One of the year's biggest rock reunion tours will be making its lone downstate appearance Wednesday night in Bloomington's U.S. Cellular Coliseum.

The Stone Temple Pilots, in limbo for the past five years, are back on the road for the first time in eight years with its original '90s lineup intact: lead singer Scott Weiland, bass guitarist Robert DeLeo, brother Dean DeLeo on guitar and drummer Eric Kretz.

The band, according to its record label, has been nixing most of the interview requests submitted along the 65-date North American tour, which kicked off May 17 in Columbus, Ohio, and winds down in October at the Voodoo Music Festival in New Orleans.

The only other Illinois date was a Chicago stopover near the start of the tour.

The famously trouble-hounded quartet came together 16 years ago in San Diego, with roots extending back into the '80s via such formative bands as Swing and Mighty Joe Young, including one with a name so extreme (a reference to a portion of child star Shirley Temple's anatomy) that the record label demanded it be changed.

It was.

Hence, its equally short-lived successor, Stereo Temple Pirates, which morphed into the final moniker during the recording of their Atlantic Records label debut, "Core," the STP breakthrough that yielded a trio of hits ("Sex Type Thing," "Creep" and "Plush").

Though never critical darlings, the band's grunge-friendly sound struck a chord with the tempo of the times. As a consequence, 1994's "Purple" went through the ceiling with a No. 1 debut, spinning off another trio of alt-rock anthems, "Vasoline," "Interstate Love Song" and "Big Empty," the latter receiving a big boost from its inclusion on the soundtrack of the box office hit, "The Crow."

Also rendering '94 the golden year for STP: a Best Hard Rock Performance Grammy Award for "Plush."

The first of a decade's worth of troubles began the following year when the flamboyant Weiland was arrested for heroin and cocaine possession, leading to the first STP breakup, albeit a very short-lived one.

During this period, Weiland and Kurt Cobain's widow Courtney Love shared living quarters, while Weiland made do with the first of his non-STP projects, Magnificent Bastards.

Within a year, the band regrouped and recorded "Tiny Music … Songs From the Vatican Gift Shop" (1996). But Weiland's drug woes continued after he was ordered into rehab for six months of around-the-clock medical supervision, completed it, then was back for another stay in '97.

Hiatus No. 2 for STP resulted in a Weiland solo album ("12 Bar Blues") and a spin-off band for the other STP members (Talk Show), followed by the inevitable reconciliation album, 1999's "No. 4," which put them back on the charts with a hit single, "Sour Girl."

The Weiland soap opera continued apace, however, climaxing with his February 1998 arrest for heroin possession in Manhattan, and another sentencing to rehab.

In early 1999, he was charged with parole violation in Los Angeles County and spent September 1999 through April 2000 behind bars.

Upon Weiland's release, STP went back into the recording studio and emerged with "Shangri-La Dee Da," released in 2001. The band's weakest-seller to date.

After an on-stage altercation between Weiland and Dean DeLeo during STP's 2002 fall tour, the band faced its Waterloo, and by 2003 was officially no more - though a greatest hits album, "Thank You," trailed the break-up.

More side projects ensued, with Weiland coming out on top, despite yet another arrest in October 2003, this one following a Hollywood traffic mishap, a DUI charge and another pass through rehab.

Despite all this, success returned to the embattled star, via the super-group Velvet Revolver, featuring Weiland and a trio of Guns N' Roses émigrés, Slash, Suff McKagan and Matt Sorum, not to mention Wasted Youth guitarist Dave Kushner.

The band's 2004 debut, "Contraband," was a hit, debuting at No. 1 and producing two No. 1 singles in "Slither" and "Fall to Pieces," with the former winning a Grammy Award for Best Hard Rock Performance. A sophomore release followed a year ago, "Libertad," which proved a commercial disappointment.

The pendulum then swung the other way again, with Weiland patching up differences with his old STP mates and announcing at a Velvet Revolver concert in March that he would be leaving the band.

As recently as April, Weiland was still in trouble with the law, being sentenced to 192 hours in county jail for a November 2007 DUI arrest, but later released and placed on four months' probation.

Even so, the reunion tour has been receiving rave reviews in its first two months.

Per a San Francisco Weekly account of the band's show two weekends ago at the Bay City's Greek Theater: "After a 45-minute sound check and a few degrees chillier, Stone Temple Pilots exploded onstage with psychedelic visuals engulfing the entire backdrop and lead singer Scott Weiland belting out bone-chilling notes.

"Weiland's sexy swagger and Iggy Pop-like dance moves unintentionally grabbed the crowd's attention and wouldn't let go. Despite the singer's various hiccups with the law and drugs, his performance is the epitome of rock and roll."

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BRMC roaring onto stage

By Dan Craft | dcraft@pantagraph.com

Opening for Stone Temple Pilots Wednesday night at the U.S. Cellular Coliseum are San Francisco-spawned alt-rockers Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, better known to their minions as BRMC.

The band's guitar-fueled sound is noted for its cross-cultural influences befitting a membership that began as two-parts American (co-founders Peter Hayes and Robert Levon Been) and one part Brit (drummer Nick Jago).

Been, son of The Call's Michael Been, and Hayes were high school cronies when they formed the band, with Been on bass and Hayes on guitar. Searching for a drummer, they crossed paths with Jago, who'd just moved to California from Devon, England.

Seeking to avoid any charges of nepotism, Been adopted the pseudonym Robert Turner for the first half of BRMC's history, reverting to his own name around four years ago.

Christened after the biker gang Marlon Brando led in his 1953 classic "The Wild One," the trio is revving up for its 10th anniversary this year - but not without some mechanical difficulty.

On the eve of the current tour with the famously trouble-prone STP, the band lost drummer Nick Jago, BRMC's version of STP's Scott Weiland.

It wasn't the first time, though.

The initial parting of ways with the drug-troubled percussionist was around three years ago, in 2005.

The build-up to the estrangement is said to have started two years earlier at the NME (New Musical Express) Awards ceremony during which BRMC's "Whatever Happened to My Rock 'n' Roll (Punk Song)" was up for a Best Music Video Award.

During the show, Jago had to be forcibly removed from the stage after a stretch of odd behavior, including standing still for nearly 10 minutes without saying a word.

Absent from BRMC for most of the recording of the band's third album, "Howl," he was back on board by 2007 for the band's most recent recording, "Baby 81," the group's highest-charting release to date, peaking at No. 46.

Two months ago, Jago was out again.

A MySpace bulletin he dispatched indicated a move to a solo career. His replacement is Leah Shapiro, of The Raveonettes.

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At a glance

What: Stone Temple Pilots with Black Rebel Motorcycle Club

When: 7:30 p.m. Wednesday

Where: U.S. Cellular Coliseum, 101 S. Madison St., Bloomington

Tickets: $35 to $65

Box office number: (866) 891-9992