HELPING ADDICTED MUSICIANS

Drug Abuse 'Like An Occupational Hazard'

As it turned out, it was a sad, solitary exit for Layne Staley, the lead
voice of Seattle's Alice in Chains, whose death last month followed a
long-publicized battle with heroin addiction.

This latest celebrity death once again turns the spotlight on rock
musicians, whose visibility has painted them, sometimes unfairly, as
mirrors of societal woes and torch-bearers of a well-worn ethos that
prescribes living for today because tomorrow may never come.

Those who loom larger than life leave lasting impressions in death,
claiming our attention whenever heroin takes another life: Hole bassist
Kristen Pfaff, in 1994; Shannon Hoon, lead singer for Blind Melon, in 1995;
Sublime vocalist Brad Nowell and Smashing Pumpkins keyboardist Jonathan
Melvoin, in 1996; John Baker Saunders of Mad Season, with whom Staley
played, in 1999. And now Staley.

Heroin and other drugs are big-enough concerns for the music business that
there's a need for agencies like Seattle's Musicians Assistance Program, a
no-fee service funded by the Recording Industry Association of America, and
MusiCares, the health- and human-services arm of the National Academy of
Recording Arts and Sciences.

As musicians become more successful, drug abuse is "almost built-in," says
Harold Owens, who oversees MusiCares' addiction-recovery program in Los
Angeles. "It's like an occupational hazard."

The chronicling of addicts' sordid struggles is a common theme in much of
the grunge music written during its heyday in the early '90s - such as
Alice in Chains' 1992 release Dirt.

Those known for staying clean - members of Pearl Jam and Soundgarden, for
example - were overshadowed by those who succumbed to heroin, including
Mother Love Bone vocalist Andrew Wood in 1990 and guitarist Stefanie
Sargent of 7 Year Bitch in 1993.

In 1994, Nirvana's Kurt Cobain shot himself a week after nearly dying of a
heroin overdose, just as Staley was returning from rehab at the Hazelden
Foundation Clinic in Minnesota.

After appearing on a 1996 cover of Rolling Stone that read, "The Needle and
the Damage Done," Staley all but disappeared, and his continuing addiction
kept the band from developing significant new projects. Staley died in his
Seattle home, surrounded by drug paraphernalia, two weeks before his body
was discovered April 19.

This sort of downward spiral is a pattern MAP counselor Mike Kinder often
sees. Calls come from musicians kicked out of newly signed bands at the
behest of record companies unwilling to take on their addiction problems.
Others are simply eager to deal with a habit that has earned them
reputations among club owners or recording executives as unreliable or risky.

A longtime professional drummer and recovering cocaine and alcohol addict,
Kinder has been helping musicians get treatment for four years, referring
clients to renowned California facilities such as the Betty Ford Center and
the Pasadena Recovery Center.

Many musicians, Kinder says, don't have health insurance. Even those
successful enough to afford it often don't use it if they fear that news of
their treatment might be leaked, he said.

Inquiries also come from touring performers referred by similar agencies
nationwide.

"I'll get people in recovery who'll call me up and ask, where's a good
meeting to go to, or it'll be the music community putting together safe
rooms for people on tour," Kinder says. "You'd be surprised who can be on
the other end of the telephone."

The influx of high-purity heroin into the country, mostly from Colombia, is
a major factor in the past decade's substance-abuse trends, says Carol
Falkowski of the Hazelden Foundation, whose treatment clinics have played
host to Breeders guitarist Kelley Deal, among other performers. The purer
blend can be snorted or smoked, so with injection no longer its only avenue
into the body, the drug is losing its seedy aura.

"People who may have been deterred are now trying it because it can be put
up your nose," Falkowski says.