CHRIS CORNELL'S "SONGBOOK" AND "THE KEEPER"

I saw Chris Cornell on his solo tour last year, and was blown away, so I was glad when I heard he was putting out a live Songbook album. Like Eddie Vedder, Chris Cornell is making a good case for having parallel careers with a band, and as a solo acoustic troubadour.

The album starts and ends with brand new songs that he hadn't released before this. The first two tracks "As Hope And Promise Fade" and "Scar On The Sky" show that he still has lots of great songs in him. It's hard to imagine Soundgarden (or even Audioslave) doing "As Hope And Promise Fade." I would imagine this is the direction his solo career will go in.  He sings really honestly about some of his issues.  The line "You're never more than two drinks away from crying" kills me. "Scar On The Sky" sounds like it could be a classic Soundgarden slow tune. I just wonder: can he still write rockers?

The LP ends with "The Keeper," a studio track (not from the live performances) that he recorded for the film Machine Gun Preacher. It's an amazing song (I haven't seen the film) that somehow lost to Madonna's "Masterpiece" (cough) from a film she directed W.E. I like Madonna, but Chris's song is way better (and so is Mary J. Blige's "The Living Proof" from The Help).

Back to Songbook: most of the album is solo versions of Chris' songs from Soundgarden, Audioslave, Temple Of The Dog and his solo records. He does great versions of these classics.  Soundgarden's "Black Hole Sun" and "Fell On Black Days" sound even more black, and the Audioslave tunes are just as soulful, stripped of their (amazing, face-melting) arrangements.  I love "Doesn't Remind Me" and "Like A Stone." Of course, the Temple songs are incredible. And the album points out that Chris has had some great solo songs - and (sorry) that maybe his much-mocked Scream album would have been better with a producer other than Timbaland. I love lots of records that Timba has worked on, but I just don't think that that combo worked. Maybe someone like Flood or Danger Mouse could do a great, modern-sounding Chris solo record.

My only "complaint?"  Well, I would have loved to hear the Bruce Springsteen covers that Chris performed when I saw him: "Atlantic City" and "State Trooper." And the "bonus tracks" on the album are "different" versions of "As Hope And Promise Fade" and "Call Me A Dog," that aren't much different from the non-bonus track versions of those same songs, on this same album. But I'm not a negative guy, so I'll just hope for a Songbook Vol. 2.  But let's get that new Soundgarden record first!

THE NIGHTWATCHMAN'S NEW RELEASES

Last month, I wrote about The Nightwatchman's solo(ish) acoustic(ish) concert at City Winery in New York City.  I've been listening to his two latest releases (The Union Town EP and World Wide Rebel Songs), both before that show and since.  I think that Tom Morello is finally coming into his own as a solo artist.

Saying that Tom has "come into his own" does sound a bit weird.  He's one of the most innovative and influential electric guitarists of the past two decades, and Rage Against The Machine was one of the best bands to come out of the amazing '90s Lollapalooza era. He "came into his own" a long time ago. Audioslave may not have quite reached Rage's heights, but had lots of incredible songs over their three album run.  And Street Sweeper Social Club has a lot of potential, and already have a fistful of great jams.

But when he started performing and recording songs as The Nighwatchman, he did so to prevent people from coming to see a "Tom Morello" show. He's more in the lane of artists like Springsteen and Earle than of Rage's peers.

When Tom did his first Nightwatchman album, One Man Revolution, in 2007, lots of the songs were pretty dry.  It reminded me a bit of Springsteen's The Ghost Of Tom Joad, which I know was a big influence on Mr. Morello. Both guys were really influenced by Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger.  The first few performances I ever saw by any artist were by Pete, and the thing about him is that, as political as he is, he wants you to sing along, and maybe have a good time while thinking about the world. Tom had one great sing-along on his first album, "The Road I Must Travel," but the rest of album wasn't as engaging (although there were definitely some great songs).  I felt like the album would appeal mainly to Tom's existing loyal fans, but I don't think that was his intent.

I think World Wide Rebel Songs actually may help him find a different audience, and may not just have him preaching to the converted.  Don't get me wrong, I don't think a lot of Faux News loyalists will start listening to Tom and have their minds opened.  I'm saying that his two latest release makes him a more credible solo artist, regardless of his prior discography.

My favorite Nightwatchman song ever is probably "Save The Hammer For The Man," a duet and co-write with the great Ben Harper. I'd love to see these guys do more together.  "World Wide Rebel Songs" is a great sing-along.  He gets his Tom Waits on on "Facing Mount Kenya."  And, here is maybe the best compliment  I could give him: when I listen to "Stray Bullets," I can hear the late, great Joe Strummer singing it.

