How the mighty do fall....

And fall hard sometimes they do. Case in point: Chris Cornell. He is currently the definition of the the law of diminishing returns.

Now I am a big Soundgarden fan. Superunknown is one of my favorite albums of all time. His vocals are simply amazing for a rock singer, how he can hit those notes I will never know. See Flower below:



Soundgarden were one of the original Seattle bands that stuck around and made it big. They produced some incredibly heavy music, but in a way that wasn't clichéd like much of the hair metal 80's bands. They instead played Sabbath and Zeppelin infused heavy rock with increadible wailing vocals from Cornell. They produced 4 full length albums peaking with the afformentioned Superunknown, before and acrimonious split in 1996.

Cornell embarked on a solo album (Euphoria Morning) which was very stripped down and a departure from the Soundgarden sound. It contained a few gems, although nowhere as good as his two previous solo soundtrack contributions Seasons (Singles) and Sunshower (Great Expectations).



He then made the bizarre decision of joining the members of Rage Against the Machine to form Audioslave. They subsequently made three albums together, which were quite frankly, rather bland. They subsequently broke up Rage became, comically, an unintentionally ironic relic by touring their greatest hits.

Cornell then released a fantastically average solo album, which was most notable for carrying a rather serious cover of Michael Jackson's Billie Jean, as well as the theme song to the James Bond movie Casino Royale. He then went on tour with that fantastic bastion of alternative music: Linkin Park. I remember thinking at the time that Chris Cornell had hit rock bottom.

I was wrong

Chris Cornell "Part Of Me" (produced by Timbaland)

I mean what is he thinking? If it was 5 years ago and every blimmin song on the radio wasn't produced by Timbaland, it could (possibly) be seen as a departure. But plain and simple Chris Cornell has sold out. He is using auto-tune for god's sake. It is very, very, very sad to watch the downfall of a previously great singer, reduced to using the same techniques as Cher and Chris Brown. He has even sunk to chauvinistic lyrics.

Clearly, Cornell, while being the frontman of Soundgarden, was definately not the creative talent. I fail to see how he can come back after this.... I need to see this amazing performance to heal!