The debut occasionally touched upon that, but there were also distinct traces of the band’s glam metal past. In a sense, ‘Dirt’ is the album where Alice In Chains found its signature sound: generally slow, creepy riffs that combine a seventies hard rock swagger with a doom metal feel and of course the trademark dual vocal harmonies by Layne Staley and Jerry Cantrell. While Alice In Chains has yet to release an album not worth hearing, there is a sense of urgency and a dark, twisted atmosphere to ‘Dirt’ that none of their other albums consistently feature, making it one of my favorite albums of all time. It will be an impossible task to find the words for how much I love this album, but if one album deserves the effort, it would be Alice In Chains’ sophomore album.

And yet, that is what I will be doing in the next five hundred words or so. In any case, proof of the broad listener appeal for the creative triumphs found on Jar of Flies was immediately confirmed by its astonishing chart-topping success – and then perpetuated by its legacy as a high water mark in the Alice in Chains catalog.You probably don’t need me to tell you that ‘Dirt’ is a masterpiece. Perhaps it was this unexpected invitation to look behind the band’s customary wall of metallic guitars that appealed to so many long-time fans, while seducing countless new ones along the way. The greatest surprises were saved for uncommonly spartan, restrained and simply gorgeous musings like 'Nutshell,' 'Don’t Follow' and the instrumental 'Whale and Wasp' – all of which laid bare the vulnerabilities of Alice in Chains' musical soul like never before. In each, their customary intensity was reeled back significantly, though that was not entirely foreign to fans of popular melodic album cuts such as 'Bleed the Freak' and 'Rooster.'

Some of these – including the lead-off single, 'No Excuses,' its follow-up, 'I Stay Away' and the EP-opening 'Rotten Apple' – showcased full band performances. One week later, the founding threesome of Staley, guitarist Jerry Cantrell, drummer Sean Kinney, along with still relatively new bassist Mike Inez, emerged with all of seven new tracks, written and recorded in a torrent of inspiration.

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