The new, and final, Soundgarden album is almost complete, according to the band themselves.

The three surviving members – and originally bassist Hiro Yamamoto - gave an interview to Allison Hagendorf’s podcast at the Rock N’ Roll Hall Of Fame before their recent induction. They reflected on the band’s early days, the group’s legacy and the final album, which they had been working on in the run up to Chris Cornell’s suicide in 2017. That record was the source of a long legal dispute between Cornell’s widow, Vicky and the group. But since that was resolved in 2023, they have recommenced work on it.

“There’s very familiar elements in some of this new music,” said drummer Matt Cameron. “There were a couple songs that felt like it was kind-of a new chapter, or it could have been a new chapter. So it’s really exciting to hear that. It’s bittersweet, of course.”

“I’m really excited for people to hear it, have our fans hear it. It’s fun for us to be working on it. And sometimes listening to it, it’s overpowering. But, yeah, I’m super proud of the music that we did put together. And we’re pretty close (to finishing it). And, yeah, it is nice having Terry on board with us, for sure.” (Terry being Terry Date who produced their breakthrough album Superunknown)

Meanwhile in other Cornell-related news, his Audioslave bandmate Tom Morello has given an update on the unreleased material that band accumulated over the course of their three studio albums.

Back in 2019, the guitarist had said that there was “a record’s worth” of material in the Audioslave archives. However, in a new interview SNSMix, Morello didn’t sound in any hurry to get it released. “It’s not for lack of anything other than that just we don’t have it together,” he said. “There’s no plan to not put it out. I would love for it to get in the world and hopefully it will one day.”

“It’s not like here’s the 10 best jams,” he added. “Sometimes it’s like, someone likes this one, someone’s not feeling that one. So, we had from each of the three Audioslave records, we had songs left over, some of which are really great.”

Speaking to USA Today in 2020, Vicky Cornell stated that all her late husband’s material would “see light of day” eventually, so presumably she has no moral objections to such a project. But it clearly doesn’t sound like a priority for Morello at the moment.

The seventh and final Soundgarden album is coming. But it looks unlikely that you’ll hear it this year, and certainly not before the band’s induction into the Rock N’ Roll Hall Of Fame in November.

That’s according to Matt Cameron, anyway. In an interview with Billboard the drummer gave an update on the record fans have been waiting on for over a decade. “There’s not a set release date or anything as of yet. There were a couple schools of thought, like, ‘Hey, let’s put out a single.’ I think eventually we decided we want to make sure the whole thing is completed before we start releasing singles. I’m excited for people to hear it.”

The delays are believed to be largely as a result of the legal wrangling that took place between the three surviving members of the band – Cameron, guitarist Kim Thayil and bassist Ben Shepherd - and Chris Cornell’s widow, Vicky Cornell. The band had been working on new material – seven new tracks, reputedly - prior to Cornell’s suicide in 2017, but were only able to return to the tapes once the legal issues were resolved in 2023.

The drummer said that recording the album had been emotionally draining for the remaining trio. “It’s been extreme highs and extreme lows,” he summarised. “Hearing [Cornell’s] voice on these powerful hard rock songs is the most empowering thing in the world for me. Then I listen to his voice solo-ed up when I’m working on stuff, or if Kim or Ben is working on something, and it all comes back to the fact that he’s not with us and he left us in a way that has so many questions. It’s been gut-wrenching but at the same time very empowering.”

Cameron quit his other band, fellow grunge legends Pearl Jam, in July, and told Billboard that it was an amicable parting of the ways. “I definitely gave them a lot of notice,” he said. “I’ve spoken with Jeff [Ament] and Stone [Gossard] a little bit… It’s been fine. Hopefully we’ll get back together at some point and have a beer or something.”

“I’m at a point in my life where I want to redirect my time and energy in a way that is a little bit based on what I want to pursue as an artist at this point,” he said. That, in the short term, includes a new band, Is This Real?, in which he’s stepped forward from behind the kit to provide vocals and guitar.

“I was having some issues with [Pearl Jam’s] three-hour shows and constant touring and stuff,” Cameron added. “That’s definitely an art form unto itself, to be able to do those types of shows… I’m at a point now where I want to do a face-melting 70-minute set, and that’s kind of what I’m focusing on right now.”

Pearl Jam drummer Matt Cameron has, out of the blue, announced his decision to leave the grunge veterans 'after 27 fantastic years'.

Cameron is a godfather of grunge drumming, having joined Pearl Jam in 1998, and also done percussive honours for fellow Seattle superstars Soundgarden in two stints, once from 1986 to 1997 when they initially split, and then from 2010 when the band reformed until 2017, when Chris Cornell died.

In a statement on socials he wrote, "After 27 fantastic years, I have taken my final steps down the drum riser for the mighty Pearl Jam. Much love and respect to Ed, Mike and Stone for inviting me into the band in 1998 and for giving me the opportunity of a lifetime, one filled with friendships, artistry, challenges and laughter.

"I am forever grateful to the crew, staff and fans the world over,” Cameron's statement continues. “It’s been an incredible journey. More to follow. Thank you all from the bottom of my heart.”

In contrast to other recent drummer breakups, featuring combustible Who stalwart Zak Starkey and previously unflappable, Taylor Hawkins-replacing Foo Fighter Josh Freese, the split seems entirely amicable.

In response to Cameron's announcement, Pearl Jam issued a glowing tribute which reads, "From being one of our first musical heroes in the bands Skinyard and the mighty Soundgarden, to playing on our first demos in 1990, Matt Cameron has been a singular and true powerhouse of a musician and drummer.

"He has propelled the last 27 years of Pearl Jam live shows and studio recordings. It was a deeply important chapter for our group and we wish him well always. He will be deeply missed and is forever our friend in art and music.

"We love you Matt."

The surviving members of Soundgarden have reunited for a charity gig to raise funds for the Seattle Children’s Hospital.

The gig happened on Saturday and the group - guitarist Kim Thayil, bassist Ben Shepherd and drummer Matt Cameron – performing under the name Nudedragons, the anagramatic alias they have used previously.

