Chris Cornell Discusses Covering Michael Jackson And Audioslave Split

by shehzaad jiwani, chartattack, may 2007

Chris Cornell has had a busy couple of years. He's managed to release an album every year since 2005 — Audioslave's Out Of Exile and Revelations, and his second solo effort, Carry On, which will be released on June 5.

"I always felt, even in the early Soundgarden days, that bands should be able to put out a record every year or year-and-a-half," Cornell declares. "It shouldn't be this three-year period between records where people put so much importance on a record so you don't feel you can screw around and experiment and go far outside your norm.

"When I was a child, bands would really go out on a limb for a record, and some people wouldn't like it, but so what? They're gonna put another record out in eight months, it wouldn't matter. You could have a career where you could really play around with your personality and who you were, like The Rolling Stones could do Satanic Majesties Request, then Emotional Rescue. All that had an effect."

The effect it had is clearly apparent on Carry On, which sees Cornell expanding far outside the hard rock niche he's existed and excelled in since the mid-'80s, and even experimenting outside the softer tones of his first solo effort, 1999's Euphoria Morning. The most obvious curveball is the inclusion of Michael Jackson's "Billie Jean."

"I had a discussion with [my wife] about the art of choosing a cover song," Cornell explains. "It started on numerous occasions with her hearing a song that she likes and saying, 'You should do that song.'

"Now you can't just do any old song. If Pearl Jam does a song by The Who, that makes perfect sense for the band to do that song. Soundgarden would do like a medley that included an Alice Cooper song, 'Working Man' by Rush, and it went into a Led Zeppelin song, but it all made perfect sense for Soundgarden to do.

"There's the opposite way, where you couldn't imagine the coupling of the band with the artist. Johnny Cash doing 'Rusty Cage' or 'Hurt,' that's the best example I could think of. It yielded something so unexpected, but it turned out really great. So then, as a challenge, she asked what I'd do. And off the top of my head, the least likely thing I could think of was Michael Jackson."

Cornell insists the album, along with Rage Against The Machine's subsequent reunion, had nothing to do with Audioslave's break-up.

"At the end of the last Audioslave tour, before we started making a third record, we started running into issues, some arguments about business things. We were able to set that aside and make another Audioslave record, which we were all ecstatic about. Once the record was done, we got into another list of issues that we were trying to sort out business-wise that we weren't seeing eye to eye on at all. I just said, 'OK, I'm gonna do this solo record. Maybe we need some time apart.'

"That's the key, I suppose. Time apart is going to yield one of two conclusions. The one it yielded for me was that I was having a great time making music on my own. That was the initial agreement in the first place when we started making music, that it was fun."

Though the break-up came out of left field for some fans, Cornell insists that it was a natural decision and that he's much happier where he is now.

"We said, 'As long as it's fun and not complicated and there's no drama, I'm into it.' Eventually, it became that. I'm very proud of the records we made. There was nothing we did that I'm not proud of. But I mean, if that does happen, and I've been in a band for 14, 15 years, I'm tired of that.

"I'm happy to go and have a solo career for the rest of my life. I'm just really happy to be on my own. I love the music I'm making now."

—Shehzaad Jiwani, ChartAttack

Chris Cornell Fan Page © Clare O'Brien 2007