chris cornell not daunted by return to solo career

toronto sun media, april 13 2007

screenshot from MuchMoreMusic, April 13 2007

On Friday the 13th, Chris Cornell says he's not feeling superstitious about the release of this, his 13th career album.

"I'm not superstitious but I'm somewhat pessimistic so I err on the side of caution," the singer admitted ahead of a performance at MuchMoreMusic.

"It did make me a little nervous talking about career album number 13. But anybody around long enough to have 13, is lucky, it's great."

Carry On represents another stage in the veteran musician's career. He fronted Soundgarden, one of the key bands to emerge from the 1990s Seattle scene, for years before trying his hand at a solo record, the well-received Euphoria Morning, in 1999.

From there he joined the band Audioslave, a musical amalgam of Cornell from Soundgarden and members of another popular rock band from the 1990s, Rage Against the Machine. But after a successful album that band's future was thrown into doubt when Rage members announced that the band was reuniting. Cornell subsequently departed Audioslave, citing "personal differences."

And his return to solo artist territory began in a noticeable way when he penned the theme song to the latest James Bond movie Casino Royale, titled "You Know My Name."

Cornell says he doesn't feel pressure to achieve the same kind of success he experienced with Soundgarden.

"I don't know that it matters. I think -- when I did my first solo record the last thing I was worried about was how it would sell. I had sold millions of records with Soundgarden," he said.

"I sort of look at it as simply being inspired by whatever it is that I do -- as long as I'm naturally inspired by it, then somebody else would be interested in it. And that's been true all the way up to now."

Reprinted without permission from Toronto's City News.

Chris Cornell Fan Page © Clare O'Brien 2007