This short E.P. from Alice In Chains was released after Dirt, contrasting the ferocity of other AIC albums, Jar of Flies shifts the music down several gears and the results are fantastic. The openers Rotten Apple and Nutshell are so hypnotic, drawling and brooding that from the very first time I heard the open bass lick, I was instantly hooked and thanks to the paring down of the guitars we are finally given Cantrell and Staley's harmonies at their most intimate and most haunting. This album is obviously more mellow than their previous ones and has a certain sound to it that is pure brilliance. The song I Stay Away has some orchestral violins that complements the song beautifully, the following song after that is No Excuses which in my opinion is one of Alice In Chains best songs ever and anyone who disagrees is probably an idiot ;-). No Excuses is an epic acoustic number with catchy lyrics that get stuck in your head and in it's MTV Unplugged version sounds even better, it was definitely a masterpiece and 'Whale And Wasp' is a fine example of how to do an instrumental right and doesn't become boring like some do and has some nice arrangements with some brilliant guitar work. Don't Follow was a nice acoustic ballad which slows down the pace abit but is nonetheless one of the main highlights on this great cd. The album then closes off with the bizarre but brilliant Swing On This, I think it's more of a jazzy acoustic number. Overall Jar Of Flies was a short but brilliant and amazing album from AIC, it's good to kick back or chill out to this enjoyable cd and the reason why I listen to it after work, buy this NOW!!!.

While Alice In Chains made a great deal of angry metallic hard rock, they also made two EPs worth of equally emotive music. Both Sap and Jar of Flies are melancholy EPs that find Alice in Chains at their most vulnerable. While Sap was a fun outing, it was also a little unsure of itself. Jar of Flies, however, perfectly articulates what it is trying to say without missing a step. What makes it so appreciable at first listen is how different it is from any other Alice in Chains release, in that none of the songs have the heavy crunch that the full albums do, and instead rely on texture and simple melodies to do their work.

Launching with Rotten Apple and Nutshell was a dangerous move. These are two of the band's most well put together songs, and one would think that putting them back to back would make for too difficult of a beginning. But their juxtaposition only does them good. Rotten Apple is the albums foremost statement. Everyone is at their instrumental prime here. Layne Staley works layered vocals like no one else can in wispy flourishes, Jerry Cantrell presents an almost funky sounding guitar solo while alternatively strumming complex but warm chords, Mike Enez's bassline is the strong supporting undercurrent of the song, and Sean Kinney delivers a knockout drum performance. All of this comes together to make quite a start...sad and affecting, yet somehow fun and digestible, as Cantrell's fun riffing at the end suggests.

If Kurt Cobain ever wanted to heal the fully realized articulation of what it means for "comfort in being sad," we can only wonder if he heard Nutshell before his suicide later in 1994. This is likely the saddest song committed to recording, mostly due to Layne Staley's vocals. His delivery is completely earnest and believable, and when he says that he would be better off dead, we know he means it. Kinney's steady rhythm sounds almost like the crackling of a campfire. Enez's bassline is once again the core of the song. Cantrell takes the cake with a memorable chord progression and a muscular solo.

From here the album hits its emotional extreme with the second single from the EP, I Stay Away. This is about the hardest and softest the EP gets, all within the same song. After a short delicate string intro, the song starts its light, emotional verse. Each verse is interrupted what feels like halfway before it should to make way for an angry alternate second verse, which sounds like a slowed down Dirt outtake. The song teeters in this schizophrenic style until it finally reaches its chorus only to be once again interrupted by the angry second verse. When the song finally does hit the entirety of its chorus, the full force of the violin melody does its emotional damage. This song is the blends the sadness that precedes it with the recovery that proceeds it.

And that recovery comes with No Excuses, the disks first single, which pulls the listener up by their collars into something more happy. Instead of settling for despair like the songs before it do, No Excuses, much like Got Me Wrong from the Sap EP, seems to offer a constructive solution to the problem, and therefore lyrically feels very accomplished. It also helps that the song might just be the catchiest single in Alice in Chains' library. Once again, the performances all around the board are perfect, and by this point we can trust the band. Also notable here is Jerry Cantrell's excellent backup vocal performance. It is hard to not think of Staley and Cantrell as being one of the best vocal duos in rock history.

Whale and Wasp is the EP's odd duck, in the sense that it is an instrumental. However, it is just as well constructed a song as any other piece on the disk. Like its title suggests, it also deals with extreme contrast, like I Stay Away, albeit somewhat more softspoken. The song alternates between a minor toned guitar strum that is complemented by sharp, haunting solo tones, and a more happy chord progression that is complemented by a cello solo part. By the end of the song, both parts meld to make a lush major toned melody that acts as a compromise to the conflict that came before it.

After this we have the most tender song on the album, Don't Follow. The song is a lullaby, the basis of which is a lightly plucked melody on an acoustic guitar from Jerry Cantrell that develops into a gospel piece with Layne Staley's finest vocal performance on the disk. And finally, the EP is capped off with the funky sounding Swing On This, probably the most positive song Alice in Chains ever made. In fact, Layne Staley does say "I'm okay," halfway through the song, albeit in his signature haunting doubled vocals, but we believe him here as much as we believed him on Nutshell. The speaker finally gives up being alone and says that it is time to come home, which is a proper resolution to listlessness, confusion, and recovery present on the rest of the album. Jerry Cantrell ends the disk with a similar funky guitar solo to that which ended Rotten Apple at the beginning of the EP.

The magnitude of excellent songs on Jar of Flies would have been enough to make the EP be one of the best ever. These songs are completely confident of themselves and understanding of complex emotions. But its development is what makes it truly striking, and an easy pick-me-up for me when I feel sad. I used to think Sap and Jar of Flies should have been combined to make Alice in Chains' finest full album, but I see now that this could not have worked. Jar of Flies is perfect on its own. It tests the limits of the artistic possibilities of the EP format and succeeds in revealing a wealth of conclusions of its strengths and boundaries, as well as being a perfectly formed album. And it ended up being one of the top selling EPs of all time, and also being the first to reach number one on the Billboard Top 200. Those numbers don't lie. This is likely the greatest EP of all time and Alice in Chains' definitive statement.

What can I say this is simply a "Masterpiece" In my opinion..The Guitar work and Layne's vocals make this a "Classic" in Rock!...A "Must Have" in your collection.

This is a major departure from the bands first two albums. On the song I stay away that actually has an ochestra on it. No Excuses is their only song to make it to number 1 on the rock charts. Whale and Whasp is an instrumental song, Dont Follow is a very good laid back song to relax to

As much as I love Alice in Chains's full-length albums, I think their EP releases are the best evidence of the band's versatility, talent, and soul. Case in point is the 1994 EP Jar of Flies. Coming after two unrelentingly heavy albums like Facelift and Dirt, a laid back, almost mellow collection of material is about the last thing you'd have expected from Alice in Chains, yet it never seemed out of character.

The disc starts off with a pair of very slow-paced songs that retain the gloom and atmosphere of Dirt, if not that album's fury. After that comes a pair of upbeat (for Alice in Chains anyway) singles - I Stay Away and No Excuses - which are among the band's all time best songs. Next is the soulful instrumental track Whale & Wasp, followed by the laid back, harmonica driven Don't Follow, which is one of my absolute favorite Alice in Chains songs. Closing track Swing on This is an odd one, sounding like a bizarre swinging version of Dirt's God Smack.

If you're an Alice in Chains fan, you have to own Jar of Flies. It's an important moment in the band's progression, and one of the better albums the 90's alternative rock scene had to offer.