Krim said the discussion centered on “whether we pick this big, glossy hair band, sort of late-in-the-game hair-band video by this band [Blue Murder] or this dark, sepia-toned, sort of weird band, Alice in Chains. I don’t remember the deciding factor, but we decided it was time to change the landscape a little bit, try something different, and we went with Alice in Chains.”
As far as the decision-making process, Krim said they would have votes or try to reach a consensus. For “Man in the Box,” he said, “I think we talked both sides through, and I do think the consensus ultimately was, ‘Let’s just try something different,’ which it certainly was.” This was how a group of fewer than ten people broke Alice in Chains nationally.
“That video in the MTV ‘Buzz’ clip helped us out a lot, and I know it helped a lot of other bands as well,” Jerry said during an interview with MTV. “It can blow you up really fast.” The impact was immediate. One week after MTV put “Man in the Box” in the “Buzz Bin” in early May 1991, Facelift jumped from number 166 on the Billboard chart to 108. A month and a half later, the album peaked at number 42.17
“I think MTV had a lot to do with it. I think MTV at that time in particular was really leading the drive on record sales. It was kinda the peak of MTV. Everybody was watching. When MTV put it in ‘Buzz Bin,’ everything changed for that band, everything,” Paul Rachman said. He also thinks it was MTV that drove the song’s airplay on rock radio.
According to Jerry, Facelift had sold only about forty thousand copies after eight months of touring by the time the “Man in the Box” video hit.18 Another indicator of the song’s success happened when the band and crew walked into a bar on a night off from the tour and heard the bar band performing a cover of “Man in the Box.”
“We couldn’t believe it. We were blown away,” Biro said of the band and crew’s reaction. “They didn’t know we had come in through a back door. Nobody knew we were there.”
“[The ‘Man in the Box’ cover] sounded atrocious, but they knew who it was,” Biro said, referring to the band’s recognition of their song. “And then [the bar band] got all weirded out when they realized the band was there.”
Another sign was when the band started getting recognized at truck stops and people were asking for autographs. It was during this period that Jerry realized he would have to learn how to read sheet music. According to Biro, that decision came after seeing transcriptions of Alice in Chains songs and discovering they were inaccurate.
The band’s popularity in Seattle grew by leaps and bounds. “I almost can’t describe it. They were just ridiculously popular up here,” Jeff Gilbert said. “Fans would call KISW and just demand that KISW keep playing them. That led to ‘Metal Shop’ putting them into regular rotation. That album got more airplay than Nirvana, Pearl Jam, and Soundgarden combined. That is a fact right there—that band got sick amounts of airplay. Everybody was an Alice in Chains fan.”
If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, then Alice in Chains should have been very flattered after the success of “Man in the Box” and, later on, the Dirt album. Jack Endino, who produced Bleach, told Nirvana biographer Everett True, “Right around ’92, ’93, that was everybody’s meal ticket. ‘Oh, we’ve got to sound like Nirvana, or the Melvins or Soundgarden’ … or, times a thousand … ‘We’ve got to sound like Alice in Chains.’ That was the easiest blueprint for the suburban metalheads to follow because Alice in Chains made the transition from metal into grunge, whereas the other bands came from punk rock.
“Everybody copped to the metal side of grunge and that was where the really bad horde of imitators came from, the Soundgarden and Alice in Chains side of the grunge equation. The people who were hair metal bands a few years ago and now they’re a grunge band.”19
Kathleen Austin said Layne was having issues with his newfound fame. “Layne hated the fame. He couldn’t go to a cash machine without it being written up,” she said. “The Rocket … would say, ‘Seen at ATM outside 7-Eleven on such and such at three A.M., Layne Staley.’ He couldn’t go anywhere. The next time he’d go to that machine, there’d be people hiding in the bushes. He hated it.”
Another time, Layne and Demri had gone out to dinner with Austin at one of their favorite restaurants. “They had just brought our food, the three of us, and we’re involved in a family conversation. This guy comes up and just, ‘You’re Layne Staley! My girlfriend’s in the back in the bar. I really need your autograph. I have to take it to my girlfriend.’ It just kind of hit me the wrong way,” Austin recalled. “I turned and I looked at this person, and I said, ‘You know, we’re trying to have a family dinner here. I’m sure that Layne would love to write his name on a napkin for you after we have our dinner.’ And of course, he’s backing up and backing off. He apologized and he left.”
After this happened, she looked at Layne and said, “Oh, honey, I’m so sorry. That was not for me to do. Please forgive me.” He replied, “Oh, Kathleen, I just wish I could take you with me everywhere I go.”
Layne later told Jon Wiederhorn, “When someone’s excited about what you do, you’ve got to give them respect and be grateful. But when they run by and pull a clump of dreadlocks out of your head and your scalp is bleeding, then you should just kick the shit out of them.”20
A few years later, Layne was talking to Randy Biro. “The greatest line he ever told me: he said if he had known that being in a band was going to be such a tough job, he would have stayed dealing weed,” Biro recalled.
Layne wasn’t the only one having issues with fame. According to Austin, “People approached my daughter and [would] say, ‘Oh, I know you! You’re Layne’s girlfriend!’ And she would say, ‘No, I’m Demri.’ Demri had had a strong sense of self since she was two years old, and she started losing her identity to Layne, being identified as Layne’s girlfriend. Layne, on the other hand, started losing his identity to the band.” She added, “There were times that people came up to him and [said], ‘Oh, I know you! You’re Alice in Chains!’ And he’d say, ‘Do I look like an Alice to you?’”
At some point during 1990–91, Layne and Demri got engaged. Austin does not know the specifics of when or how this happened but says that Layne bought Demri a claddagh ring, an Irish design consisting of two hands clasping a heart, often surmounted by a crown. She recalled that Layne and Demri went to see her at Harborview Medical Center, where she worked, to tell her of their engagement, adding “and then they had a big engagement dinner, down at the Old Spaghetti Factory.”
Jim Elmer recalls that the two families went out to dinner to celebrate the engagement. Wedding plans were made, though the engagement was eventually called off. According to Austin, Layne and Demri chose Kiana Lodge for the venue, located on Bainbridge Island, a ferry ride away from downtown Seattle.21 Demri bought a wedding dress from a vintage clothing store in Pioneer Square.
Johnny Bacolas remembers the engagement and thinks it happened in 1991. He recalls one time while working at his father’s Greek restaurant in the U District when Layne, Mike, and Demri came to see him. Layne told him he was engaged. He also recalls Mike taking a shot of whiskey and saying, “I’m going to be his best man! He’s my bro. I’m going to be his best man at the wedding!” Bacolas assumed this to be true, because he was saying this openly with Layne and Demri right there. In terms of Layne’s demeanor, Bacolas said, “They seemed happy. It just seemed logical because he loved her and that was the next logical step.” Neither Jim Elmer nor Kathleen Austin had ever heard that Mike was to be Layne’s best man. “It never got that far,” Austin said. “There wasn’t a date. There were colors picked out, and nobody told them to me. But I do know that they were very happy at that time.”