They played at the Sandbox venue for the annual SmooCH fundraiser for the hospital. Also on the bill were ex-Guns N’ Roses bassist Duff McKagan, Dinosaur Jr man Lou Barlow and his Sebadoh project and Built To Spill frontman Doug Martsch

Seattle-based vocalist Shaina Shepherd stepped into the shoes of late frontman Chris Cornell who died by suicide in 2017. The band played a short six-song set that included favourites such as Hunted Down, Outshined, Flower and Beyond the Wheel. McKagan then took over the mic for Kickstand and a set-closing cover of MC5’s Kick Out the Jams. Here’s a clip:

The event aims “to celebrate and support the extraordinary work that Seattle Children’s Hospital does for all children, regardless of means or circumstances. Children’s Hospital is an extremely important community asset that provides incredible care and hope for all kids.”

Saturday’s event is not the first time the remaining members of the band have reunited since Cornell’s death. They played together in 2019 at a tribute concert to Cornell in Inglewood, California and again the following year at another tribute event to Alice In Chains.

In April 2023 it was revealed that the long standing and very unpleasant legal dispute between the band and Cornell’s widow, Vicky, had finally been ended by an out-of-court settlement. This meant that the seven unreleased songs Cornell recorded with the band before he died in 2017 could finally see the light of day. But more than eighteen months on there’s still no word on when these final recordings by the band will be released.

There is no better way to remember a talent who has passed than through celebrating their work. On what would have been Chris Cornell's 60th birthday we have an embarrassment of musical riches to reflect on, but it's clear that some of his most fascinating songwriting and playing took place outside of his album discography with Soundgarden, Audioslave and solo career.  

"Some of my favorite Chris songs are B-sides," Cornell's Soundgarden bandmate and drummer Matt Cameron reflected to Spin back in 2021. “She Likes Surprises, She’s a Politician, Cold Bitch. Some of his best songs are B-sides and those are amazing songs. Fresh Deadly Roses is another incredible B-side that never made the cut. Those are good problems to have. If you have too many good songs, I guess you’re going to have to throw a couple to the B-side pile."

So let's dig through the legacy of Chris Cornell's career and remember one of the greats. 

Sunshower

Cornell's passing gave some of his most beautiful songs a while new poignancy, and to begin with, Sunshower sounds like the almost hopeful, wistful sister to his earlier composition Season's dark resignation. The phrasing reflects a Seattle musician who was just at home in the classic songbooks of Paul McCartney and Cat Stevens as he was punk rock.

Sunflower was included on the soundtrack to the 1998 film Great Expectations and marked the beginning of the fascinating collaboration between Cornell, Alain Johannes and his late wife Natasha Shneider of the band Eleven. It would go on to yield the songwriter's first post-Soundgarden album Euphoria Mourning (originally released as Euphoria Morning in 1999). 

The experience of making music together was hugely positive for the trio, yet Sunshower and the album that followed are marked by Cornell's relatably melancholic lyricism that continues to be a source of attraction for many listeners. "If you’re writing about a subject that’s depressing or melancholy, ultimately it’s going to speak to someone who is in that environment who feels lonely, and they rise up because of it," he reflected to Alternative Press after the release of Euphoria Mourning. "I would always sit in my bedroom and listen to music by myself. That was my favorite thing to do. I would often listen to really dark music, and if I was in a very dark period of my life, it made me feel happy." 

While Cornell is credited as guitarist on Sunshower, the multi-talented Johannes and Schenider play flamenco guitar and bass respectively. It doesn't just showcase their chemistry but also a reminder of Cornell's inventive approach as a guitarist. The outro here deserves a special mention;  perfectly pitched between adding majestic light shadowed in sadness, it feels like Cornell is still pulling on our heartstrings. 

Cold Bitch 

Alongside fellow non-studio album Soundgarden song Birth Ritual and Ultramega OK's Beyond The Wheel, Badmotorfinger outtake Cold Bitch demonstrates just how high a register of Cornell's voice could reach. But all three also prove a reminder of just how originally off-kilter Soundgarden's take on metallic heaviness could be. 

Like the excellent Blind Dogs (more on that later), there's also a lesser-known recording of Cold Bitch to be found amongst Soundgarden's Badmotorfinger outtakes that I've included above from the 30th anniversary reissue of the album – Cornell 's voice hits harder on this and there are some trippier musical sections to give it more form. 

A co-write between the singer, Kim Thayil and Matt Cameron (but credited to Cornell by Cameron), the slow grind of Thayil's huge slab of a riff underpins Cornell's haunting paean to an icy muse like Sabbath diving further down the spiral. On their blackest days, Soundgarden were easily the heaviest of the Seattle giants. 

"For some reason, Kim and Chris didn’t want Cold Bitch," bassist Ben Shepherd recalled to Spin for its 30th anniversary piece on Badmotorfinger. "But when we tracked that, man. That was a fucking heavy day. We were there at Bear Creek [Studios], me, Kim, Chris. I don’t think Matt had gotten there yet. The power went out as the cellos were playing. A lightning strike hit the lawn outside and put the power out as they were tracking. It was so fucking heavy. It was like, “That is the mojo song of the whole record, man.” That would’ve… I think that would’ve catapulted that record to another level immediately."

Cameron echoed his love for the song, though its writer Cornell didn't seem to share it. "Cold Bitch is one of my favorite Soundgarden songs of all time. I was just crushed that it didn’t make the cut. It was Chris’s call. I remember we were at a Denny’s and when we were mixing the album in Tarzana or something. We were like, “Okay, what’s our sequence for the album?” We all figured out a sequence, and then Chris vetoed Cold Bitch. He wrote the song, so he had veto power on that one. I was just like, 'Aw'. He said it didn’t groove. I’m just like, that’s the grooviest! It’s a weird groove, super weird. He didn’t like the vocals…He just didn’t hear it. To this day, I’m just like, 'Ugh, that should’ve made the cut.' 

