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Degradation Trip
Degradation Trip is the second solo album by Alice in Chains guitarist and vocalist Jerry Cantrell, released on June 18, 2002. It marks his difficult transition from Columbia Records to Roadrunner, and was dedicated to Alice in Chains lead singer Layne Staley, who died two months before the album's release. The title was taken from the song "Solitude", the fifth track from the album. Degradation Trip featured two singles and was well received by critics, faring better than Cantrell's solo debut and bearing stronger resemblance to his work in Alice in Chains. The tracks "Anger Rising" and "Angel Eyes" were released as singles. "Anger Rising" reached No. 10 on Billboard's Mainstream Rock Tracks and stayed on the chart for 18 weeks. The album has sold 100,000 copies in the U.S. as of December 2002. In April 2019, it was ranked No. 21 on Rolling Stone's "50 Greatest Grunge Albums" list. Degradation Trip was released on vinyl for the first time on January 20, 2017, with a limited edition of 1,500 copies on transparent green vinyl.
The album was the result of an intense writing process that resulted in 25 songs. Cantrell enlisted new bandmates (Faith No More drummer Mike Bordin and then-Ozzy Osbourne/Black Label Society bassist Robert Trujillo) to officially dissociate himself from the incapacitated Alice in Chains and, after being dropped from Columbia, faced a turbulent recording process funded entirely by himself. After a lack of label interest, Cantrell eventually acquired a deal with Roadrunner who requested that he condense the material to 14 tracks. On November 26, 2002, the full Degradation Trip sessions' songs were released in their entirety as Degradation Trip Volumes 1 & 2. Cantrell's backing band for the Degradation Trip tour was Comes with the Fall, featuring Alice in Chains' future co-lead vocalist, William DuVall.
Not long after the April 1998 release of Cantrell's solo debut, Boggy Depot, he began work on a sophomore record which he confidently projected for a mid-'99 release. The majority of this follow-up, later entitled Degradation Trip, was written in the seclusion of a house in the Cascade Mountains. In a state of self-imposed isolation, Cantrell recorded the demos using a four-track recorder and a Gibson Les Paul. In 2002, he detailed the experience of writing the album and its outcome:
Amidst writing a surplus of material between fall 1998 and spring '99, Cantrell showed two of his new songs to Alice in Chains' lead singer Layne Staley, who had been living in seclusion for some time prior and had not worked with Cantrell in some time. Staley contributed to the songs which would become "Get Born Again", a single from Nothing Safe: Best of the Box, and the song "Died". Thus, rather than becoming Cantrell's solo work, this led to their recording by Alice in Chains in 1998, released the following year. They would later be recognized as the final material written by the band with Staley.
When asked about his thoughts on the album in a 2018 interview with Billboard magazine, Cantrell said:
By April 2000, Cantrell already had over 30 songs written, so he put aside his confinement and began to search for a band to begin the recording process of Degradation Trip. To continue developing his second solo album, Cantrell enlisted drummer Mike Bordin and bassist Robert Trujillo of Ozzy Osbourne (and later Metallica). The choice would deliberately refrain Cantrell from his Alice in Chains bandmates and therefore distinguish his solo career from his past. He originally booked studio time with Dave Jerden, who produced Alice in Chains' first two albums; however, Cantrell fired him after two days, claiming "It was just not working out personally... Mike and Robert had hooked up with me and we had been through rehearsals, and we got into the studio with Dave and it all blew up on us on the second day. It took us months to get regrouped again." Cantrell was unable to find a replacement for Jerden and decided to self-produce Degradation Trip with his friend Jeff Tomei. They waited another three months for Bordin and Trujillo to become available again, but Cantrell found himself losing Columbia Records' approval of the project. As soon as recording began, his contract with Sony, parent to Columbia, had ended, leaving him with staggering studio bills. He continued financing it on his own, even mortgaging his house to do so, and developed the album to its completion without label interference. Cantrell reflected in early 2002 on his time making a record without a label:
Trujillo noted the difficulty in re-recording Cantrell's "little hoodrat demos". He was asked to replicate the demo arrangements which were on cassette and, according to Trujillo, had nearly indistinguishable bass. It resulted that Trujillo, inspired by Pino Palladino, developed his own code for writing down bass compositions which he would continue using in the future. However, he remarked positively on his recording experience with Cantrell: "I was primarily just there to enhance the bass, but he taught me a lot about simplicity and using space and notes that really mean something to a song."
Finally, he was picked up by Roadrunner who insisted Cantrell narrow his solo work to 14 songs. He was told, however, that the remaining tracks would later be released in some form. Indeed, on November 26, 2002, a second version of the album – considered to be the "definitive" and originally intended version – was released. This limited edition double album includes 11 additional recordings that Roadrunner forced Cantrell to cut, in fear that a double album would have low commercial viability. As such, Cantrell has called the single-disc release the "Reader's Digest version" of Degradation Trip.