The bonus track on the album is the title track to the EP, released a few months earlier, "Union Town." It's another of his best songs, and the first time he's really combined his Nightwatchman persona with his electric guitar wizardry.  He's said that playing an electric version of "The Ghost Of Tom Joad" on stage with Bruce Springsteen made him realize that he could combine the two.  But he's not always about the electric guitar on this EP: his rollicking version of "Solidarity Forever" is a piano and acoustic guitar driven tune. He takes out the electric for an incredible version of "Which Side Are You On?" and his "This Land Is Your Land" is the most rocking I've ever heard (and of course, includes the "banned" lyrics).    It closes with a solo live version of "Union Song" from One Man Revolution recorded at the Wisconsin protests earlier this year. The original version is pretty great, but this is the definitive one for me.

I imagine the next thing Tom will do will be a new Street Sweeper album, which I'm also looking forward to.  But I also think that The Nightwatchman will get more and more powerful in the years to come.  Given the state of the nation, I don't think Tom's running out of ideas, or great music, any time soon.

THE NIGHTWATCHMAN AT CITY WINERY: A (GLORIOUSLY) IRONY-FREE ZONE

I'd seen the great Tom Morello in concert a number of times - with Rage Against The Machine, Audioslave and Street Sweeper Social Club.  But this was my first real Nightwatchman show (other than a brief appearance at Pete Seeger's 90th birthday concert).  At that show, Tom and Bruce Springsteen did an acoustic duet of "The Ghost Of Tom Joad," a song that Rage surprised people with when they covered it in the '90s.  These days, it makes a lot more sense. Tom's dedication to sticking up for the less fortunate, and his outrage at the evils of society is similar to Bruce's (he's even more "left" than Bruce, I think).  But performing as The Nightwatchman, Tom makes a compelling case as a guy with two different and legit musical personas.  One - the guitar shredder from Rage and Street Sweeper, and, two, The Nightwatchman either solo or backed by a band. The Nightwatchman is something he can always do, whether or not he is with a band. Or whether or not he has electricity.

There's a bit of a misperception about Tom doing The Nightwatchman.  Because his debut album, 2007's One Man Revolution was a bit sparse and dry, people probably think his shows will be slow and boring.  I think on some level, even Tom realized that he could be playing to bigger audiences by, well, having a bit more fun.  If you listen to "The Iron Wheel" (a duet with Shooter Jennings) from his second album, 2008's The Fabled City, it's a great sing-along tune. Some of Woody Guthrie's songs were fun, I think Tom caught on to that.  I think his earlier tours were like Bruce's first solo acoustic tour for The Ghost Of Tom Joad. I saw that show twice: it was good, but demanding, and it felt like fun was not allowed. You can pull that off if you're, like Leonard Cohen or something. But Woody, Pete Seeger, even Steve Earle, they have fun at their shows.  I think Tom realized this. This tour was more like Bruce's Devils and Dust tour: he realized that it's ok to do serious solo acoustic shows and still have a good time. Everyone walked out of the show with a smile on their face, but also charged up.

So last night's show was a solo acoustic deal, but he was joined by Carl Restivo from his backing band (Carl is also in Street Sweeper Social Club).  It was an incredibly powerful show.  Like Bruce, Tom lets the audience know when to be quiet, and those moments provided some of the most powerful moments of the night. One was "Battle Hymns," which he dedicated to Iraq Veterans Against the War (learn more about them here). He also did a version of Pink Floyd's "When The Tigers Broke Free" from The Wall (about how the main character's father died in the war), updating the lyrics for 2011.  

But those songs had greater weight, because, as Tom put it, he brought the "heavy metal thunder" on many other songs.  "Save The Hammer For The Man" from his new album, World Wide Rebel Songs, was incredible (the original is a duet with the great Ben Harper, Carl did his best to sing Ben's part, and he did so ably).  "The Ghost Of Tom Joad" was mindblowing - Tom switching to an electric in the middle of the song to melt faces.  Maybe the most rockin song was "This Land Is Your Land." Tom added the "censored" lyrics, which make it much more radical (see the lyrics and a historic performance of that song by Seeger and Springsteen here). He had the whole room jumping - explaining that everyone HAD to jump, as his show was "an irony free zone" even though it was in New York City.  You can see a bootleggy video of the performance here.  It's obvious he has taken notes from Springsteen, but he's clearly doing his own thing.  He finished up by inviting the audience on stage for "World Wide Rebel Songs," instructing one woman in the audience to film the show for YouTube, and demanding that the rest of us stop tweeting and filming and live in the moment.

I was fortunate enough to be invited to the after-party (and this is a good place to mention that I got complimentary tickets, in the interest of full disclosure).  I met some nice folks from Tom's management team, and even introduced my wife - who took these excellent photos, and who is a public school teacher and a proud union woman - to Tom.  She got to thank him for his support.  It was a great moment.