Seasons

Cornell's contribution to the soundtrack to Cameron Crowe's film Singles – that he also cameoed in alongside members of Pearl Jam and Alice In Chains – this might just be his greatest-ever solo song.

It came during a period when the songwriter was coming into his own creatively, both inside of Soundgarden and beyond. 

"One thing I really noticed with Chris, in particular, is, when he and Andy were living together at Chris’s house on Capitol Hill, he was recording a lot on his four-track cassette recorder," remembered Crowe to Spin. "He wasn’t recording just hard rock Soundgarden-type songs, he was really trying to stretch out as a songwriter."

There had already been abundant evidence of this with the Temple Of The Dog project, but Crowe noted Cornell was exploring acoustic-based writing, and out of this furtive period came the Poncier demo.

Its genesis seems so fantastical it could only come from a remarkable songwriter hitting his stride. Named after Matt Damon's hapless musician character Cliff Poncier in Singles (a part Cornell was originally earmarked for), the musician wrote an EP for Poncier's fictional solo debut, but with real songs that included at least two future classics.

Alongside Seasons there's future Soundgarden classic Spoonman, Flutter Girl (that would be reworked for Epuphoria Mourning),  b-side Nowhere But You (that would find a home as a b-side) and Missing – a proper obscure gem Temple Of The Dog performed on their reunion tour in 2016.

"I couldn’t believe how fully realised it was, and how different it was," marvelled Cameron. "How elegant. I loved all the songs, but Seasons, stood out from the first listen with that Zeppelin, open-tuning vibe. It was like, holy crap! It was the best thing I’d heard in a really long time." 

"It was a facet of Chris that I wanted to use; this rich vein of Chris’s solo impulses," added Cameron. "Stuff that’s not particularly Soundgarden, but very personal and him. It quickly went from mind-blown, to how can we make this part of the sound of the movie?"

Seasons would also be included in a very different film; 2013 Superman blockbuster Man Of Steel, but it still resonates far beyond the silver screen.  

We Got The Whip 

There are still outtakes from Audioslave's time together yet to surface, according to Tom Morello, but away from their three albums there's treasures waiting to be heard. The funky Give is well worth a listen but Cochise b-side We Got The Whip proves an interesting exception to the idea that Cornell wouldn't carry on the politically-fired lyrics of Rage Against The Machine when he teamed up with 3/4 of that band in 2001. 

The riff is undeniably Morello, typical of the purple patch he was in for Audioslave's prolific start when they wrote 16 songs together in three weeks. Lyrically We Got The Whip is quite different from some of the more personal subject matter on Audioslave's debut but its politicism is still fairly open-ended and it suggests the idea of a country's dominance on the world stage through superior firepower: 'We got the better bomb'.

Is Cornell referring to the US? He never said but he would become much more openly vitriolic when scathingly calling out his government's response to Hurricane Katrina on Wide Awake from Audioslave's third and final album Revelations. 

Wrong Side 

Cornell's final solo album Higher Truth in 2015 showed he was still exploring new ways to express his craft. This outtake from the main album is a case in point; a tragic Western theme and narrative more at home in the world of country gets a Cornellian treatment with a Morricone-esque guitar break.

Wrong Side's feel recalls the album's Through The Window where Cornell sounds both familiarly intimate but with a new cinematic scope under the production ear of Brendan O'Brien. It was the sound of an artist becoming classic in the next stage of a career with still so much to offer. And learn.

“Whether it's something like Going To California or a Nick Drake song – I worked back and learned a bunch of Nick Drake songs," Cornell told MusicRadar of his guitar prep for Higher Truth. "I went back and learned some Beatles songs where there are different ways that Paul McCartney or John Lennon would pick through songs, and just got into a bunch of different approaches to it, so that I had more bullets in the gun when I sat down with an acoustic guitar and tried to write a song." 

“I ended up going way past what I needed to, to get what I wanted done," added Cornell. "But it was good, because it's a big leap forward in terms of understanding the instrument," he added. "My approach to guitar has always been, 'I don't want to know anything; I don't want to learn anything from anybody else. I just want to make it sound in ways that I think are cool, and if I do that, then there's always gonna be some degree of personal stamp on whatever that song is.' I had to reach out a little more into the history of songwriting and guitar players and actually learn some stuff!”

Kristi

Soundgarden's 1996 opus Down On The Upside was not a short album, but its b-sides and outtakes Bleed Together, Kristi and Karaoke could have easily have made the cut on quality. While Bleed Together is the upbeat punk rock Cornell could confidently turn his writing hand to, and Karaoke is oddly catchy, Kristi nods back to the band's early days in all the best ways.

Kristi grinds doomily and stutters in an odd-metered way that's unmistakably Soundgarden and extremely difficult to imitate. It finally saw the light on rarities and b-sides collection Echoes Of Miles in 2014, and fans could enjoy Matt Cameron's vicious snare (it was one of the drummer's favourites from the band) and Cornell's Superuknown-esque croon and bite in full glory.

The band actually played it once back in the day too – at the 1995 Reading Festival. It sounded spectacular then too with Cornell demonstrating his often underappreciated skill for playing in odd time signatures while singing. 

Kyle Petty, Son Of Richard and Blind Dogs 

How good were Soundgarden's outtakes? For the final pick I was torn between Storm, Fresh Deadly Roses and… just listen to them all! But I'm honing on the live versions of Kyle Petty, Son Of Richard and Blind Dogs Soundgarden performed on Pearl Jam's Self Pollution Radio broadcast in 1995 because they capture one of the great rock bands at a special time. And Cornell sounds positively haunting on the latter song. 

Kyle, Son Of Petty is a b-side (named after the former US stock car driver) from the Superunknown era featuring the band digging into 7/8 and 5/4. Soundgarden had never performed it live before this session and didn't again until after their reunion at a 2015 show in Sydney, Australia. It sounded great there too. 

Blind Dogs is a fascinating song – a Cornell/Thayil co-write digging into the psychedelic slow build side of the band with the vocalist's low register giving way to a high crescendo. 

Surprisingly, it was the first song the band chose to play together after their reunion was announced in 2010.

