So I just saw (belatedly) that Scott Weiland died. Even following the deaths of Layne Staley, Shannon Hoon, Kurt Cobain, Hillel Slovak, even going back to Janis Joplin, it’s still a shock. Not so much that they lived and were famous, but more because that was part of what destroyed them. All have that history of numbing pain through heroin and other drugs, unfortunately on a public stage.

Once you’re a known personality, the pressure would create even more stress to perform to perfection and increase your concerts and media activity to an unprecedented level. If you have that inner tension which depressives often have, you are prone to explode. When normal life already depletes any strength you have in the first place, any extra stress can be poison. There are pictures of Kurt Cobain sitting with his guitar, crumpled against the drum set, just losing his shit, crying and having a total breakdown. If it existed, I'm sure each overdose would show something similar on a semi-regular basis before or after their performances, when the stress was highest.

Fall to Pieces from Velvet Revolver shows Weiland (in a music video) having an overdose/breakdown, and being dragged off a bathroom floor as a staged event. If that’s not a cry for help, I don’t know what is. Obviously it was inspired by his past life, since it's not really an common artistic, conceptualized video scene. It's an experience of life and consequences few of us will encounter, one he most probably has had,  but why put it out there so publicly? So many of us fantasize that it would be over, yet very few put it on film. Even though at the end of the video he lives, it’s only by breaking down to the one person he trusts to take care of him, and it's implied he recovers.

Outside of the ones who break/overdose/kill themselves consciously or unconsciously, there are those who struggle on a regular basis and make it through. Dave Matthews bravely ran a story in Rolling Stone explaining why Everyday also spawned Busted Stuff. The photograph accompanying was authorized, no crying though you know there could have been many if he allowed it.

All he could write at that particular time was a reflection of his state of depression, so they had to start from scratch to make Everyday. Yes, it separated the two albums from each other. Yes, Busted Stuff has a beauty in and of itself to turn that emotion into an album that, in many ways, encapsulates the complicated despair occurring with a depressive episode. Worst of all, the knowledge that the depression will be recurrent, so you have to brace yourself for every wave that comes your way. Yet he’s alive. Fighting still, but alive.

I remember the tortured Kurt from his picture encapsulating the visual pain. Dave's defiance since he's opening up with an honest written explanation of that kind of pain. Kurt's photo and Dave's article are windows into the gut-wrenching reality that so many of us have to endure but with two very different endings. It's a fight that I think Scott Weiland would have understood, but finally gave into despair. You can only fight for so long until you know there will be a reason to stay (wife, family, etc), or you eventually give up and let go.

For Weiland, he tried valiantly, although I'm sure that people will disparage him for his vices. But few addicts I've known or heard of have lasted as long, gone back and forth from rehab, actually cleaned up occasionally, and made a "normal" life for themselves after all of that.

Maybe it would have been better for him not to tour again. I guess we'll never know how things might have been different to help him to hold on to life a little bit tighter, or reach for support. Dave Matthews found much of it from his wife and children, living for them as a solid, outside reason to keep going. Not everyone has that luxury or drive to change their lifestyle. I wish that was true across the board, but for now, Weiland's story is written. No more chapters.