One moment that I wish he had was "The Iron Wheel," one of The Nightwatchman's greatest songs.  Shooter Jennings was there, I couldn't believe they didn't perform together! Maybe next time.

On a final note, I'll mention that I got to chat with Mr. Morello the day before - I filmed him for SiriusXM's E Street Radio.  We discussed a recent quote of his from Rolling Stone magazine, where he said that he's the last man in America who thinks Bob Dylan sold out by going electric. So, I'm here to say that Tom has at least one stance that I totally disagree with.  "Hurricane" is way better with a band than it would be without, and ditto for "Lovesick." That's just off the top of my head. But anyway, thank you Tom for a great show, hope to see you again soon. (Tom will be on E Street Radio on September 5 and 6, for listings and rebroadcast times, go here).

CHRIS CORNELL AT THE WELLMONT - AWESOME

Chris Cornell’s local solo acoustic concerts – two at New York City’s Town Hall and one at Montclair’s Wellmont Theater – sold out almost instantly. When I went to a ticket re-sale site, the cheapest seats were twice as much as the list price. I decided to take the gamble – I’ve seen some great performances by Chris (notably on his tour for his 2007 solo album Carry On, and with Audioslave on Lollapalooza in 2003) and some that weren’t so good (most of the Soundgarden shows I saw). 

I’m glad I spent the bucks, tonight’s show blew me away. It was a great mix of Soundgarden, Audioslave, Temple of the Dog and solo songs, and a couple of incredible covers, including two Bruce Springsteen Nebraska-era tunes. 

The show was over two hours, but he only played four Soundgarden tunes – probably because he’ll be playing them in July, when the band finally tour. 

He opened with the great Audioslave song “Be Yourself,” and then went into “Ground Zero,” from his most recent (and much-maligned) solo album, Scream. Scream, of course, was slammed in large part because it was produced by Timbaland, and while I thought it was an interesting idea, it just didn’t work. Timbaland treated Chris like any other singer in his assembly line of hitmakers, and a lot of the songs just sounded forced. But “Ground Zero,” and the other Scream tunes, "As Hope And Promise Fade" (a B-side) and "Scream," came off a lot better stripped down of the huge arrangements. I'd love to see an acoustic version of that album ("Long Gone" is definitely a great song). 

He played lots of "hits" (Soundgarden's "Fell On Black Days," "Burden In My Hand" and "Black Hole Sun," Audioslave's "I Am The HIghway," "LIke A Stone") all of which took on a new life without the hugely muscular bands that he played with on those songs.  There were also lots of fan favorites, Temple Of The Dog's "All Nite Thing," "Call Me A Dog," "Say Hello 2 Heaven," his Singles solo tune "Seasons," and "Sunshowers" from the film Great Expectations. And some really unexpected selections, like Soundgarden's "Mind Riot" from Badmotorfinger (inspired by the first Gulf War) and Audioslave's "Wide Awake" from their final album Revelations (inspired by the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina). Back in the Soundgarden days, Chris seemed not to enjoy being onstage, and while he has always been really charismatic, he was never what you'd call "warm." Seeing him tonight was an altogether new experience: it was fun listening to him talk about the songs, and discuss politics a bit. I remember reading that when he hooked up with the Rage guys to form Audioslave, one of his conditions would be that it wasn't a political band. But it seems that maybe he was influenced by his former bandmate Tom Morello, he was getting a bit political at points, which I'm totally cool with. At some points, he seemed as engaging as Eddie Vedder on a good night, or even Bruce Springsteen. And speaking of... 

About an hour into the show, he strapped on a electric guitar and played a familiar riff. When he sang "New Jersey Turnpike..." people went nuts.  He covered the Nebraska era classic "State Trooper!" And funny enough, it was the most Soundgarden-y moment of the night, and even veered on being Sonic Youth-ish. He looped his riff and started soloing over it, and then just played with feedback for a while.  It was intense and totally awesome. And that wasn't enough Springsteen for him, he closed the show with another Nebraska tune, "Atlantic City." Unbelievable.  Who even knew he was a fan? 

There were a few other covers: Led Zeppelin's "Thank You" (which was funny, I remember the guys in Soundgarden claiming that they weren't influenced by Zeppelin at all, which sounded hard to believe... and "Thank You" kind of makes up for Chris' "Whole Lotta Love" debacle with Santana), John Lennon's "Imagine," MIchael Jackson's "Billie Jean" and Mother Love Bone's "Man Of Golden Words." 

I remember last time I saw Chris, thinking how much pressure his band must be under to be able to play like Soundgarden, Pearl Jam (on the Temple songs) and Rage Against The Machine (in the Audioslave songs). To me, it makes much more sense for him to tour solo acoustic, and I hope he does more of this between Soundgarden albums and tours, if they are in fact back as a semi-full-time thing. 