The studio version was originally included on the soundtrack to the 1995 Leonardo DiCaprio film The Basketball Diaries. But the longer outtake version above, included on the Badmotorfinger anniversary reissue tops it.  

The live 1995 Face Pollution performance has an undeniable intensity of its own. It's an intimate seat in the room with a band and vocalist we'll never hear the likes of again.  

NAMM 2024: It is a widely held belief among many guitar players that the Guild Polara – most famously played by the great Kim Thayil of Soundgarden fame – is one of the most underrated electric guitars of all time, a cult classic that is just waiting for its breakout moment. 

But maybe today its time has come, with Guild refreshing the model with eight new models options, including a new Vintage White version of Thayil’s signature guitar, and a “blacked out” Night Edition, with this stripped-down single-pickup version of the classic double-cut wearing an über-noir Tungsten finish that is certainly more contemporary metal than we’d rightfully expect from the brand.

Guild is offering these new-look Polaras across three different series, with the Deluxe models resplendent in classic Cherry Red and Vintage Sunburst finishes, a classy muted Canyon Dusk metallic model rounding out the trio. These are the more upscale models in this 2024 release, and feature bound rosewood fingerboards, and pearloid block fingerboard inlays where the entry-level models have dots.

The Polara Deluxe has a tune-o-matic bridge and compensated stopbar tailpiece. They look they part and yet none will break the bank. Guild has listed the Polara Deluxe for a very approachable $699 street, while the Night and Standard edition models are priced $549.

The new Standard Polara (well, it’s not officially called the Standard; Guild calls it “base level”) is offered in Blue Steel, Phantom Green, and Voltage Yellow, which Guild describes is ‘80s-esque but on our screen looks more taxi cab yellow.

These guitars are all mahogany and have a 24.75” scale length, as per the classic recipe. The have a vintage soft U profile necks, a 12.5” fingerboard radius, and are equipped with Guild HB-2 humbuckers.

The Deluxes have the dual volume, dual tone control setup. The Standard models have volume and tone, and more scaled down hardware, where we have the tune-o-matic bridge but no tailpiece; it’s a string-through-body job.

All of these look very cool but the belle of the ball has to the new Kim Thayil signature model. It seems astonishing now to think of how long it took to get him a signature Guild. After all, he had only been playing them for 45 years. But whenever Guild had planned to release one the company changed ownership and the project was put on the backburner.

In September 2023, it finally happened, with Guild releasing two Kim Thayil signature Polaras. One was masterbuilt Guild USA Artist Edition S-100 Polara, which had body of old-growth Honduran Mahogany and pickups hand-wound by Jason Lollar, and was finished in White.

Thayil also had a more affordable Newark St Collection signature model, too, finished in black with gold hardware. Like the new Vintage White model, this retails at $899 and is a lot of guitar for the money. 

Signature details include the King Animal truss rod cover and Badmotorfinger control plate on the back of the guitar, and you have the HB-1 humbuckers as standard. For more details, see Guild Guitars.

Guild has unveiled a signature guitar collaboration with Kim Thayil, offering two takes on his go-to S-100 Polara – one super high-end, the other more affordable, both super cool and instantly recognisable as a Thayil’s guitar.

It is not as though Thayil has been the only player to play the S-100 Polara but by some distance he is the most famous. Both quite brilliant, perennially underrated, Thayil and the Polara were made for each other.

The Polara is the quintessential Thayil guitar. If there is a whiff of the Gibson SG about it, then it is to the SG what Soundgarden were to metal in that you can recognise the influence, and yet the angles were all different. They are operating on a different plane. There is an asymmetry to the Polara design; the same could be said of Soundgarden.

When Thayil chose the Polara, there was a degree of fiscal prudence involved in the decision. But speaking to Total Guitar in 2021, he said the mahogany-bodied double-cut was fundamental to finding his sound. 

“The S-100 is the guitar I bought when I was 18, and ultimately was the one I could afford to buy,” said Thayil. “It only cost me $250, which was way less than a Les Paul or Strat. I think friends would have directed me to those other guitars, but this one looked good – it was black – and it was in good condition with great action. When I picked it up, I found that it was easy to play and had a fast neck. By learning on that guitar, my style developed. It was how it made me play and what it allowed me to do.” 

Thayil would play around with the strings below the bridge, and find weird sounds from the microphonic quality of the original's pickups.

After over 45 years with the Polara, Thayil finally has his name on the instrument. The timing could scarcely have been better. It was Thayil’s birthday yesterday, and it is surely no coincidence that Guild announced that it had something special incoming for the Soundgarden guitarist and legend of the so-called Seattle Sound. That said, these signature models had been in the works for some time. 

Speaking to MusicRadar in 2019, Thayil revealed there had been three different attempts to make a signature Polara. The big stumbling block? Guild kept on being sold to different companies. 

“I was on the cover of Guitar Player with an S-100 in the early-’90s, and Guild said they got more letters and phone calls about that guitar in that picture than they’d ever received before,” said Thayil. “They decided, ‘Let’s talk to Kim and find out what he likes about these guitars.’ And they started the production line again; they made four or five for me, and they started producing them. Guild sold to Fender, and this was in the early ’90s.

“Then, in 2010, the band gets back together and Fender sends some reps up, and they want to start a Guild line again, and design a Kim Thayil model. I do the signature and everything, I approve the specs, and they take all the measurements. And then, in 2011 or 12, Fender sells the Guild line. So, yes, there were three different attempts to make a signature model Guild S-100, thwarted by the fact that the company would keep getting sold.”

Thayil did say there were further talks. People were excited about the prospect of a signature model before it petered out. Finally, it's here, and Jonathan Thomas, president of Guild, sounds delighted to have got it over the line.

“We’ve been talking about doing this together for many years and are excited to finally bring these guitars to life,” said Thomas. “It’s hard to look at a Polara and not think of Kim, his influence in music, and long connection to his Guilds.”

