One year already?
Still have a hard time really thinking about this without growing extremely sad. Such a great musician and person. Such a terrible way for his life to end. Also, I heard someone suggest that Cornell's death by suicide kind of served as bookends the grimmer side of the Seattle music explosion of the nineties, which started to show a sour side with Kurt Cobain's death.
For me and my son, this was especially sad. I have loved Cornell's music since the nineties, but I got a renewed appreciation for his work several times, including in the early 2000's, with Audioslave, and then with his solo works, which I got into somewhere around the same time period. But m son and I bonded especially with two more recent albums. The first was the reunited Soundgarden's "King Animal." The second was Cornell's most recent (sorry, I guess I mean his last) solo album, "Higher Truth." We listened to these two albums a lot when we went on our western trips in the summers of 2015 and 2016, so much so that the musicon those two albums still reminds us both of those trips.
In the fall of 2016, I took my son to see Temple of the Dog at Madison Square Garden. Something told me to take him, and boy am I glad that I did! That marks the one and only time that he would see Cornell in person, in concert. Very thankful to have gotten the opportunity to share that experience with him.
Hard to believe that it has been a year already! Chris Cornell is still remembered and missed. RIP.
Here is the original RIP blog entry that I wrote one year ago on this day, when the shock was obviously still with me, and I struggled to actually come to terms with it.
What the hell? This is such a huge loss! I loved almost every work that this man was part of! He was not even really old, or anything. Working on a new Soundgarden album, with other musical projects going on, possibly even something new with Temple of the Dog. He always seemed very healthy, at least to me. Such incredible musical talent. He was incredible with Soundgarden, Temple of the Dog, Audioslave, his solo career, and some of the other stuff that he did, to boot! So how the hell did this happen, and with no warning whatsoever? Oh, my God! What a loss!
Okay, let me try and gather my thoughts a little. Sorry, but it's just that he was really one of my favorite musicians, and there was nothing - absolutely nothing! - to suggest that this guy was about to die.
This one was even more painful and shocking to me then some of the big musical losses last year, such as Prince and David Bowie. David Bowie was a lot older, and Prince was not much older, but he also was not quite as big in my life as Cornell was. I loved Prince's music, but mostly, admittedly, I knew his stuff from the 1980's, when he was at his biggest, and when he dominated the airwaves.
Cornell was part of that whole Seattle alternative music explosion of the early 1990's, which I was a very big fan of. I loved Soundgarden and Temple of the Dog. Later, I got into both Audioslave and Cornell's solo stuff. He also worked with other musicians on individual projects, such as the Zac Brown Band. Hell, he just had that song that he did for the movie, "The Promise," which I watched a couple of weeks ago with my girlfriend. It was a somber song, but fitting, and typically for Cornell's work, it was a great song!
Plus, Soundgarden was on tour, and if I am not mistaken, Cornell was going to go on a solo tour after that!
Then, all of a sudden, he dies, just like that!
Yes, this one hit me harder than the other big musicians and artists who died recently, because my son and I shared a mutual love of Cornell's music. This was especially true during our trips out west the last two summers, in 2015 and 2016. We especially listened a lot to Soundgarden's last (I was going to say most recent, until I caught myself) album, "King Animal." We loved that album tremendously, and it seemed to fit perfectly with the rugged western landscape.
Oh, man, this one really actually broke my heart quite a bit! I dread having to tell my son later today that Cornell died. I told him several times that the next time Cornell came around on one of his solo tours, that I would love to take him to a show. His solo shows were always great, and I was privileged enough to have gone to one, and reviewed it here on "The Charbor Chronicles" about three and a half years ago.
Frankly, I still viewed Cornell as young. He looked younger than perhaps he was, because he kept himself in good shape. I was looking forward to a lot of great music still to come, including a new Soundgarden album, as well as surely other great solo albums and other musical projects that surely were to come.
Now, all of that is cut short, tragically.
This is still new, so the details about his death have yet to be discovered probably, let alone released.
All I know is that I am very glad that I took my son to see Temple of the Dog at Madison Square Garden last November.
Cornell created and played music the way it's supposed to be played. He moved people, and I will forever remember his music helping to bring my son and I closer, helping to create and even greater bond between us. Now, for me, music involving Cornell actually reminds me of the times that my son and I enjoyed his music together.
Another great musical talent, another brilliant artist, is taken away from us much too early!
Rest in peace, Chris Cornell. You will be missed.
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