CORNELL HESITANT TO TAMPER WITH SOUNDGARDEN LEGACY

Chris Cornell is finally able to look back at his legacy with the band that put him on the map, Soundgarden. They were the first band from the Seattle grunge scene to sign to a major label, but they were one of the last to have commercial success. In 1994 Soundgarden’s album ‘Superunknown’ debuted at number one on the Billboard Rock charts and yielded the Grammy Award-winning singles “Black Hole Sun” and “Spoonman”. In 1997, Soundgarden broke up due to creative differences, presumably between Cornell and founding Soundgarden guitarist Kim Thayil.

We caught up with Chris Cornell recently to discuss his latest solo release, ‘Carry On’ and if he could look back on his legacy with Soundgarden.

“I think and this is now with some distance in listening to the records but on the outside looking in with all earnestness I think Soundgarden made the best records out of that scene. I think we were the most daring and experimental and genre pushing really and I’m really proud of it. And I guess that’s why I have trepidation about the idea of reforming. I don’t know what it would mean. I guess I just have this image of who we were and I had probably a lot of anxiety during the period of being Soundgarden, as we all did, that it was a responsibility and it was an important band of music and we didn’t want to mess it up and we managed to not, which I felt is a great achievement.”

So what are Cornell’s thoughts on a possible Soundgarden reunion in the future?

“I don’t think it’s something that will happen. It’s something that not one member of Soundgarden has ever brought up. I’ve never gotten a phone call from any of them with an interest in doing a show or anything. Everybody is busy doing what they are doing. I guess I don’t really see any reason for it. I think the only reason would be for the fans but I feel that’s a double edged sword in a way. We were able to have a career with Soundgarden and make records all the way up to the last one that I feel were totally vital and totally creative records and I think the last record was the best one and the band produced it. It was the most cohesive the band ever was on the last record. Then we just kind of put it away unscathed and untainted so I can’t image what would be a good enough reason to take that back out and start tampering with it now. It doesn’t really make sense to me.”

With 2007 forever being known as the Summer of reunions with bands like Rage Against the Machine, The Police and The Smashing Pumpkins reforming, has Cornell been approached about a Soundgarden reunion?

“This season of reunion tours the promoters, especially the people making money besides the bands, are going to start thinking every year ‘You know what we need this summer, we need a great new reunion. Last summer we had all those great reunions and we’re missing that this year. We got to start making some phone calls!’ And that’s when I’ll get the phone call where someone says ‘You guys should get back together. That’s probably why people wait until they are a lot older. That point they figure there’s enough distance that it doesn’t have anything to do with the band before. It usually ends up being money that motivates people in getting that kind of thing back together and hopefully we’ll never be in a position where that is something that becomes so important that we need to make a decision that we really didn’t want to make.”

Cornell’s U.S. Tour in support of ‘Carry On’ starts July 10th at the Warfield Theater in San Francisco and will extend until July 31st at The Beacon Theater in New York. Chris and his band are also set to participate in Live Earth on July 7th along with The Police, Dave Matthews Band, Foo Fighters, Smashing Pumpkins, Roger Waters, Bon Jovi, Alicia Keys, The Red Hot Chili Peppers, Genesis, Madonna and Linkin Park. Cornell will be performing at the show in Germany along with Snoop Dogg and many others.