after grunge, a plunge

teamed up with timbaland, cornell gets his smooth on

by lateef martin, montreal mirror , november 2008

Rock icon Chris Cornell helped forge grunge in the ’90s with Seattle’s Soundgarden. Five albums, a few Grammy nominations and a side project called Temple of the Dog later, Cornell went solo. He created a freer work, Euphoria Morning, an ode to friend and fellow singer/songwriter Jeff Buckley. During his three-album collaboration with the musicians of Rage Against the Machine, as Audioslave, Cornell also released Carry On, still in the vein of rock. Cornell’s forthcoming Scream, however, is produced by none other than Timbaland, who’s earned his stripes with Missy Elliott, Justin Timberlake and Björk. Slated for release in early 2009, it’s a mesh of rock and club beats—Cornell’s swagger and suave has the most diverse and funked-out park to play in to date.

Mirror: What possessed you to go with Timbaland on this one?

Chris Cornell: I dunno, the same kind of feeling I had when I made Euphoria Morning. I wanted to do something different. I wanted to work in a world that includes any type of instrumentation. That could be electronic, drum loops or rhythms or sounds, or whatever, and it turned out so much better than I thought. The whole album has non-stop music from beginning to end, where the songs are all connected by musical pieces that flow into the next song. It’s unlike anything I’ve done, so it was amazing to do this album.

M: I caught the first of the new Bond movies with a buddy a couple years back and we were both shocked to hear your voice. You’re the first male singer to sing a Bond theme. How did that happen?

CC: The composer and music supervisor wanted an unapologetically masculine person, to fit the character. They ran it by the producers and they contacted me. I was a little bit skeptical because the last Bond movie was the one where Madonna did the song. I didn’t like the movie or the song. But we got to see three-quarters of the movie in a rough edit and I loved it, so I was really excited to do the song.

M: What I liked about Soundgarden was the band’s looseness and the soulful side of your singing, especially when you were belting it out. On Scream, we finally get a chance to hear you go all-out.

CC: On some of these songs, like “Ground Zero,” I thought it was fantastic. It was a style I’ve been wanting to do for years, because I’ve had old-school R&B influences for as long as I could remember. A lot of my favourite singers come from that world, more so than rock. Definitely, Audioslave opened it up a little bit, but not to the degree this album allows. That’s part of the reason why I can connect these new songs to the older material so well. Suddenly, I realize those influences are already in there. It becomes really obvious.

Reprinted from The Montreal Mirror - originally available as an online feature here

Chris Cornell Fan Page © Clare O'Brien 2008