Thank you David for tkniag the time to write your comment, it's much appreciated. And I'm glad you liked the entry too.I think Alice in Chains had a considerably different effect here in the States as opposed to down in Oz in that Man in the Box was a cult hit when Facelift was released and Got Me Wrong enjoyed some success because of its use in the movie Clerks when that movie generated a ton of word-of-mouth buzz. So by the time Dirt was released a lot of people up here had heard of them to some extent (as opposed to Nirvana and Pearl Jam, which no one really heard of before their huge albums were released in '91 unless they lived in Seattle or Kirkland).I think a big obstacle to Alice in Chain's attempt at getting a larger audience (and one that I debated exploring in detail on this post) was that I don't think they ever won over women like Pearl Jam (and, to a lesser extent, Nirvana) did. Soundgarden suffered from this too I think. I think women saw Alice in Chain's as a new version of metal or something because my own high school experience saw that only the metal chicks or the far alternative chicks were the only ones that dug Dirt.As for Dirt being a great start-to-finish album, I agree that it is but it's also really dark and one that I can't listen to a lot so it loses a few points with me there. It's nitpicking I know.Anyway, thank you again for your comment and, again, I'm glad you enjoyed the post. Take care sir.MDS
Jack