RIP Chris Cornell 1964 - 2017

[evenslow]

For me this has only gotten harder to accept but in a weird way it has also energized me. Chris left behind a pretty incredible body of work in the time he had. Makes me not want to waste a second.

Alright who hacked into verb's account.

[96583UP]

For me this has only gotten harder to accept but in a weird way it has also energized me. Chris left behind a pretty incredible body of work in the time he had. Makes me not want to waste a second.

agreed ... and for the right reasons ...

[verb_to_trust]

For me this has only gotten harder to accept but in a weird way it has also energized me. Chris left behind a pretty incredible body of work in the time he had. Makes me not want to waste a second.

Alright who hacked into verb's account.

I am allowed 5 earnest posts per year. Decided to burn one.

[PHATJ]

For me this has only gotten harder to accept but in a weird way it has also energized me. Chris left behind a pretty incredible body of work in the time he had. Makes me not want to waste a second.

agreed ... and for the right reasons ...

Actually I've been feeling this was too. It's making me want to better myself and get healthier.

[Rangi Guy]

For me this has only gotten harder to accept but in a weird way it has also energized me. Chris left behind a pretty incredible body of work in the time he had. Makes me not want to waste a second.

agreed ... and for the right reasons ...

Actually I've been feeling this was too. It's making me want to better myself and get healthier.

Yup! Makes me look at my kids and want to clean up my act some for them.

Also listening to the tributes and the misfires - it goes to show you what an incredible register Chris had

[Dev]

Yeah I kinda felt the same in a few fleeting moments.

[everettsloane]

For me this has only gotten harder to accept but in a weird way it has also energized me. Chris left behind a pretty incredible body of work in the time he had. Makes me not want to waste a second.

agreed ... and for the right reasons ...

Actually I've been feeling this was too. It's making me want to better myself and get healthier.

I couldn't agree more with this. 52 is so fucking young and he looked in great shape. Still shocked that this is real, really thought it was another internet hoax at first when it broke. Definitely makes want to get more healthy.

I have to admit that I was sort of a lapsed fan as my ex-girlfriend had completely different music taste and I only listened to his music when I had the house to myself and could turn it up LOUD. If anything, his death has made me start listening to his music again but it's bittersweet.

[evenslow]

I'm curious as to why his funeral is at Hollywood Forever Cemetery and not in Seattle.

[Biff Pocoroba]

I've heard several comments lately that "Vedder's the last one", including a Newsweek column over the weekend with that theme, but it's interesting to me how often Billy Corgan seems to have been left out of the conversation. Grohl's been mentioned but let's face it, Foo Fighters was nothing more than a side project when Cobain died. And the Chili Peppers & U2 rode the early 90s wave as good as anyone but they were well established by then.
At the risk of sounding selfish once again I'm glad (thankful?) to have latched on to this band many years ago.

[evenslow]

I've heard several comments lately that "Vedder's the last one", including a Newsweek column over the weekend with that theme, but it's interesting to me how often Billy Corgan seems to have been left out of the conversation. Grohl's been mentioned but let's face it, Foo Fighters was nothing more than a side project when Cobain died. And the Chili Peppers & U2 rode the early 90s wave as good as anyone but they were well established by then.
At the risk of sounding selfish once again I'm glad (thankful?) to have latched on to this band many years ago.

Yeah Corgan has always been viewed as "the other", partially b/c he came up in Chicago, partially b/c SP's music was sonically different from much of "Seattle Grunge."

I've seen a lot of people on Twitter with "What about Mark Arm? Don't forget Mark Lanegan!!" But the Big 4 was a concept that has been long established. And Eddie is the last.

Fucked up.

[Green Habit]

Been difficult to find the right words to say about this in the past few days.

Best thing I could muster is just listening to lots of Soundgarden & TOTD on a day trip to and from McCall this weekend.

[given2trade]

This interview from 2007 by Howard Stern is a bit chilling. He talks about Cobain and if he had only waited 6 months maybe life would have gotten better. Also talks about his relationships with his parents/siblings. It's multi part and this is just the first part but all are on youtube. He also says Eddie is one of his closest friends and a great guy.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mJSj2beqMTk

[darth_vedder]

This interview from 2007 by Howard Stern is a bit chilling. He talks about Cobain and if he had only waited 6 months maybe life would have gotten better. Also talks about his relationships with his parents/siblings. It's multi part and this is just the first part but all are on youtube. He also says Eddie is one of his closest friends and a great guy.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mJSj2beqMTk

Thanks for sharing. Howard's show overall is ok, but his interviews are far and away the best.

[darth_vedder]

Been difficult to find the right words to say about this in the past few days.

Best thing I could muster is just listening to lots of Soundgarden & TOTD on a day trip to and from McCall this weekend.

Same here, well, sans the road trip. I haven't been saying much about his death. Not sure what to say. It sucks, I'm sad and I feel bad for his friends and family.

[ilpazzo]

I'm curious as to why his funeral is at Hollywood Forever Cemetery and not in Seattle.

I thought this was odd too... I can only think it's because it seemed the family was 'based' in LA now.

I read a couple places that there is an intention to do a public memorial at a later time. I'd assume that would be in Seattle.

[Green Habit]

I'm curious as to why his funeral is at Hollywood Forever Cemetery and not in Seattle.

I thought this was odd too... I can only think it's because it seemed the family was 'based' in LA now.

I read a couple places that there is an intention to do a public memorial at a later time. I'd assume that would be in Seattle.

