Jane’s Addiction is like Francium: scarce, radioactive, and with a half-life of 22 minutes or so. With just four albums in the span of almost 4 decades, the band’s constant break-ups makes it hard to be a hardcore fan of the band.

Nothing’s shocking and Ritual de lo habitual were massive commercial hits for the band. Mountain Song and Been Caught Stealing were everywhere, and I clearly remember during the first years of FTP servers with MP3s you could find a marching band tribute to Been Caught Stealing. Never knew where that one came from, but it was amusing.

As talented as the band members were, the tensions were always there, and the inevitable breakups after the Ritual de lo Habitual tour was a long thing coming. The band did reunite in 1997 for a quick tour (without Eric Avery), and would eventually release a third album in 2003, called Strays.

Just Because is a tremendous single, but the video always felt like a sanitized version of Red Hot Chili Peppers’ Warped, which also featured Dave Navarro pulling all stops on guitar. A rare guitar hit in an era where Drop-D and punishing your guitar with Top Shop bracelets seemed to be the norm in Rock. It was a refreshing, sonically-expansive song and I do have fond memories of rocking out to it at a couple of joints in Nottingham. It was my last months and I really wanted to live as fully as possible in the place. Nice dream.

So, 13 years for a third album, then another 8 for a final fourth. Then another 13 years and the band disbanded after Perry attacked Navarro on stage. It’s a shame that Jane’s Addiction ended like this.

-Sam J. Valdés López