CANDLEBOX Band reunites after ill-timed debut struggles

The group's managers passed up playing with Paige and Plant.
BY JOHN BENSON
VINDICATOR CORRESPONDENT
CHICAGO -- In many ways, you can't help but feel sorry for Candlebox, which arrived on the alt rock scene a few years too late.
With the grunge/alternative world still in disarray after Kurt Cobain's suicide the previous spring, the summer of 1994 was a confusing time. Newcomer Green Day was moving pop/punk to the mainstream, but Candlebox was caught in the crossfire of opinion.
It is for this reason that Candlebox should be considered the first post-grunge band, compared heavily to the Seattle sound yet possessing a distinct middle-of-the-road rock style. In looking back, Candlebox singer Kevin Martin said the entire experience went from a dream come true to a nightmare from which the band couldn't wake.
"I would definitely say we were positioned incorrectly," said Martin, calling from a tour stop in Chicago. "I remember the conversation we had with the label, they were like, 'We're trying to get alternative radio,' and I'd say to them we're not an alternative band. We're a rock 'n' roll band. Don't try to get us to wear this type of clothing or try to direct us towards this type of an audience."
Yet that's exactly how Maverick Records, just like every other label that arrived in the Northwest with open checkbooks a few years before, viewed this Seattle-based band.
To fully understand the bad timing that plagued Candlebox, you must take a look at the great timing of fellow Seattle band Alice in Chains, which in the late '80s was an unabashedly metal, glam-rock looking act.
Martin knows this because Candlebox had practice space next to Alice in Chains. In fact, he befriended its lead singer Layne Staley, even admittedly getting high with him on various occasions. Staley died a few years ago after a long addiction with heroin. The point is, when the grunge door opened for its moment of fame, Alice in Chains -- which was decidedly not anti-establishment or punk sounding -- was given a free pass to join the ranks of Nirvana, Soundgarden and Pearl Jam. All Candlebox received a few years later was negative press.
"What happened was, it ended up alienating us from a lot of our musical peers," Martin said. "People we had grown up with in Seattle thought we were trying to cash in. It was a difficult time for us. We were young and really didn't know how to fix it."
Crucial misstep
The other bitter piece to this puzzle was the fact Candlebox's management passed on an offer for the band to open for the 1995 Paige/Plant world tour, which could have opened the eyes of unsuspecting mainstream hard rock fans who perhaps were unfamiliar with the band.
After three albums (1994's self-titled release, 1995's "Lucy" and 1998's "Happy Pills"), such trials and tribulations lead to Candlebox breaking up in 1999. While its members stayed active in various solo projects, the decision was made earlier this year to reunite and support its new greatest hits CD. You can see Candlebox on Saturday at the House of Blues.
"I would really love to have lightning strike twice," Martin said. "I think we all would because we've grown up a lot, we know who we are, what we want to do and how we want to control things."
With a new Candlebox album due to be recorded this fall and released next spring, Martin said the pressure is on.
"I'd like it to be the best record we've ever written, and I think in some ways it kind of has to be," Martin said. "It has to be the kind of record that people go, 'Wow, this band really still has something special and amazing."