The question as to which of these Kim Thayil S-100 Polaras to go for is no doubt determined by the price. The USA Artist Edition S-100 Polara Kim Thayil is master-built in California and has a $6,999 street price. The other comes in at a reasonable $899, in line with its siblings in Guild’s superlative Newart St Collection.

Let’s window shop with the USA model first. Limited to 30 instruments worldwide, it has a neck and body carved from old-growth Honduran mahogany. The over-sized headstock speaks to Guild’s design sensibility in the ‘70s – when everyone seemed to be making headstocks bigger – and the slim neck checks out with Thayil’s formative experiences with the instrument.

Features include a pair of custom-wound Guild USA HB-1 humbuckers, for which Guild had pickup guru Jason Lollar wind by hand. A phase switch allows you to access some off-road tones. There is also a reproduction Guild/Mueller-style bridge and compensated stop-bar tailpiece, gold hardware, an Indian rosewood fingerboard with MOP block inlays, and Grover Rotomatics. 

Signature touches can be found on the King Animal truss rod cover and a back-cover that has a Badmotorfinger design and Kim Thayil’s actual signature on it. He has also signed the COA, and it comes in custom guitar case. The whole thing is finished off in white and a lick of gloss nitro. Very nice. But it will cost you.

At $899 street, the Newark St Kim Thayil S-100 is way more accessible but still retains that vintage high-end look, and a lot of the spec. It, too, has the large headstock, with Chesterfield inlay. 

There are a pair of vintage-correct Alnico II HB-1 Humbuckers, and the all-important phase switch for adventures in the Seattle Sound. The King Animal and Badmotorfinger signature details are here too – though not signed. The body and set-neck are mahogany.

The rosewood fingerboard is bound and inlaid with pearloid blocks. There’s a multi-ply pickguard, a tune-o-matic bridge and compensated stop-bar tailpiece. And it is black, as per Thayil’s original S-100. 

Both Kim Thayil S-100 Polara models are available now. See Guild for more details.

There can now be no doubt that in the roll call of rock, Chris Cornell’s legacy will stand proudly alongside the all-time great vocalists. But his incredibly emotive range that could reach from soul to metal is only part of what made him one of the key artists of a generation.

Even next to Nirvana, Pearl Jam, Alice In Chains, Screaming Trees, Melvins and Mudhoney in the fascinating hotbed of alternative rock talent that emerged from the Pacific North West of the US in the early '90s, Soundgarden covered the widest musical breadth. In many ways they are the only band to ever successfully bridge the sonic worlds between The Beatles’ fierce and relentless creativity with Black Sabbath’s bluesy weight.

It yielded a deep, engaging diversity in their sound that was epitomised by their masterwork, 1994’s sprawlingly ambitious Superunknown - the album that would host Cornell’s universally-acclaimed masterpiece, Black Hole Sun.  

Cornell’s talent travelled further: with and without a guitar in his hands on stage, in bands Temple Of The Dog and Audioslave as well as an acclaimed solo career that would take him to acoustic troubadour territory, running parallel to his welcome reunion with Soundgarden in the last years of his life. When this writer spoke to Cornell in 2013 he spoke as a re-energised guitarist.

“I guess it’s a post-Audioslave thing when I picked up the guitar up again and I did a couple of solo albums,” he explained.

“Then Soundgarden reformed and in the middle of that I started doing acoustic tours. And that was a huge thing for me - a different animal. You have to play correctly when you’re doing a two-and-a-half-hour acoustic show because everyone can hear everything. 

"Granted, I have a lot of songs and a huge catalogue and history to draw from, and I don’t have to go out there and play everything perfectly, but it’s still a sort of naked experience.  

And I grew a lot from that because I played so many shows that way and just figuring out how to relax and play something in that environment when everything is so completely clear. I don’t have any other instruments backing me up and I had to accompany myself only. I’d never done that before.”

Burden in my hand 

For those who had been introduced to Cornell in his role as Audioslave’s frontman in the first five years of this century, his role in Soundgarden was a very different animal. And even for the singer, returning with new album King Animal in his old band after a few years touring their back catalogue, it presented challenges to him.

“There was some of the complexity of the new Soundgarden album… having to play and sing on it,” he reflected. “[Playing acoustic shows] definitely helped me with the sudoku of guitar playing, I think. It’s helped me to increase my capacity to understand it because I don’t think I’m a natural guitar player.”

That might sound like modesty - and Thayil had noted to us that the singer was a “tighter, improved” player on his return to Soundgarden - but it was a telling admission. Cornell approached the instrument from a different direction to his peers and it became a huge part of Soundgarden’s unique chemistry.

He actually began as the band’s singing drummer when bassist Hiro Yamamoto and guitarist Kim Thayil founded the fledgling Soundgarden with him in 1984. Cornell would switch to mic duties on stage only for a few years before Soundgarden’s developing compositions demanded a second guitar live. Cornell’s drumming roots are something that Kim Thayil believes informed his guitar style.  

“Because he was our drummer initially he always had a great sense of timing,” he told this writer in 2013. “He plays from his elbow - some lead guitarists play with their wrists and bass players might play with their shoulders.”

Thayil’s early encouragement of Cornell’s creative ambitions around the time of Soundgarden’s 1988 full-length debut Ultramega OK proved vital in the band’s rapid progression from punk rock to a much broader palette.

“I was a novice at that time, really,” Cornell told MusicRadar just a couple of months before his death. “I didn’t start playing guitar in earnest until then, and it was really to contribute songs or ideas to Soundgarden. Unlike a lot of bands, I didn’t get any resistance; I got a lot of encouragement.

“I’d come into the room and start playing the part, and if Kim liked it, for example – and he’s the guitar player so he would be the first one to be pissed off that someone else is pushing in on his territory – he would really respond positively to it and it would become a song. So, that was sort of the beginning of me becoming a guitar player on that album.”

Rhythm king 

Soundgarden were not your typical American rock 4/4 cruisers when it came to their rhythms.

There was a fearlessness from the beginning, and it drove later songs like Rusty Cage, Fell On Black Days and King Animal’s By Crooked Steps in ways that would rattle most singing guitarists. Not so with Cornell, who worked hard to deliver their odd metered grooves on stage.  

