Review | Alice In Chains

BLACK GIVES WAY TO BLUE

MUCH BETTER THAN COULD BE EXPECTED

Black Gives Way To Blue

14 years is a long time to wait for a band to make an album! While impossible to state that it was worth the wait, the new Alice In Chains LP, “Black Gives Way To Blue,” is much better than could be expected. Gone is Layne Staley, but the beauty of the band’s situation is that guitarist/songwriter Jerry Cantrell always did about half the vocals anyway, and new singer William Duvall sounds a tad like Staley as well. The new Alice sounds remarkably like the old Alice! That’s a good thing!

The major difference is the lack of morose overtones that were the theme of most of Staley’s lyrics and songs. Not to go so far as to say they’ve become upbeat, but the title of the album clearly states that this group has transpired and morphed into something just a wee bit more positive than Old Alice!

William Duval and Jerry Cantrell

The crunching guitar riffs are sill there, as evident on the atonal riffed “Check My Brain,” and the slow yet charged “Lesson Learned.” Also present are hints of what made this so-called grunge band cross over. They’re melodic acoustic music, celebrated on “When the Sun Rose Again,” hauntingly pretty & vaguely psychedelic. The album concludes with an unlikely pairing, that of Elton John and Jerry Cantrell singing a slow ballad, an ode to dead drug addict Staley, “Black Gives Way To Blue.” A very sad song indeed for a very sad passing.

Still there are also the classic “Chains” vocal harmonizing, again making new Alice reminiscent of the old. Only one tune reminds  me of the immortal record “Dirt,” that being “A Looking In View,” which starts out creepy, yet the chord changes are slightly more uplifting than the drudging, plodding, and the “It’s my time to die” attitude that’s missing from the current work. That’s what we loved about former Alice, and that element is missing.

Its a consistent album with relatively no duds on board either. Life changes, bands change, and so does their music. Alice has taken a new direction and we are all lucky they’ve put out something worthy, competent, viable & entertaining!