There’s nothing like music to take you back. Some 30 years ago (at the start of my professional career) I was what you might call an angry young man. Music has always imbibed me with a kind of fuel and at that particular time it was the music of Alice In Chains, which was fuelling my anger rather nicely. 

Back in 1992 I was on some major IT systems project for an energy company, in the employ of Andersen Consulting, the behemoth now known as Accenture. I was sharing a flat with a studious American called Floyd and a conscientious, ambitious young lady called Heidi, neither of whom could make head nor tail of me or my anger issues. 

To Floyd & Heidi, that project was the place to be, the pinnacle of professional assignments. To me it sucked. So much so, I would start my days with a loud blast of Alice In Chains’ ‘Dirt’ (I’m talking LOUD and before 8 am too). I must have been the flatmate from hell. Belated apologies Floyd & Heidi wherever you are. Although Heidi, I will ever forgive you for showing me a spreadsheet with a list of names on whose jobs were on the chopping block. Like I said, it sucked. 

For those unfamiliar, Dirt is a stone cold classic. It is unforgiving, relentless, driving, bleak, but at the same time as melodic as rock gets. It was my album of the year (I used to keep a top 20 list) and over time has become my de facto “album of the 90s”. 

So for National Album Day 2023 with its 90s theme, it seemed like the appropriate thing to do to pop along to my local record shop, Roan Records Teddington and buy the remastered reissue. Listening session is now highly anticipated. Although these days I am no longer so angry (and not so young either). 

Here are some highlights from Dirt:

1. Would. The most thrilling, hairs-on-the-back-of-the-neck metal song, ever. I first heard it on the Tommy Vance Friday Rock Show and when I did, I knew it was totally different to anything else I’d ever heard, and I grew up on rock & metal. 

2. Jerry Cantrell. The band’s songwriter, lead guitarist and co-lead/harmony vocalist. Cantrell's guitar playing often uses the wah-wah and follows off-kilter time signatures but most of all - he uses down-tuned open stringed chords that put him in the club with Tony Iommi and other great rock players. And, he is melodious. He’s a genius. 

3. Layne Staley’s lead vocals. Layne had what is called in the music trade ‘a signature voice’. One that screamed pain, melancholy, anger and yet soared. His harmonising with guitarist/vocalist Jerry Cantrell made Alice In Chains sound utterly unique. The fact that the band found a way to replace him (after his death in 2002) is a miracle. 

4. Rooster. Possibly the best rock song ever about Vietnam, Cantrell wrote it for his war veteran Dad. It virtually takes you deep into the hell of the jungle. It actually feels dangerous to listen to. 

5. Them Bones. When I first bought my copy of Dirt and put it on the CD player, Them Bones frightened me. I wasn’t sure if I was equal to the record if that makes sense. I thought it was going to be too hardcore for me. Yet I grew to love it - all two and a half angry urgent minutes of it. As an opener, it is one hell of a statement. 

6. Dave Jerden’s production and Brian Carlstrom’s sound engineering. I’m not technical and can’t say my ears are finely tuned, but I think the very best rock records always owe something to the studio teams. In this case, the sludgey, dirgey and heavy chords and riffs don’t completely drown the record, they are equal in the mix with the vocals and rhythm section. It’s actually a very balanced listen that makes it accessible. 

7. Rain When I Die. Jerry Cantrell writes some monster riffs, and this one is an absolute beast. It’s King Kong and Godzilla. 

8. Down In A Hole. A superb, bleak-as-anything ballad that shifts the album’s pace - takes things down a notch. Brilliant. 

9. Angry Chair. A spooky and dark thing that comes from the “scary verse to soaring chorus” song school, it should be on anyone’s half-decent Halloween movie soundtrack playlist. 

10. The album's cover art. The cover features a young woman half-buried in a cracked desert landscape. It is photographed by Rocky Schenck, who created the image along with the album's art director, Mary Maurer. It’s scary and depicts the album’s contents very well indeed. Even in the CD era, it is a classic ‘metal’ album cover. 

Dirt’s legend has grown steadily over three decades. Michael Christopher of PopMatters wrote "the record wasn't celebratory by any means – but you'll be hard pressed to find a more brutally truthful work laid down – and that's why it will always be one of the greatest records ever made."

I would imagine the making of the record was fraught. Staley was recently out of rehab but back on heroin and drummer Sean Kinney and bassist Mike Starr were also struggling with alcohol addiction. Recording began during the Los Angeles riots that erupted following the acquittal of four LAPD officers who had beaten Rodney King. Yet the band was clearly on a huge creative streak and had matured since their 1990 debut album Facelift. The drug addiction at the heart of the album’s subject core gave the record a concept album feel.

Nobody should ever say drugs and addiction make for great records and the idea of suffering for art’s sake is usually total bunk. However, Dirt remains an exception. A stone cold classic.