One year ago, we predicted that Jeff Gutt, a recent contestant on The X Factor and former vocalist from the nu-metal act Dry Cell, would be Stone Temple Pilots new singer. Last night (14), the alternative rock giants have confirmed that he is their new singer and they performed their first show with him at the Troubadour in West Hollywood, CA.
It wasn’t an easy choice since Gutt won against 15,000 candidates including Life of Agony’s Mina Caputo and Scott Stapp. The search started over a year ago after Linkin Park’s Chester Bennington left the group back in 2015. Now, it’s Gutt’s turn to sing tracks that were originally sung by the late Scott Weiland.
Guitarist Dean DeLeo told Rolling Stone:
“We were not willing to settle. I mean, dude, think of the criteria that had to be filled here. You know, this is STP, man. So we would not settle. The fans deserve more than that.”
He continued:
“He was one of the last guys we saw, in the last two days of auditions. And that was just over a year ago – September of 2016. Jeff wasn’t even part of the singer submissions. But Robert happened to be playing a gig with the Hollywood Vampires in Michigan and somebody came backstage after the show and approached him and said, ‘You should check this guy out. He’s a local guy.’ And Robert called me the next morning and was like, ‘Hey, man …’”
Gutt shared his experience:
“I came in and I picked the hardest song first, which was ‘Piece of Pie.’ There’s not a lot of space to breathe in that song. But I figured, ‘If I get past this one I’ll be good.’ And one thing I remember is that the microphone was turned up really loud from the guy before me, and when I grabbed it the monitors just started screaming. It was pretty insane.”
Today (15) the group unveiled the new song “Meadow” and it sounds like their classic style.
Check it out below:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gJCguDrMyAQ
