The surviving members of Soundgarden are putting the finishing touches on the band’s highly anticipated final album featuring vocals from late singer Chris Cornell.
Prior to taking the stage at the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony on November 8th, the band sat down with music journalist Allison Hagendorf for a pre-show interview that was recently shared on her YouTube channel.
During the conversation, Hagendorf brought up the album, which was being worked on prior to Cornell’s death in 2017, along with mentioning that Terry Date (Badmotorfinger, Louder Than Love) was handling the production.
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Guitarist Kim Thayil remarked (as transcribed by Blabbermouth), “One of the cool things about Terry is he never imposed his production style or sound on any bands. He would learn from the bands. And one of the things he would assert when he took a job was, ‘I want this to be a co-production thing.’ And it’s, like, ‘Well, that fits just perfect with the kind of band we are.’”
He continued, “There are a lot of producers out there who have a particular style — for instance, you think about Phil Spector and the ‘wall of sound.’ It’s, like, okay, well, that’s his thing. But producers had that kind of role in the ’60s and, to some degree, the ’70s, but with the way bands are post-1977, they have a sense of what they’re writing and what they wanna sound like, and the producers should simply facilitate that. And Terry’s that guy. I mean, you listen to records he’s done, and it’s very different from certainly what he’s done with us. There isn’t a signature Terry Date thing. It is him helping the band be the band.”
When Hagendorf mentioned Matt Cameron’s previous remarks that a few of the songs marked a new sonic direction for Soundgarden, the drummer responded, “There’s very familiar elements in some of this new music, but, yeah, there was 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.”
Cameron went on to say, “But, yeah, 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.”
Bassist Ben Shepherd talked about the power of the new tracks, noting, “I was going to get coffee down the hall from the control room, and Nate and Terry were playing it back — Nate’s our assistant engineer on it. It was, like, ‘Holy hell, that’s Soundgaren. It’s so cool to hear it again.”
Thayil concluded, “Yeah, it’s like we had these various demos, and you had a particular quality. And it was, like, ‘Okay, how do we flesh this out?’ And then we start doing it, and it’s, like, ‘This sounds different.’ It’s almost like you can pinpoint before and after. It’s, like, ‘Now it’s Soundgarden.’”
For a number of years, the music was tied up in a legal battle between the Soundgarden members and Cornell’s widow Vicky. However, the parties reconciled in spring of 2023, allowing the band members to complete the songs using the vocal demos that Chris had recorded prior to his passing.
See Soundgarden talking about the upcoming album with Allison Hagendorf below.