Take A Load Off

Album: Stone Temple Pilots (2010)
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Songfacts®:

  • This is a track from Stone Temple Pilots' last album with lead singer Scott Weiland. It was their first record in nine years, their previous release being 2001's Shangri-La Dee Da.
  • Guitarist Dean DeLeo told MusicRadar about the song: "To me, there's two types of people: there's thinkers and there's feelers. The thinkers are lawyers and accountants. The feelers are writers and artists. When I hear this song, I'm thinking that everybody can be in that second category. Musically, it gets me off like you wouldn't believe. I love the chord voicings, which are a little Jimmy Pagey, I guess. Plus, the band is really playing balls-out on this song. When we got back together and played live on the road, we had some hot coals in our pants. This song reflects that spirit."
  • For the song's lyrics, singer Scott Weiland listened and studied to more poetical wordsmiths to learn how to free his writing from his autobiographical and "self-obsessed" nature. He told Ted Stryker in an interview on his KROQ-FM show, "There's an art to telling a story, and it can mean anything, or it can mean nothing."

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