Everclear lead singer Alexakis talks upcoming Myrtle Beach Speedway show, autobiography | Music

For a time, Art Alexakis, singer/guitarist/songwriter of Everclear, wasn’t sure he was going to bring back his ‘90s alternative rock-themed Summerland tour for another run this year.

But that idea changed one day earlier this year when he got together for breakfast with Mark McGrath, frontman of Sugar Ray.

“We have breakfast probably six or seven times a year, whenever we’re not too busy and catch up and find out what’s going on,” Alexakis said in a mid-June phone interview. “He said he wasn’t going out (on tour) this year. Last year was a really rough year for them. Even though it was more rock and we had a really good year, I wasn’t sure I was going to do another year of Summerland. But when he said he wasn’t going out, I was like ‘Dude, why don’t you come out on Summerland? We’ll just blow it out this year. We’ll get Lit and maybe another band like Sponge or someone else, and let’s do this.’ And he’s like ‘That’s great.’ And I said ‘Dude, you don’t have to do anything. It’s not your tour. It’s my tour. Just go be a rock star. I’ll pay you well and go out and do it.’ And that’s what we’re doing.”

As the quote above hints, there is Summerland history between Alexakis and Everclear and McGrath and Sugar Ray. They worked together in putting together the first Summerland tour in 2012 and co-headlined that first outing.

But after the tour, Alexakis decided he wanted Summerland to lean further toward rock, while McGrath favored more of a pop direction. So they decided to do their own package tours, with Alexakis keeping Summerland going and McGrath starting the Under The Sun tour, which Sugar Ray headlined each of the past three summers.

This summer, Alexakis is having Sugar Ray headline, and Lit and Sponge indeed are the opening acts for Summerland 2016.

Everclear will play about 40 minutes, and will hit the highlights of a career that goes back to 1991, when Alexakis formed the first lineup of the band in Portland, Ore.

“We’re going to mix in a couple of old song favorites and maybe a different new song off of ‘Black is the New Black’ to mix it up a little bit,” he said. “But we’ll play all of the hits and that’s kind of what Summerland’s about. You’ve got to play your hit songs.”

“Black is the New Black” is Everclear’s current album. It was released in April 2015 and took the band back to its hard rocking roots. The album was defined by the big guitar riffs and crashing drums (and abundance of melodic hooks) that power songs like “American Monster,” “Anything Is Better Than This” and “The Man Who Broke His Own Heart.”

Alexakis said “Black is the New Black” reminds him of Everclear’s 1995 album, “Sparkle and Fade,” which was a key album for Alexakis and the early trio version of Everclear. It was the first album Everclear recorded under its major label deal with Capitol Records -- and the follow-up to the group's debut album, “World Of Noise.”

Capitol's belief in Alexakis and Everclear was rewarded.

Featuring the hit single “Santa Monica,” “Sparkle & Fade” became Everclear's commercial breakthrough and first platinum album. The success continued with 1996's “So Much for the Afterglow” (which included the aforementioned hit “Father of Mine”) and the 2000 CD, “Songs from an American Movie, Vol. 1: Learning How to Smile” (which featured the hit single “Wonderful”).

Everclear’s commercial fortunes have fallen off since then, but Alexakis has continued to record and tour regularly, utilizing a few different band lineups along the way. Throughout his Everclear career, Alexakis has remained uncommonly candid about his life and the struggles he has faced, both in interviews and in his lyrics.

But “Black is the New Black” may include the most shockingly autobiographical song Alexakis has ever put on album. The song “You” is based on a traumatic life-shaping incident that Alexakis never revealed until after his mother's death about seven years ago. He's talking about it in detail now.

When he was 8 years old, Alexakis was attacked and raped by a group of boys.

“They were crazy family of boys that lived next door,” Alexakis said. “And there was an older sister, and she was in the house. She didn't do anything to stop it. The two older boys were teen-agers in high school. And they had two of their friends over. They were getting high, and the youngest brother and me were about the same age, and there was a middle brother. And the older boys just kind of took over and just playing around became something very sexual and violent and angry. I mean, they beat me up. Even as an eight year old, they were punching me in the face and raping me. It was brutal, man.

It was just brutal.

“I didn't tell my mom. I didn't give her a chance to (help) because honestly, my mom would have killed them,” he said. “I'm not kidding, she was from the deep South. She would have bought a gun and killed those kids, just flat out.”

Now 54 and happily married to his fourth wife, Vanessa, Alexakis said he no longer feels shame or guilt about being raped. But he thinks a lot of earlier problems he had in his life — including a addictions dating back to his teen-age years, which started with marijuana and moved on to heroin, cocaine and alcohol before he got clean in 1989 — can be traced back to the attack.

“I feel like I had PTSD from it and I think I watered it down in my brain for a long time,” he said. “My addictive behavior, even though I'm sure I have the gene, a lot of my actions and my acting now, definitely have come from that.”

Alexakis is working on an autobiography about his tumultuous childhood that he hopes to have published next year. The nutshell story goes like this: After spending the first six years of his life living a fairly comfortable suburban existence in Los Angeles area community of Redondo Beach, his parents divorced, leaving Alexakis to be raised by his mother. Left with far less income, his mother moved the family into projects near Culver City. Money was tight and Alexakis, who was hurt and confused by no longer having a father in his life, struggled through childhood. At age 12, his older brother, George, died of a heroin overdose. That same year, Alexakis’ 15-year-old girlfriend committed suicide.

Along with the autobiography, Alexakis has also started work on a solo album that will be very different from Everclear’s full-on rocking sound.

“It’s going to be like a ‘Nebraska’ type thing, just me and a guitar, four track, two guitars, two vocals, keep it really minimal,” Alexakis said, comparing his concept for the album to Bruce Springsteen’s acoustic 1982 album. “I’m really intrigued by doing that. I think it’s the right time to do that.

“It’s just me and this song right now, right here,” he said. “That’s what I want to capture in that, because to me a great song, regardless of how you produce it, should be able work with just a voice and an instrument.”

This story was originally published July 7, 2016 at 3:57 PM with the headline "Everclear lead singer Alexakis talks upcoming Myrtle Beach Speedway show, autobiography | Music."