Man in the Box
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| “"Man in the Box"” | |||||
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| Single by Alice in Chains from the album Facelift |
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| Released | 1991 | ||||
| Format | CD, Cassette, Vinyl |
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| Recorded | 1990 | ||||
| Genre | Grunge Heavy metal |
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| Length | 4:46 | ||||
| Label | Columbia Records | ||||
| Producer | Alice in Chains, Dave Jerden |
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| Alice in Chains singles chronology | |||||
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"Man in the Box" is a single by the grunge group Alice in Chains. It was released in 1991 and featured on their debut full-length album Facelift. In the liner notes of 1999's Music Bank box set collection, Jerry Cantrell said of the song, "That whole beat and grind of that is when we started to find ourselves; it helped Alice become what it was." The song makes use of a talk box to create the guitar effect.
The song was #19 on VH1's 40 Greatest Metal Songs and its solo was rated 77th greatest guitar solo by Guitar World. It is widely considered to be one of the band's signature songs, even though it only peaked at #18 on the mainstream rock charts at the time of its release. The MTV music video for the track was directed by Paul Rachman who also directed the 2006 feature documentary American Hardcore.
"Man in the Box" has been featured in several movies, including The Perfect Storm and Lassie. The song was also used in several versions of trailers for the 2004 movie Collateral (though it was not included on the movie's soundtrack), as professional wrestler Tommy Dreamer's theme song and in Jerry Bruckheimer's television series Cold Case. It has also been used for hockey games when a penalty is called on the away team, and the skater must go to the penalty box. Richard Cheese and Lounge Against the Machine turned this song into a Lounge style on their 2005 album "Aperitif for Destruction".
In a recorded interview with Fuse TV Staley himself states that the lyrics are about censorship in the mass media, and "I was really stoned when I wrote it."[1] The original Facelift track listing credited only Layne Staley and Jerry Cantrell with writing the song. All post-Facelift compilations credited the entire band. It is unclear as to why the songwriter credits were corrected.
At Alice in Chains' last concert with Staley on July 3, 1996, they closed with "Man in the Box".
[edit] Track listing
- "Man in the Box" (4:46)
[edit] Notes
- ^ "Fuse TV Interview" (last accessed November 21, 2006)
[edit] External links
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