Benante, Osegueda + Menghi Cover Mother Love Bone Classic

Anthrax‘s Charlie Benante continues to make the most of his quarantine covers. This time out, he’s pulled in a couple of friends from the metal world to take on the grunge era classic “Chloe Dancer / Crown of Thorns” from Mother Love Bone while showing his range playing drums, guitar and piano.

“Chloe Dancer / Crown of Thorns” is arguably the best known track from Mother Love Bone, whose career was cut short when singer Andrew Wood died from a heroin overdose just days before their Apple album was to arrive in 1990. The song would get its biggest exposure appearing on the Singles movie soundtrack.

For this version, Benante called upon Metal Allegiance‘s Mark Menghi and Death Angel‘s Mark Osegueda to play bass and sing. However, much of the heavy lifting here is done by Benante, who starts off on piano, plays both acoustic and electric guitar and handles drums on this cover. You can watch it below.

“What if?” Benante asks in the description for the cover. “I always ask that when I listen to Mother Love Bone, Would Andrew Wood have sung ‘Release’ or ‘Why go’? Would that Ten album have been the next MLB album?”

Both Stone Gossard and Jeff Ament got their start in Mother Love Bone, later teaming with Mike McCready and special guest Eddie Vedder for the Temple of the Dog project with Chris Cornell that served as a tribute to Wood. That pairing of musicians would then lead to the formation of Pearl Jam.

Benante continues, “I remember sitting in Lonn Friend’s office when he got the call that Andrew Wood had died. I couldn’t believe it, WTF?? I thought that band was going to have a long career…well some of them did.”

“What a great album; to this day it’s one of my favorites. The ‘Chloe/Crown of Thorns’ song is a stand out, it’s so perfect. A few years ago I did a version of ‘Chloe Dancer’ with Mark Osegueda and Mark Menghi at a Metal Allegiance show. I think they both capture the feel and emotion on this song,” he continues.

“I always thought I never really finished or felt fulfilled and I wanted to do a better cover of it. Since I’ve been doing these jams this song has always been on my mind. I get goosebumps when I play it, it’s weird and emotional. I hope you dig it!”