Album Review: Songbook [Live] by Chris Cornell

Chris Cornell‘s career has spanned the spectrum of rock and roll, from his start in Soundgarden to the beloved Temple of the Dog, to his supergroup Audioslave and his solo work. Earlier this year, Cornell went on a quick solo tour playing an acoustic set in various intimate settings. To those unfortunate enough to miss the shows, they are now a part of his solo acoustic live album, Songbook.

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After spending over a decade avoiding his past, Chris Cornell reconnected with it in a big way during 2010. First, he reunited with Soundgarden, their tour so successful it spilled over into a studio collaboration interrupted by Cornell launching an acoustic tour where he revisited his catalog, quite definitively tying his solo career and time with Audioslave to Soundgarden. Songbook is a live album culled from this tour and has Cornell sampling from all phases of his career, often spinning harder-rocking songs into moody reflective territory.

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Soundgarden man puts off that Soundgarden record a little bit longer.. Just when you thought a new Soundgarden record was on the horizon, a new Chris Cornell record has appeared! Never fear though, it’s much better than ‘Scream’ (though ‘Ground Zero’ does appear, hugely improved we hasten to add). ‘Songbook’ is a live and acoustic compilation of many of Cornell’s finest songs and a few covers, but it’d be a far easier listen if it was a proper studio release.

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Finally, Chris Cornell is giving his fans what they want. After a number of attempts at pushing them away with misguided Timbaland collaboration Scream and tours with Linkin Park, he now eagerly ushers them back into the fold, first with a Soundgarden reunion and now his debut acoustic album, Songbook. While the fruits of Soundgarden 2.0’s labours are yet to be seen, Songbook comes off the back of Cornell’s highly rated solo acoustic shows in the USA.

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Now that the Soundgarden reunion is official with a subsequent untitled album set to drop this year, Chris Cornell spent much of 2011 looking back. In addition to hitting the road for a small string of dates with his old band mates and releasing the group’s first live album, Cornell went on a brief solo acoustic tour earlier in the year during which time he trotted out material from the various stops of his musical life. The Seattle native was kind enough to cherry-pick a number of these performances for what became his fourth solo album.

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