One of the rare Hunger Strike performances with PJ was in LA in 2009.

[stip]

I was playing around with a longer post on this, but I may not get to it, so I'll just say this here. Like most of us of a certain age, grunge was my formative musical experience, and everything resonated incredibly powerfully. Even my lesser lights in the big 6 (I always included STP and the Pumpkins-it feels right spiritually, if not geographically) were still tremendous talents, and I just couldn't believe that there was this much talent coming out of this one moment in time. 1991-1996 saw Ten, Nevermind, Gish, Badmotorfinger, Core, Dirt, Vs, Siamese Dream, In Utero, Jar of Flies, Vitalogy, Purple, Mellon Collie…, No Code, Tiny Music…, Down on the Upside. 6 bands. 5 years. 16 classic albums. Four genre-defining singers coming out of the same god damned town. What a time to find yourself first opening up to music. This became the benchmark against which we all came to measure what music could do. Even if we left these songs behind we expected new music to make us feel the same way.

During those formative years, struggling with the transition into adulthood, I found the darkness and the bleakness in grunge utterly compelling. It felt true, in a way that joy and light and peace and acceptance never did – at least not without being earned, purified through suffering. But one of the things that spoke to me the most about Pearl Jam, which I wasn't able to articulate until I was a bit older and started writing and talking about them in a systemic way, was that optimism that was underneath the music. Everyone was a lost soul looking for another human being to walk down a long, dark, lonely, road. But only Pearl Jam's music reflected that this road lead to a way out. For everyone else, as history seems to have played out, the road was the final destination.

Cornell's story is really striking in this regard. He's someone who seemed to make it out, and maybe he did, but the darkness and the demons stayed with him. Even if they were under control, all it takes is that one slip, that one bad night, that one mistake. And his death, or really what his death demonstrated, has made the music more vital. As I've grown up, and started a family, and a career, and have generally lived a very happy life there's a way in which the grunge themes that seemed so powerful became, if not nostalgic, at least historical. Something that no longer rang true in the present, and that you interacted with from a distance and as memory. These songs were still great, but I had to remind myself that they were still great. They were no longer living truths. And as such, I had a tendency to become ever so slightly dismissive of them. A little overwrought and over the top. Music for white suburban first world problems. Music for teenagers that play an important part in your transition to adulthood, but that are best left behind afterwards. Fondly recalled, but not taken with the same deathly seriousness.

I love Pearl Jam in part because their music grew past those themes. Themes of alienation became social and political, or personal in a way that reflects a life being lived. When there was a grievance it was a grievance with the world, rather than sullen personal, static, experience. And the best songs were inspirational - reflecting a desire for a better life. They were written from a place of wisdom and experience - from someone who completed their journey and made it out alive, rather than from someone still stuck on the long, lonely road. And even if I preferred the songs written on the road, I was glad that they moved past it. The fact that they grew, that they weren't stuck in that moment, made those earlier moments feel more authentic - an important piece of a larger, more vivid picture. A central chapter in a complex and moving arc, rather than the entirety of the story itself. It's why a middle aged album like Lightning Bolt, filled with middle aged themes like love, fear of loss, fear for the world we leave behind, both resonant with me and make the earlier work simultaneously more vital.

But this also reflects the thoughts of someone who left that road behind. Pearl Jam speaks to my experiences. Chris Cornell's tragic death has been a stark and powerful reminder that not everyone escapes, or that you can escape and find yourself wandering back in a loop that feels closed, even if it isn't. That these songs no longer speak to my direct experience doesn't mean they have nothing to say. And in the last few days I find these lonelier, angrier, more hopeless and nihilistic songs have recaptured much of the dark power and terrible beauty that they lost.

Chris Cornell was not one of my favorites in the grunge pantheon, but he was still in the pantheon. I was drawn more to Pearl Jam, Nirvana, and Alice in Chains. But there were still a large number of his songs that I adored, and Soundgarden was my younger brother’s first favorite band. I have vivid memories of him listening to my copy of Superunknown on my Sony discman on long driving vacations with my parents. And given the place that grunge holds in the formation of my identity during those critical years, and Chris’s place within that story, his death hurts, and hurts more for seeing how raw that wound is for so many other people.

I have also received enough 'Eddie is the last man standing' texts from my friends that I find myself incredibly grateful for the fact that he is, especially since, 20+ years ago, he seemed the person the most likely to go first. Many of us have bemoaned the celebratory atmosphere that defines the modern Pearl Jam concert experience. But maybe we should be celebrating the vanquishing of our demons, and finding passage into safer harbors. I had the following thought watching the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame ceremony on my bootleg periscope feed - especially with the Alive - Given to Fly - Betterman run of songs.

Eddie was set up to be a martyr. That mystique was one of the things that drew us to him, and to the music. The scene was full of them. But what makes Pearl Jam's story special, possibly even unique, is that this messiah didn't have to die to liberate his followers. Instead it was the followers who helped saved the messiah. The night of the Hall of Fame I celebrated that as much as the music and the history. And that's why songs like Alive or Betterman can have their meaning almost entirely inverted from the original intent, and feel as powerful as ever. Even more.

In the face of the alternative that is, I think, something to celebrate.

[evenslow]

well done stip.

I echo your sentiment of being grateful to have grunge (or whatever you want to call it) arrive during my formative years.

[doone]

Any tox report yet?

[dprival78]

wonder how eddie is going to handle this tour coming up. funeral is the 26th, and he's got a show the next day in amsterdam..