Scott Weiland Is Now Officially Out Of Velvet Revolver

04/02/08 4:00pm

by Kate Harper (CHARTattack)

Things seem to have gotten a little heated in Velvet Revolver land over the last week, to the extent that the band fired singer Scott Weiland on Tuesday.

At a March 20 show in Glasgow, Scotland, Weiland announced that Velvet Revolver's current tour would be their last. This launched a spurt of online poop-hurling between Weiland and drummer Matt Sorum. Things came to a head on Tuesday when Velvet Revolver announced right after a performance in Amsterdam, Netherlands that Weiland was no longer their vocalist.

"This band is all about its fans and its music, and Scott Weiland isn't 100 per cent committed to either," guitarist Slash (real name Saul Hudson) said in a media statement. "Among other things, his increasingly erratic onstage behavior and personal problems have forced us to move on."

In response to Slash's comments, Weiland sent MTV News an email in which he lashed out at the Velvet Revolver guitarist and the other band members, saying it was "humorous" that they had dumped him after he had already "claimed the group dead in the water on March 20 in Glasgow."

"In response to Slash's comment regarding my commitment, I have to say it is a blatant and tired excuse to cover up the truth," Weiland wrote. "The truth of the matter is that the band had not gotten along on multiple levels for some time.

"On a musical level, there were moments of joy, inspiration, fun… at times. But let's not forget the multiple trips to rehab every member of the band had taken (with the exception of one member — no need to mention his name)."

Weiland's last trip to a rehabilitation facility was in February, but he's been to rehab for heroin addiction and other drug problems several times since the '90s. Velvet Revolver bassist Duff McKagan went to rehab in 1993 when he was a member of Guns N' Roses.

Weiland went on to say that he thought former Skid Row frontman Sebastian Bach would make an excellent replacement.

The singer wrote he would continue his music career with the recently reunited Stone Temple Pilots, who he says "speaks to my commitment to my music and my fellow bandmates in [Stone Temple Pilots] and to the fans who I feel would much rather watch a group of musicians who enjoy being together as opposed to a handful of discontents who at one time used to call themselves a gang."

Stone Temple Pilots play Edgefest at Toronto's Downsview Park on July 12.

In the meantime, Slash has just launched a line of limited-edition Gibson and Epiphone Les Paul guitars that he helped design.