rock-star lifestyle rather than in the music. The official word was that he didn't want to tour anymore. He mentioned at some point that they kicked him out due to the fact that he was seriously addicted to junk. The origin of his addiction is linked to his involvement in Alice In Chains, so it probably would have been much better for him if they had fired him when they initially pretended to do so. On the other hand, i consider it a shame that he couldn't recover from his drug addiction once he was out of the band. One could think that being relatively away from such lifestyle, and having already faced death would be of help to get rid of the habit. Then again, this is an easy assumption since of course i never met him, and thus, i have no idea what was going on in his head. Reasons why people do (or can't stop doing) certain things are complicated matters. At least all the struggling is over now, and i hope he's in peace.
I never followed his post Alice In Chains career, and don't have any interest in hearing that Sun Red Sun record even now. I had sympathy for him due to his work on "Facelift", "Sap", and "Dirt", which i used to really love when i was younger, and which i still appreciate in some level even though i rarely listen to them anymore. I got into Alice In Chains when a friend of mine gave me a cassette tape containing "Jar Of Flies". She later gave me "MTV Unplugged" in cassette format as well. I like the so-called "Tripod" and the "Alice In Chains Live" records, too. Again, i don't listen to those too often either. On the contrary, i still listen to "Jar Of Flies", and "MTV Unplugged" sometimes, and still enjoy them a lot. I've heard "Black Gives Way To Blue" and i find it atrocious, not only in terms of the music contained in it. I think at some point i read an interview with Mike Starr, in which he said he was against the idea of the band going on under the Alice In Chains moniker without Layne Staley. Maybe it's not very remarkable, but i thought that was a cool honest gesture from his part (i wasn't aware he was somehow close to Layne to the point to be with him in the final days of his life, that's a recent discovery as well).