TheInSound offices got slightly louder than usual when the first Alice In Chains album in ten years, Black Gives Way To Blue (out Sept 25) landed on our desks…

The first official single from the album is Check My Brain, and the video is a hazy West Coast acid-trip directed by Alex Cortez. Moreover, it’s the first clip featuring new vocalist William DuVall – for those not acquainted with Alice In Chains history, he’s the chap with the slightly-outta-place-amongst-flowing-metal-hair afro.

Watch Check My Brain:

• Quicktime (mov)
• Windows Media (wmv)

The album’s title track Black Gives Way To Blue is a piano-laden tribute to AIC’s late singer Layne Staley. And yes believe it or not, it features Elton John:

“We were thinking about adding piano to the track and a friend suggested we call Elton,” recalls guitarist/vocalist Jerry Cantrell. “I remember laughing and saying, ‘Yeah, I’ll get right on that.’ But I decided it was worth trying and wrote Elton an email explaining what that song means to us—that it’s a real, raw openhearted song for Layne. We sent him the track and got a call shortly after saying he thought it was beautiful and that he wanted to play on it. We were blown away.”