He is the quiet and introverted drummer of "Alice In Chains" but he also formed a supergroup and even recorded with "Metallica" !!
(Photo: drummagazine.com)
1. His full name is Sean Howard Kinney and he was born in Washington, on May 27, 1966.
2. His father was a policeman and his mother was a municipal employee.
3. He became interested in and played music at an early age, his first drum set was at 5 years old.
4. Already at the age of 9 he was the drummer in his grandfather's band "The Cross Cats" and even went on tour with them in the northern United States.
5. In 1985 Sean met with Layne Staley during one of Lanye's band's shows "Sieze". Sean did not like Layne's band but was very enthusiastic about Layne himself. He wrote his girlfriend's phone number on a piece of paper (since there was no phone) and offered to jam together.
6. A year later Jerry Cantrell and Layne Staley met at a party in Seattle when Layne was the singer of Alice N 'Chains. Jerry received from Layne the phone of a girl named Melinda Starr, the same phone that Sean had given to Layne a year earlier.
7. Fate wanted the same Melinda was also Mike Starr's sister whom Jerry wanted as bassist for the band, she, of course, picked up the phone and Mike immediately showed up.
8. The three were looking for a singer and really wanted Layne in their band. Layne refused because he was interested in setting up his own band. So what did the three do? There initiated auditions for very, very bad singers with Layne's presence to make him accept the offer. The breaking point was when a stripper who wanted to be a singer came to the audition, Layne could not take it anymore and agreed to join the band.
9. After quite a few names like "Mothra", "Fuck", "Diamond Lie", and more the members decided on the name "Alice In Chains", based on Layne's former band name.
(Photo: Annamaria Disanto)
10. The first demo of the band "The Treehouse Tapes" was completed in 1988. It found its way to Kelly Curtis and Susan Silver who managed the bands "Mother Love Bone" and "Soundgarden". The two transferred the demo to "Columbia Records" and they signed the band to a contract in September 1989.
11. The band's debut album "Facelift" was released in August 1990, Jerry dedicated the album to his mother Gloria, and fellow singer Andrew Wood from the band "Mother Love Bone". The singles that came out of the album are: "We Die Young", "Man in the Box", "Sea of Sorrow" and "Bleed the Freak". This is the first album from the grunge scene that was crowned gold and it was also nominated for a Grammy.
12. The album was almost released without Sean's participation !! He broke his arm shortly before rehearsals for the album and when the band came together to record he could not play. They enlisted drummer Greg Gilmore from the band "Mother Love Bone" and Sean guided him during rehearsals and recordings. Sean guides Greg but is deeply frustrated inside that he is not a partner in his new band's debut album. Here, too, fate intervened and fortunately for Sean, the band took a short break from the recordings, which gave him some time to recover. Upon returning to the recordings Sean decided that he can't take it anymore, he decided to cut and take off the cast and do all the recordings for the album with a broken arm as he occasionally puts his arm in an ice bucket next to his drum set.
(Photo: amazon.com)
13. In February 1992 the band released their first EP "SAP" which consists entirely of acoustic songs. The idea for the album came from a vision Sean had one night, he dreamed that the band was recording an acoustic album called SAP and so it was. The album features Ann Wilson from the band "Heart" and another duo named "Alice Mudgarden". On this album, Sean plays keyboards and participates in background vocals.
14. In September 1992 Alice's second album "Dirt" was released. This is the band's most successful album that created insane hits like "Would?", "Rooster", "Them Bones" and more... and was also nominated for a Grammy Award.
15. The band's second EP, which is also entirely acoustic called "Jar OF Flies" was released in January 1994 and became the first EP in Alice's first history to go straight to number one on the Billboard charts.
16. In July 1994, the band temporarily disbanded for six months and returned in November 1995, when the third album "Alice In Chains" was released. The album went straight to number one on the charts and issued the singles: "Grind", "Heaven Beside You" and "Again". This album marked the beginning of the end when this time the band did not go on a tour to promote the album and did not hold shows for two and a half years until the encore performance...
17. Sean plays himself in the December 1995 mockumentary film "The Nona Tapes", which was released to promote the band's third album "Alice In Chains".
18. In April 1996, Alice made one of the biggest and most famous shows on the MTV Unplugged show. Jerry went up sick as a result of stomach poisoning and Layne looked completely wasted from drugs and alcohol.
19. That same year Sean joined Johnny Cash, Kim Thayil ("Soundgarden"), and Krist Novoselic ("Nirvana") for a cover recording of singer Willie Nelson's song "Time of the Preacher" for a tribute album called "Twisted Willie"
20. In the same year the band held its last four performances with Layne, who passed away six years later in April 2002. From that year the band had no activity and disbanded completely.
21. In 1998 Sean participated in Jerry's first solo album called “Boggy Depot”, he also went out with Jerry on a tour to promote the album.
22. In the same year he played the drums in Metallica's cover of the song "Tuesday's Gone"
recorded for the album "Garage Inc.", Jerry also participates in the song.
23. In 1999, Sean, along with his friend Mike Inez, singer Vin Dombroski from "Sponge" and guitarist Chris DeGarmo from "Queensryche" formed the band "Spy4Darwin". They released one EP with six songs called "Microfish"
24. In February 2005 the three remaining Alice members returned to perform together for the first time in almost 10 years. It was at a fundraising event for tsunami victims.
25. The three went on tour with many varied guest singers to celebrate their love of music and remember the old days. In 2006 William Duvall officially joined the band and became the lead singer. It made them want to keep writing and recording new music.
(Photo: EMI)
26. On September 25, 2009, the band released their fourth album "Black Gives Way to Blue", on this album Jerry took the lead in singing while William served as co-pilot.
27. The album's stunning cover is the fruit of the concept conceived by Sean.
28. On May 26, 2013, the band released their fifth album, "The Devil Put Dinosaurs Here", with Jerry continuing his role as the album's lead singer. This album was also nominated for a Grammy Award and included the singles: "Hollow", "Stone" and "Voices,
29. In 2015 Sean participated in the special and rare show
"Mad Season / Seattle Symphony: Sonic Evolution / January 30, 2015 / Benaroya Hall"
30. In August 2018, the band released their sixth album "Rainier Fog" which they recorded in "Studio X", where the band's third album and the last with Layne was recorded. The album includes the singles: "The One You Know", "So Far Under", "Never Fade" and the album's theme song.