OC Rocker Stone Temple Pilots Singer Scott Weiland Dies

Scott Weiland, a rock vocalist who first gained fame with the 1990s band Stone Temple Pilots, has died. He was 48.

The Grammy-winning singer, who also enjoyed success with the platinum-selling group Velvet Revolver, was found dead on his tour bus, according to his official Instagram account. The cause of death was not immediately reported.

A statement on Weiland’s Facebook page posted Thursday night said Weiland had “passed away in his sleep while on a tour stop in Bloomington, Minn.”

“At this time we ask that the privacy of Scott’s family be respected,” the statement said.

Weiland’s latest band, Scott Weiland and the Wildabouts, had been scheduled to perform Thursday evening in Minnesota. The concert was canceled and refunds were to be issued.

Weiland’s death was the second to hit the band this year. Guitarist Jeremy Brown, 34, died of multiple-drug intoxication March 30, the Los Angeles County coroner’s office reported.

Weiland, a talented rock vocalist plagued throughout his career by substance abuse problems, was born Scott Kline in Santa Cruz on Oct. 27, 1967. He was a former Huntington Beach resident who graduated from Edison High School and attended Orange Coast College.

He got his start as a rocker in Southern California and met future Stone Temple Pilots bassist Robert DeLeo at a punk show in Long Beach, according to the Los Angeles Times. Their 1992 debut album, “Core,” sold over 8 million copies, and the band became one of the world’s biggest hard-rock groups.

Weiland was unapologetic about his arrests, overdoses and relapses, telling The Times in 2008 shortly before serving a brief jail sentence for a drunk driving charge, “I live my life the way I live my life.” Of heroin, he said, “The opiate took me to where I’d always dreamed of going.”

—City News Service, courtesy photo