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History Temple of the Dog

Temple of the Dog – History (part 2): The death of Andrew Wood

At the same time, the infamous Green River was at its peak. For those not keeping a scorecard, Green River consisted of Mark Arm and Steve Turner, who would later go on to form Mudhoney, and Stone Gossard and Jeff Ament, who, well, you know. Bruce Fairweather, a bandmate of Jeff’s from his metal project Deranged Diction, also joined to replace Steve Turner. Stone, funk denizen that he is, often jammed with Andy and Malfunkshun. Jeff used to work with Andy at the same day job. Green River breaks up, Malfunkshun packs it in, and the three of them (plus Bruce Fairweather) get together to form their own project, Mother Love Bone.

From the start, Mother Love Bone thought big time. Wanted to be big time. They wanted to be rock stars, and their dedication paid off in the form of a record contract with Polygram, signed by Michael Goldstone, who would later bring Pearl Jam to Epic Records. “We wrote more songs and dreamed big dreams,” says Jeff Ament in the Mother Love Bone compilation liner notes. They recorded the Shine EP in November of 1988, and the record was released a few months later, in March of 1989. The project toured, received critical acclaim (and critical bashing).

Mother Love Bone spent the summer and fall of 1989 recording their first album, Apple. It was during this time that the band realized that Andy’s struggle with his demons was a serious one. He was persuaded to enter a rehab program, and completed it successfully. Shortly afterwards, the band played The Rocket’s (Seattle’s local music paper) 10th anniversary party in late December, and by all accounts were the stars of the show. Mother Love Bone was, by anyone’s reckoning, on the verge of making it big, of achieving all the dreams its members had for years.

Then disaster struck. Two weeks before Apple was due to be released, Andy Wood was found comatose in his apartment, the result of a heroin overdose. He remained in a coma for several days, and never recovered. Andy Wood died on March 19, 1990.

Continue reading: History of Temple of the Dog – Part 3, the album.

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Temple of the Dog

Temple of the Dog – History (part 1): the incestous Seattle scene

Temple Of The Dog.

The project is almost legend now in the histories of Pearl Jam and Soundgarden, and the name inspires respect and a kind of awe from fans of both bands. It’s also been a project to which many misconceptions and misunderstandings are attached; how, who, and when will there be another album, another reunion. Most of us came on board after the fact, when Temple had already become a commodity. Lots of us came on board much later, and only know the legend.

Temple was a labor of love, a tribute to a dead friend, an outgrowth of the mourning process. It wasn’t intended to be the commodity that it was later forced to become. This is an exploration of the project’s genesis, motivation and creation, as well as its aftermath.

The story begins with aspiring “Freddie [Mercury] prodigy,” Andrew Wood. People give Stone and Jeff shit about wanting to be rock stars, selling out, the usual bullshit. Those people obviously never knew anything about Andy Wood. The saying is that Andy always played to the balcony, even if there were only 10 people in the room. His idols were Freddie Mercury of Queen and Marc Bolan of T.Rex, and Andy seemed to be one of those people destined for stardom.

“L’andrew, mythical love child from Olympus, now resides in Seattle where he fronts a band called Malfunkshun…” – from early Malfunkshun show posters

The Seattle music scene has a reputation for being incestuous. There’s a good reason for that: it is. Everyone either ends up playing or working with everyone else. Andrew’s first real project, Malfunkshun, included his brother Kevin, as well as fellow Bainbridge Island neighbor Regan Hagar (later of Satchel and Brad).

Continue reading: History of Temple of the Dog – Part 2, the death of Andrew Wood.

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Biography Members

Biography of Andrew Wood

Andrew Wood was the leading vocalist in Malfunkshun and Mother Love Bone. He was born in 1966 and died in march of 1990. He died out of overdose just before the release of the first Mother Love Bone album, “apple”. After his death, Chris Cornell wrote two songs that, eventually, became a whole album. Yes, you know: the Temple of the Dog album.

The main thing in Andrew Wood was his strong personality in scene, his voice (rather similar to the voice of Robert Plant, Led Zeppelin singer) and his sense of humour.

In 1990, after his unexpected death, Mother Love Bone disbanded and Stone Gossard and Jeff Ament (members of MLB) decided to form a new band: that new band was about to be one of the greatests bands ever: Pearl Jam.

By the way, both Gossard and Ament were playing with Cornell, personal friend of Wood and his housemate, in the Temple of the Dog album, who was a tribute band to Andrew Wood. Also, one of the greatests hits of Alice in Chains, Would?, is also dedicated to Andrew Wood.

Years later, in 2005, the documental Malfunkshun: The history of Andrew Wood, was awarded in the Seattle Cinema Festival.