Stone Temple Pilots (also known by the initials STP) is an American rock band from San Diego, California, that originally consisted of Scott Weiland (lead vocals), brothers Dean DeLeo (guitar) and Robert DeLeo (bass, backing vocals), and Eric Kretz (drums). The band's line-up remained unchanged from its formation in 1989 until the firing of Weiland in February 2013. Linkin Park vocalist Chester Bennington joined the band in May 2013 but left amicably in November 2015. In 2016, the band launched an online audition for a new lead vocalist and announced Jeff Gutt as the new lead singer of the band on November 14, 2017.
After forming in 1989 under the name Mighty Joe Young, the band signed with Atlantic Records and changed its name to Stone Temple Pilots. The band's debut album, Core, released in 1992, was a major commercial success and STP went on to become one of the most commercially successful bands of the 1990s, selling more than 18 million albums in the United States and 40 million worldwide. The band released four more studio albums: Purple (1994), Tiny Music... Songs from the Vatican Gift Shop (1996), No. 4 (1999), and Shangri-La Dee Da (2001), before separating in 2003, after which the band members partook in various projects (most notably Velvet Revolver and Army of Anyone). The band eventually reconvened in 2008 for a reunion tour, released their self-titled sixth album in 2010, and actively toured until Chester Bennington's departure. The band's only material with Bennington was the EP High Rise in 2013. STP has released two albums with Gutt on vocals: its second self-titled album on March 16, 2018 and eighth studio album Perdida on February 7, 2020.
While initially rising to fame as part of the grunge movement of the early 1990s, further releases from the band expressed a variety of influences, including psychedelic rock, bossa nova and classic rock. The band's evolution throughout the 1990s and early 2000s involved periods of commercial highs and lows, brought about in part by Weiland's well-publicized struggles with drug addiction.
