MYLES KENNEDY Says 'Rock Star' Lifestyle 'Didn't Really Work' For Him

ALTER BRIDGE frontman Myles Kennedy, who doesn't suffer from the dreaded "Lead Singer's Disease" (LSD) yet has the pipes to justify such a condition, was asked in a recent interview with "Whiplash", the KLOS radio show hosted by Full Metal Jackie, what the most difficult part has been of reconciling the "musician" part of his persona with the "rock star" perception of the public. He responded (hear audio below): "That's a good question. It's hard. People do have preconceived notions that you live a very rock and roll lifestyle, with all the trappings and clichés. And I'll be perfectly honest — I went through a period where I tried that out a long, long time ago, and it just didn't really work for me. A lot of my friends were just, like, 'Who are you? What are you doing? This is not you.' And so it didn't last very long, and I just had to be the person that my parents raised me to be. But, yeah, for me, I guess what's most paramount is just focusing on what's important, which is the music and making sure that you're doing your job and not getting lost in a bunch of extracurricular activities that will derail that."

In 2018, Kennedy released his first solo album, the stripped-down, Americana/blues-influenced "Year Of The Tiger".

Myles, who is also known for THE MAYFIELD FOUR and his work with SLASH FEATURING MYLES KENNEDY AND THE CONSPIRATORS, has said that "Year Of The Tiger" is a concept effort about Kennedy's childhood, specifically the death of his father when Myles was just four years old.

Slash told The Pulse Of Radio a while back that his partnership with Kennedy has been easy from the start. "We work really well together," he said. "I never really thought about how that's progressing. It's real natural. So it's like any kind of sort of close relationship, where I think we established it really, really early on and now we're just sort of doing our thing, you know. Yeah, I don't know what else to say — it's just a really cool kind of synergy that we've got."

Kennedy sang lead vocals on a pair of songs that appeared on Slash's eponymous solo debut album in 2010 before taking a more central role — under the SLASH FEATURING MYLES KENNEDY AND THE CONSPIRATORS banner — on 2012's "Apocalyptic Love", 2014's "World On Fire" and 2018's "Living The Dream".

ALTER BRIDGE's latest album, "Walk The Sky", was released in October via Napalm Records.