“The vocal melody is still in 4/4 while the guitars are in 5… something!” he told this writer of the latter song [it’s actually 5/4].

“It’s something Soundgarden does uniquely well," he continued. "We’ve had hit singles in 6/4 where nobody ever really noticed that. Or with odd time signature and rhythmic changes sometimes, particularly for a song that’s played on the radio. [By Crooked Steps] is like that - particularly the way the vocals sing over the guitar rhythms. It sounds almost like a straight rock song but there’s something askew.

“It’s not obvious when you’re sitting there thinking about it. It just happens. That was the first song we worked on where I felt that we were taking what it is that we do to a new level. And at the same time it’s definitely the most challenging one to sing and play. To just sing it would be easy but the singing and playing part – it’s a new beast. But I’ve run into that before – Rusty Cage was a very difficult song at first.”

Alternate rock 

All four songwriting members of Soundgarden - completed by drummer Matt Cameron and Hiro Yamamoto’s eventual replacement, Ben Shepherd - were as creative with their use of tunings, too. It helped Soundgarden sound other-worldy at times, and somewhere to the left-field of everyone else, even in the Seattle scene.

By the Superunknown tour in 1994, the band's guitar racks were brimming with instruments out of necessity, and it seemed tunings drove their songwriting in much the same way as U2’s Edge uses effects. But Cornell revealed that the truth wasn’t so calculated; more often a case of being in the right place, with the right guitar.  

“It’s a little bit more about proximity to the tuning as opposed to picking up a guitar, putting it into a weird tuning and then trying to create something out of it,” he explained to us.

“There’s some reason to be holding a guitar in that tuning and you’re noodling around and something cool comes out of it. For example, for Been Away Too Long, I had an old Gretsch hollowbody that was hanging on the wall in my hallway that was in that tuning [E E B B B B] and I just took it off the wall one day and I strummed it. I didn’t know what tuning it was in but I just strummed that basic riff out of the blue.

“A couple of days later, that riff was going through my head so I figured, ‘Okay, I’ll make a song out of it.’ It just happened that was the tuning the guitar was in, and that’s similar to a lot of songs I’ve written in weird tunings.

“I’ll be working on one song… like that tuning from Been Away Too Long that’s made up of Es and Bs. That was originally introduced to me by Ben [Shepherd, bass] on a song he wrote called Somewhere that was on [1992’s] Badmotorfinger. 

"Sitting around practising that and holding a guitar in that tuning I came up with other ideas. My Wave is in that tuning and that came from a riff that I played in a rehearsal when we were practising Somewhere - it became that song.”

Searching for truth

Cornell’s solo acoustic tours would develop another side to his playing. Outside of Soundgarden, acoustics had always played a part in his work - from his leadership of Temple Of The Dog with Cameron and most of Pearl Jam, to 1992’s Singles soundtrack with the solo song Seasons, Audioslave’s countrified I Am The Highway and the unusual progressions found in 1999 solo debut Euphoria Morning.

His last solo album during his life, 2015’s Higher Truth, had been directly informed not just by his solo Songbook shows, but by a conscious shift in how he allowed his influences to manifest in his guitar playing. 

My approach to guitar has always been, ‘I don’t want to know anything,’” he told Total Guitar in 2015. “ I just want to make it sound in ways that I think are cool. If I do that then there’s always gonna be some degree of personal stamp on whatever that song is. I had to reach out a little more into the history of songwriting and guitar players and actually learn some stuff!”

These touchstones would include Led Zeppelin and late folk artist Nick Drake, who can be heard in the strong pronounced fingerstyle of standout songs Through The Window and Dead Wishes. The latter found Cornell tuning to “work out the notes I wanted to hear”, leading him to the unusual E A E E B E: “It’s one of those mystical, almost British folk tunings; that sort of pastoral, nuns and fairies, misty mountain feeling.  

“There are some pretty subtle tuning changes that create these very specific open auras musically,” he added of his attraction to Drake’s playing.

“It’s difficult to write in those without sounding like that sprightly, sparkly pastoral Nick Drake thing. But it does help create new ideas in a sense when you’re sitting there.”

A different world 

Higher Truth was another illustration of the breadth Cornell could cover with his voice and guitar - and he was still on a conscious journey in this regard.

“I wrote songs with lots of chords that are not necessarily easy even for me to play,” he reflected on his past work.

“I write songs, sometimes, with real challenging vocal parts to sing. But I wanted to make sure that there are some songs in there [on Higher Truth] that somebody could learn and post themselves on YouTube singing, and it’s easy. It’s just something that you can learn after a couple of listens - maybe you don’t even have to know what key I’m playing it in.”

All of this made his loss to the music world still harder to bear. A new Soundgarden album would have been the next destination on his musical journey, though we may still yet hear what that would have sounded like if the remaining Soundgarden members can finish work on several demos. 

Despite an enviable catalogue behind him and the respect of his own heroes Page and Sabbath, in the last years of his life Chris Cornell was still questioning, learning and developing as a player and writer.

Whether stripped down alone with a D-28 or building layers of squalling feedback with his Seattle bandmates, one overriding vision was always there for him.

“No matter what I’m writing, I’m writing a soundtrack to a somewhat imaginary world,” he told us. “I have to get lost in what that imaginary world is, and then start listening and work out, ‘What am I hearing in here?’”

It’s a sound we will continue to miss. 

Even singular elements of Jason Everman's story are remarkable; he was a member of both Nirvana and Soundgarden as a guitarist and bassist, respectively. He even funded the recording of Nirvana's debut album, Bleach. Then he went on to become a decorated US Army Ranger and Green Beret. No wonder Joe Rogan wanted him as a guest on his podcast.

"With Nirvana, I guess initially when I came onboard Kurt wanted a second guitar player for the live show basically – have a heavier sound live and take some of the responsibility off him so he could concentrate on vocals and that kind of thing," remembered Everman of his time in the band and why it didn't work out in the longer term. "Initially I thought I was going to be able to contribute to the band creatively and then it got to the point when I realised that wasn't going to happen. And the same thing happened with Chad [Channing] the drummer, I think.

