STONE TEMPLE PILOTS Drummer Says Making 'Perdida' Album Was An 'Amazing And 'Cathartic Process'

STONE TEMPLE PILOTS drummer Eric Kretz spoke to Australia's "Everblack" podcast about "Perdida", the group's first-ever acoustic album, which came out in February 2020. Asked if the follow-up effort will see him and his bandmates returning to the heavier sounds of STP's earlier releases, the 55-year-old musician said: "On every STP record, we've always had one or maybe two songs that had that kind of vibe to it — where it was just softer and kind of acoustic based. And I think it was, like, 'Let's just do a whole album like that — have some fun and do something different.' And it was an amazing and it was a cathartic process to record it because it was a whole different thing… It was really trying to do more with less and trying to make the space be just as important as the notes that you're hearing. And yeah, we were just about to tour it when COVID hit. It was, like, 'Oh-oh. Here we go.'

"The next record, who knows?" he continued. "It could be the hardest or the loudest record we've ever done, or it could be a mix of the two. I don't know. I'm sure after we get back from [touring] Australia [at the end of March], everyone's gonna be itching and saying, 'All right, let's go. Let's go make another record again' in between the shows we have lining up this year here in the States. But no, that was kind of just a one-time thing to see where we're going, but at the same time, we all really enjoyed a lot of the aspects of it. So maybe you'll hear more of a blend of it. I always how LED ZEPPELIN could mix in — kind of the mixtures of stuff like that and have mandolins in songs right next to 'Black Dog' and other fantastically, amazingly good rock songs. It's all possible, and it's all coming from us, and it's all music. So we just try to make it all work."

In November, STONE TEMPLE PILOTS scrapped the remaining shows on their tour — including an appearance at the Welcome To Rockville festival in Daytona Beach, Florida — after a "member" of the band's "organization" tested positive for COVID-19.

STONE TEMPLE PILOTS features three original members — Robert DeLeo, guitarist Dean DeLeo and Kretz.

Singer Jeff Gutt, a 45-year-old Michigan native who spent time in the early-2000s nu-metal act DRY CELL, among other bands, and was a contestant on "The X Factor", joined STONE TEMPLE PILOTS after beating out roughly 15,000 hopefuls during an extended search that began more than a year earlier.

Original STONE TEMPLE PILOTS singer Scott Weiland, who reunited with the group in 2010 after an eight-year hiatus but was dismissed in 2013, died in December 2015 of a drug overdose.

Chester Bennington, who joined STP in early 2013, departed nearly three years later to spend more time with his main band LINKIN PARK. Bennington committed suicide in July 2017.

"Perdida" was Gutt's second LP with STP. His recording debut with the group was on its self-titled seventh album, which arrived in March 2018.