music: I am ready and willing to admit that 2011 was the year of Adelle. She swept the Grammy's and had a couple of the biggest hits of the year. These things were well deserved. Her album 21 was incredible. Her voice, not only beautiful, was a throwback to a different time. There was, however, a couple of performances by a different artist that deserve some recognition.
This artist is Chris Cornell. He had two releases in 2011. One was his song The Keeper from the not often seen film Machine Gun Preacher, which was nominated for a Golden Globe. The other was his album Songbook. This was a collection of live acoustic performances that were recorded throughout the year that he put together. It closely resembles the old MTV Unplugged format.
These two releases, while not showcasing the waling vocals of Soundgarden albums or the diversity of Audioslave's neo-funk approach, showed that Cornell is still not only one of the best vocalist of our time but maybe ever. His sensitivity towards these acoustic offerings gives a beauty to his voice that can rarely be matched. I'll say it now, The Keeper is on of the five most beautiful songs I've ever heard by a rock artist. Don't mistake my use of the "beautiful" for "best". I simply mean beautiful. Songbook shows his skill unleashed on some of his best work. I can site at least three songs that I have heard and loved of his (or his bands) in the past that just hearing his live and unharnessed voice backed by nothing but an acoustic guitar were a revelation to what these songs were meant to evoke. These three would be I Am The Highway, Black Hole Sun, and Fell On Black Days. In I Am The Highway he simply accentuates all the beauty of an already stunning tracking with the feeling only a live recording can give. On Black Hole Sun, he takes a song that while great (I have heard this song referred to as the Dark Side Of The Moon of the 90s) and made it simple. There was no production. There were no vocal effects. There was no vocal layering. It was all him. The power of that song, with that illustrious comparison, was carried all in his voice. Not in a feeling, but in a voice. Fell On Black Days was less of the kind of revelation that I am making the previous two songs out to be. It was simply just a great song done in an acoustic setting with a total lack of restraint and regard. It rocks every bit as the full volume of Soundgarden ever did. maybe on any song they ever did.
The real kicker to the Songbook album, though, is the cover he does of Thank You by Led Zeppelin. Covering Zeppelin is a difficult thing to do. They possess a somewhat indefinable quality that makes precision sound wrong and sloppiness sound worse. Only Zeppelin can be Zeppelin. Everyone else just tries and fails. Cornell seems to be the exception to this rule. Not because he can be Zeppelin. It is not about them. He pours his heart into a song that as soon as you hear it you can tell is close to him. He provides intimacy and inflection to one of the great songs by one of the great bands of all time. He didn't make it his own by changing it. He made it his own with his love and care and skill.
In a year where a young phenom, set to build a blindingly bright future for herself, was all the talk. One of the great, grizzled veterans made his mark as indelibly. Chris Cornell may not be the greatest ever. But maybe more so than when he was with Soundgarden, wailing on late eighties metal and nineties alternative rock, or when he was letting his funk out with Audioslave, he has cemented his place as one of the best. There's just no one like him. If you don't believe me, check it out.
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