"Everyone in the band, including myself, were poor communicators – a lot of passive aggression," Everman added. "We were kids."

The musician was only 20 at this time and become increasingly dissatisfied with the situation in the band. "On the rare times where we actually rehearsed as a band, which was not a lot, Kurt kind of half-heartedly [asked], 'Who has ideas?' and I'd throw a couple of ideas out. And Chad, a very accomplished musician in his own right, would throw some ideas out and then it would just be glossed over and [Kurt] would be like, 'Well here's the new song I wrote' and we'd start learning that. So it was very cursory. He kind of like threw it out there but it was;t going to go anywhere."

This won't be surprising to anyone familiar with Nirvana's creative dynamic; regardless of the lineup Cobain was the primary songwriter. Everman saw out a US tour with Nirvana in the late '80s – the band's first national run – before deciding he was done with his rock n' roll "foray". But then Soundgarden called.

"I got home and I was planning on going trekking in the Himalayas," explained Everman to Rogan. By his own admission to Rogan, that was really Everman's childhood dream – not being in a rock band. He'd started buying maps and gear for the trip but got an unexpected phone call. 

"Kim [Thayil] from Soundgarden called and was like, 'Hey, Hiro [Yamamoto, bassist] quit, do you want to audition for the band?'" Everman was back in the game. "At that point, Soundgarden was my favourite Seattle band, hands-down," he recalled.

Everman is humble enough to say he didn't think he would get the gig, but he did and joined the ranks in the fall of 1989. He still ended up getting fired and was out the band again by mid-1990, to be replaced by Ben Shepherd.

"It's complicated," Everman began when he explained the reasons for his parting of ways with Soundgarden. "But at the end of the day I wasn't getting along with Chris [Cornell] that well and obviously, who's gonna go? It was me." But unlike Nirvana, this time it took a much heavier toll on Everman. 

"It broke my heart," he told Rogan. "It was a bad spot for me because I loved that band. I never thought they would get as big as they did. Honestly, it was surprising because they were a great band but I always thought they were a little bit too quirky to be huge, despite the Chris factor; a genetically engineered rockstar. But I always thought they were a little too weird to have mainstream success. Which was fine with me – I thought they'd be like a big indie band. Like Sonic Youth or Buthole Surfers, that level. 

Everman doesn't feature on any Soundgarden studio albums (or Nirvana, despite being pictured on the cover art for Bleach) but he features on their live EP Loudest Love and the live video Louder Than Live. 

"Getting fired from Soundgarden put me in a pretty bad tailspin," he admitted. "It was a rough patch of my life for sure so in order to cut this tailspin off I had to do something radical so what I did was I ended up moving to New York."

He would eventually get far enough past his negative experience with Soundgarden to go on to join the bands Skunk, OLD, and then Mind Funk, but a few years after his dramatic move from Seattle to New York Everman signed up for the US Army.  

"I'd always been really intrigued by the military" explained Everman, now 55 years old. "Both my grandfathers were Word War 2 vets."  Both shared incredible stories with Everman and it sewed a seed, combined with a desire for growth.

"At the time, in 1993, there wasn't a lot of books out about special operations and pretty much the only ones that were out there were Vietnam dudes," Everman explained about the focus of his military ambitions that would eventually be fulfilled. "I devoured every Vietnam War special operations book."

Everman would end up completing a tough process to be selected for US Army's 2nd Ranger Battalion. After completing his military service and eventually travelling to Tibet to study at a Buddhist monastery, Everman was offered the opportunity to join the US Special Forces, completing tours in Iraq and Afghanistan.  

Check out his full story on the Joe Rogan Experience episode above. 

There's plenty of one-fingered chords to enjoy in this one, to make up for the hassle of retuning! We're looking at a classic Soundgarden tune and taking in both Chris Cornell and Kim Thayil's guitar parts. 

Get the tone

Use bridge humbuckers for both parts here and for the guitar tone go for some light overdrive as the rhythm parts are actually quite clean sounding. 

For Kim's intro you'll additionally need a wah pedal used as a filter for the tone.

Tuning 

Tuning low to high is CGCGGE, so that means:

Low E down to C
A up to G
D down to C
G stays the same
B down to G
Top E stays the same

Technique tips and lesson

Kim's intro is pretty straight forward but he uses little embellishments like bends and grace note hammer-ons and try to aim to play with a pretty laid back feel. From there it's single finger chord city! 

You only really need to hit the low four strings really but fret as much of it as you can in case you over-strum. Watch out for the quintuplet grouping of notes in the verse to chorus transition - it is Soundgarden after all! 

Try using the phrase 'Hip-po-pot-ah-mus; over two beats to get that rather odd musical phrase into your head. Have fun! 

Learn 4 Soundgarden guitar chords

A 1979 Gretsch Chet Atkins Tennessean hollow-body electric guitar that was once owned by Chris Cornell and featured in Soundgarden’s video for Rusty Cage is up for sale on Reverb.

Cornell was a huge fan of Gretsch guitars over the years, notably using a 1989 Jet Silver Sparkle single-cut when recording Black Hole Sun (and shooting its video). He was a big fan of this Gretsch, too. Listed by River City Guitars in Spokane, Washington, it is described as being used by Cornell in the studio and onstage.

Bearing the serial number 29279, it is being sold with a certificate of authenticity that’s been rubberstamped by the superior court of Washington for King County.

Furthermore, it looks to be in excellent condition. Comprising a laminated maple body, a laminated rock maple neck, all-original spec with a pair of original adjustable pickups, each controlled by tone selector switch, pickup selector switch, individual volume controls for each pickup and a master volume control. 

The Dark Cherry Red finish, which was introduced in 1972 when Gretsch changed the model number from 6119 to 7655, looks to have lightened considerably over time but looks incredible nonetheless.