I have to mention Chris' opening act, William Elliott Whitmore. Amazing. Do yourself a favor and check him out. Right after he finished, I went right downstairs and bought his album (for $20!  But I had to have it).  I'll be writing about him more in the future, I think. 

BEST OF THE 00's: RICK RUBIN

I have often expressed admiration of Rick Rubin 's production skills. If I were a producer, I'd like to be like him: hip-hop, metal, funk, punk, country, singer-songwriters, nothing is off limits, and he proved that again in the '00s.

He remained close collaborator of Johnny Cash, producing American III: Solitary Man and American IV: The Man Comes Around in the early years of the decade. I would argue that Cash's American series of albums are nearly as good as anything he'd ever done, obviously American IV's cover of Nine Inch Nails' "Hurt" was one of the greatest moments of an incredible career. Rick also curated the incredible Unearthed box set, allowing fans to hear some of the incredible things that didn't make the American albums. He's also been the keeper of the Cash flame, releasing American V: A Hundred Highways, which featured "God's Gonna Cut You Down" (and now there's word that 2010 will see the final album from the American sessions, American VI: Ain't No Grave.

Rick started working with Tom Morello, who certainly was paying attention to Rubin's rap/rock/metal hybrids in the '80s. Rubin produced Rage Against The Machine's final album, the all-covers Renegades, as well as their posthumously released live album, Live At The Grand Olympic Auditorium (which turned out to be the band's final shows before reuniting years later). Rubin hooked Morello and Rage mates Tim Commerford and Brad Wilk up with ex-Soundgarden singer Chris Cornell and produced the first Audioslave album.

One of Rick's supposed talents is to discover new talent, and I don't know how much he's done that in the past decade, but one band he did work with early on is System Of A Down, who are one of the best metal bands around (even though they seem to be on hiatus at the moment). Rick signed them to his American Recordings, and has produced their albums, including (this decade) Toxicity (which, bizarely, hit #1 on 9/11), Steal This Album! and Hypnotize and Mesmerize.  Another younger band in the heavy guitar category he worked with The Mars Volta on their De-Loused In The Comatorium album.

He remained the go-to guy for The Red Hot Chili Peppers (having worked with them ever since 1991's BloodSugarSexMagik), producing the excellent By The Way and the maybe-too-long double album Stadium Arcadium. I really hope they work with him on the next one, which will be their first since guitarist John Frusciante quit (again).

He briefly returned to hip-hop, producing a cover of Ice-T's "99 Problems" for Jay-Z's "final" record, The Black Album. It may be Jay's finest moment. Less successful was his "Better Than I Ever Been" track that he produced for Nike, featuring Kanye West, Nas and KRS-One (DJ Premier later did a better remix which also featured Rakim).

Rubin also veered closer to the mainstream, producing Shakria's Oral Fixation albums, which included her huge hit collaboration with Wyclef Jean, "Hips Don't Lie." There was also The Dixie Chicks' album Taking The Long Way featuring the classic "Not Ready To Make Nice." And he tried to give Neil Diamond a new credibility by doing some American Recordings type stripped down albums with him. He also worked with Weezer, Wallflowers frontman Jakob Dylan on his first solo album, a new-ish Americana-type band called The Avett Brothers who I need to write more about, and The Gossip. And of course, Metallica's triumphant comeback album, Death Magnetic. He also produced some tracks with U2, but the full album he worked on with them remains in the vaults.  And he is apparently working with Crosby Stills & Nash and ZZ Top at the moment. Will he discover more LL Cool J's, Run-D.M.C.s, Public Enemys, Slayers and System of a Downs in the '00s? That's what will be interesting to see.

TOM MORELLO: EXOTIC DANCER?

Tom Morello has done a lot in his career: he is a member of Street Sweeper Social Club, a sometimes member of Rage Against The Machine, and a former member of Audioslave and Lock Up. He records solo albums as The Nightwatchman, and has collaborated with Primus, Maynard James Keenan, Layne Staley, The Crystal Method, Johnny Cash, The Prodigy, Anti-Flag and Macy Gray, and he's jammed with Chuck D and Bruce Springsteen. As an actor, he's appeared in Star Trek: Voyager and Iron Man. He's an activist, a Harvard graduate and he used to work for California Senator Alan Cranston. But did you know he had a stint as an exotic dancer? It's true: he talks about it in an article he wrote for the NME, "What Rock and Roll Taught Me." After graduating Harvard, he moved to L.A. to pursue rock stardom, and was a dancer to make ends meet. He says that he worked at a few bachelorette parties, and is grateful that YouTube wasn't around back then! Read the whole thing here.