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Degradation Trip
Degradation Trip is the second solo album by Alice in Chains guitarist and vocalist Jerry Cantrell, released on June 18, 2002. It marks his difficult transition from Columbia Records to Roadrunner, and was dedicated to Alice in Chains lead singer Layne Staley, who died two months before the album's release. The title was taken from the song "Solitude", the fifth track from the album. Degradation Trip featured two singles and was well received by critics, faring better than Cantrell's solo debut and bearing stronger resemblance to his work in Alice in Chains. The tracks "Anger Rising" and "Angel Eyes" were released as singles. "Anger Rising" reached No. 10 on Billboard's Mainstream Rock Tracks and stayed on the chart for 18 weeks. The album has sold 100,000 copies in the U.S. as of December 2002. In April 2019, it was ranked No. 21 on Rolling Stone's "50 Greatest Grunge Albums" list. Degradation Trip was released on vinyl for the first time on January 20, 2017, with a limited edition of 1,500 copies on transparent green vinyl.
The album was the result of an intense writing process that resulted in 25 songs. Cantrell enlisted new bandmates (Faith No More drummer Mike Bordin and then-Ozzy Osbourne/Black Label Society bassist Robert Trujillo) to officially dissociate himself from the incapacitated Alice in Chains and, after being dropped from Columbia, faced a turbulent recording process funded entirely by himself. After a lack of label interest, Cantrell eventually acquired a deal with Roadrunner who requested that he condense the material to 14 tracks. On November 26, 2002, the full Degradation Trip sessions' songs were released in their entirety as Degradation Trip Volumes 1 & 2. Cantrell's backing band for the Degradation Trip tour was Comes with the Fall, featuring Alice in Chains' future co-lead vocalist, William DuVall.
Not long after the April 1998 release of Cantrell's solo debut, Boggy Depot, he began work on a sophomore record which he confidently projected for a mid-'99 release. The majority of this follow-up, later entitled Degradation Trip, was written in the seclusion of a house in the Cascade Mountains. In a state of self-imposed isolation, Cantrell recorded the demos using a four-track recorder and a Gibson Les Paul. In 2002, he detailed the experience of writing the album and its outcome:
Amidst writing a surplus of material between fall 1998 and spring '99, Cantrell showed two of his new songs to Alice in Chains' lead singer Layne Staley, who had been living in seclusion for some time prior and had not worked with Cantrell in some time. Staley contributed to the songs which would become "Get Born Again", a single from Nothing Safe: Best of the Box, and the song "Died". Thus, rather than becoming Cantrell's solo work, this led to their recording by Alice in Chains in 1998, released the following year. They would later be recognized as the final material written by the band with Staley.
When asked about his thoughts on the album in a 2018 interview with Billboard magazine, Cantrell said:
By April 2000, Cantrell already had over 30 songs written, so he put aside his confinement and began to search for a band to begin the recording process of Degradation Trip. To continue developing his second solo album, Cantrell enlisted drummer Mike Bordin and bassist Robert Trujillo of Ozzy Osbourne (and later Metallica). The choice would deliberately refrain Cantrell from his Alice in Chains bandmates and therefore distinguish his solo career from his past. He originally booked studio time with Dave Jerden, who produced Alice in Chains' first two albums; however, Cantrell fired him after two days, claiming "It was just not working out personally... Mike and Robert had hooked up with me and we had been through rehearsals, and we got into the studio with Dave and it all blew up on us on the second day. It took us months to get regrouped again." Cantrell was unable to find a replacement for Jerden and decided to self-produce Degradation Trip with his friend Jeff Tomei. They waited another three months for Bordin and Trujillo to become available again, but Cantrell found himself losing Columbia Records' approval of the project. As soon as recording began, his contract with Sony, parent to Columbia, had ended, leaving him with staggering studio bills. He continued financing it on his own, even mortgaging his house to do so, and developed the album to its completion without label interference. Cantrell reflected in early 2002 on his time making a record without a label:
Trujillo noted the difficulty in re-recording Cantrell's "little hoodrat demos". He was asked to replicate the demo arrangements which were on cassette and, according to Trujillo, had nearly indistinguishable bass. It resulted that Trujillo, inspired by Pino Palladino, developed his own code for writing down bass compositions which he would continue using in the future. However, he remarked positively on his recording experience with Cantrell: "I was primarily just there to enhance the bass, but he taught me a lot about simplicity and using space and notes that really mean something to a song."
Finally, he was picked up by Roadrunner who insisted Cantrell narrow his solo work to 14 songs. He was told, however, that the remaining tracks would later be released in some form. Indeed, on November 26, 2002, a second version of the album – considered to be the "definitive" and originally intended version – was released. This limited edition double album includes 11 additional recordings that Roadrunner forced Cantrell to cut, in fear that a double album would have low commercial viability. As such, Cantrell has called the single-disc release the "Reader's Digest version" of Degradation Trip.