BIOGRAPHY: STONE TEMPLE PILOTS

In the wake of the success of the Seattle sound, Stone Temple Pilots emerged in the early '90s with a hard-rock approach that drew heavily on the influence of earlier guitar bands from Led Zeppelin to Blue Cheer. With their debut, Core, going platinum shortly after its release, they stirred controversy with "Sex Type Thing," a single about date rape and a stylistic approach that some critics felt drew too heavily on Pearl Jam's. Later, the controversy shifted to frontman Scott Weiland's battle to check a career-threatening heroin addiction.

Having met at a Black Flag concert in the late '80s, singer Weiland and guitarist Robert DeLeo founded Mighty Joe Young to purvey a sound combining heavy-metal-derived guitar with punk brashness; they changed the group's name to Shirley Temple's Pussy before deciding on Stone Temple Pilots. Signing to Atlantic and making the triple-platinum Core (#3, 1993) with producer Brendan O'Brien (the Black Crowes, the Red Hot Chili Peppers), they soon gained heavy MTV exposure and, while decrying the "grunge" label, found themselves in the same sales league as Nirvana and Pearl Jam. The single "Plush," which hit #9 on the Modern Rock tracks chart, continued their commercial ascension. Their followup album, Purple, debuted at #1 and featured the #1 album rock hits "Vasoline" and "Interstate Love Song." But the band's momentum hit the skids as Weiland fell headlong into a heroin addiction. An arrest in 1995 landed him in rehab for several months and forced the band to cancel a summer tour in support of its third album, the power pop-inspired Tiny Music . . . Songs From the Vatican Gift Shop (#4, 1996). They attempted to tour again in fall 1996 and the following spring but had to cancel both times when Weiland relapsed.

While Weiland went in and out of rehab, the rest of the band staved off frustration by recruiting singer Dave Coutts (from the Long Beach, California, band Ten Inch Men) and recording an album as Talk Show. Released in the fall of 1997, it stalled at #131. The following spring, Weiland released his own solo album, 12 Bar Blues (#42, 1998), but his tour was derailed after a drug arrest (his third) later that year.

STP reconvened in 1999 to record their fourth album, No. 4, but by the time of the album's release in October, Weiland was behind bars. He was sentenced to a year in prison in September after surviving a near-fatal overdose -- it was his third parole violation following a 1997 conviction in California. He was released in December after serving a little less than half of his sentence. With Weiland determined to stay clean (and free), STP hit the road again in 2000.

From the 2001 The Rolling Stone Encyclopedia