• Learn 4 Soundgarden guitar chords

The G7655 has a 24.5” scale, a bound rosewood fingerboard inlaid with Neo-Classic fretmakers, and a zero fret. 

Its hardware is chrome-plated and includes a Gretsch-branded Bigsby vibrato (listed in Gretsch catalogues at the time as a Bixby) and tailpiece.

The zero fret is interesting. A fret located just past the nut before the 1st, it first appeared on Gretsch guitars in 1959 by special request from Chet Atkins.

According to Gretsch, it was originally referred to in marketing literature as the “action-flow fret nut”. The Chet Atkins signature guitars in the current Gretsch lineup have one, as does Billy Duffy’s model.

For more information on the listing, head over to Reverb. 

• The first Boss CE-1 Chorus Ensemble ever made has been listed on Reverb for a million dollars

In the early '90s, when Grunge ruled the world, Seattle natives Soundgarden were set on forging a slightly heavier and inventive path. They seemed at home sitting beside their Grunge counterparts, but their sludgy riffs, unusual time signatures and haunting melodies certainly made them stand out from the crowd.

In this lesson we’re going to check out four key chords from their career as played by guitarist Kim Thayil and frontman/guitarist, the late, great Chris Cornell. And though the band were known for using an array of alternate guitar tunings in their songs, we're focussing on their work in standard and drop D to make this lesson as easily accessible as possible to players. 

Gsus4 (Drop D)

This chord is the opening chord from the track Black Hole Sun. It’s very simple to play. You just barre across the lowest four strings with a single finger. 

This chord is played in Drop D tuning, so the root note of the G is actually now located on the fifth fret.

This chord appears many times through the song, both as a Gsus4, and in other positions of the neck.

The 10 essential guitar riffs for beginners to learn

Dno5

During the Pre-Chorus of the track Outshined, this Dno5 chord makes an appearance. It’s a D Major barre chord rooted off the A string, but the 5th interval (Which is the 7th fret on the D string) is removed. 

Removing intervals from chords is a great way to free up sonic space in the mix for other instruments. 

The 10 essential songs beginner guitar players can learn now

Cmaj9

This chord is heard at the end of the intro to the track Fell On Black Days. It’s played with the 8th fret on the Low E and the 7th fret on the A played and combined with the other 4 strings of the guitar played open.

This chord has a slightly dissonant quality, it contains both a major third (B) and a minor third (A#) which his not a common thing to see in chords.

D7no3 (Drop D)

This chord is another from Black Hole Sun, which is a track that is jam packed full of interesting chord voicings.

This is another Drop D tuned chord. What you have is basically a D Dominant 7th chord, played in a much lower register than usual, but with the major 3rd removed from the chord. The removal of the 3rd gives it a slightly suspended sound, which adds tension.

Remembering Chris Cornell: the unsung guitarist

You know you're a big deal when you can call on not one but two guitar heroes of alternative rock to guest with you. Not only did the Black Crowes have Blackberry Smoke's Charlie Starr flying with their flock on tour for a while, but they also called in REM's Peter Buck and Soundgarden's Kim Thayil for their encore in Woodinville, Washington on 19 July. 

The all-star line-up first played played REM's The One I Love with Buck – a song that is always a joy to hear – before calling in Kim Thayil for a cover of The Velvet Underground's Rock & Roll. The latter a band that Crowes frontman Chris Robinson noted all their respected bands grew up as fans of. 

These covers follow the release of the Black Crowes 1972 EP of renditions earlier this year in homage to their influences including David Bowie, The Rolling Stones and T.Rex. 

There's something refreshing about players who work with what they have to create a signature sound, without heading out on an endless gear acquisition quest. Tom Morello is one such guitarist who simply stopped buying and began creating with what he owned as his sore sound, and Kim Thayil is another. Coincidentally, both guitarists played alongside the late Chris Cornell, in Audioslave and Soundgarden, respectively. And Thayil recently told Total Guitar how buying a Guild S-100 early on in his playing life actually shaped the latter band's sound.

”The S-100 is the guitar I bought when I was 18, and ultimately was the one I could afford to buy," he explains. "I had started playing a few years before that, when I was 15. So at that stage I was learning new techniques and getting better gradually, as I was self-taught. But I had to buy a guitar that I could afford.

He chose well, following his own advice to "get something that feels good to play"…

”The Guild S-100, which I bought in ’77 or ’78, was pretty affordable. It only cost me $250, which was way less than a Les Paul or Strat. I think friends would have directed me to those other guitars, but this one looked good – it was black – and it was in good condition with great action. When I picked it up, I found that it was easy to play and had a fast neck.”

The S-100 became Thayil's go-to guitar. It still is to this day. But it's simply a spin on a Gibson SG blueprint - it has its own facets.

“There were things about the S-100 that I didn’t fully understand," he explains. "I didn’t really know what distinguished it from a Les Paul or a Strat. By learning on that guitar, my style developed. It was how it made me play and what it allowed me to do. 

“Weirdly it had a microphonic pickup – I could blow on the strings or talk into it and that would get picked up. Consequently, I would get this weird feedback and hum – which I would probably discourage, because the people you play with might not want to hear your guitar screaming or humming away. But I did! So eventually that would become a component of what I’d do in Soundgarden. 

“It seemed to voice really loudly beneath the bridge," adds Thayil. "There’s this good space between the bridge and tailpiece where I can hit the strings and strum it to get this ‘krring’. I noticed I could do that on the headstock, though some of my friends’ guitars didn’t do that. 

“I liked the fact I could make these weird noises with my guitar and my fretting hand adapted to that guitar, with a slightly thinner neck and lower action. I felt familiar and comfortable with it. That’s how it came to be my main guitar." 

With such loyalty to the model, fans have been waiting for a Thayil signature S-100 for years. Guild reissued the S-100 after Soundgarden's popularity soared in the early '90s and though it was allegedly in discussion after the band's 2010 reunion, it hasn't yet come to fruition. 

Check out the whole chat with Kim Thayil over at Guitar World.  

Classic interview: Soundgarden's Chris Cornell and Kim Thayil talk guitar