Audioslave

Formation (2000–2001) On October 18, 2000, Rage Against the Machine broke up after the vocalist, Zack de la Rocha, announced he was leaving, citing a breakdown in the band's "decision-making process". This time, the band chose Out of Exile's mixer, Brendan O'Brien, as producer. Audioslave had 20 songs written and recorded, 16 of those in only three weeks. The album's release date, however, was postponed to early September, and the band cancelled their previously announced European tour, to have a new album to support, when they embarked on touring. The first single off the album, "Original Fire", was made available online on Audioslave's official website for free streaming in early July. News about Cornell's departure emerged in July 2006, when insiders stated that after the third album was released, he would depart the band and restart his solo career. Cornell immediately denied the rumors, stating "We hear rumors that Audioslave is breaking up all the time. ... I always just ignore [them]." In the same interview, he also discussed his intentions to record a new solo album, the second in seven years, before the end of August. as a special marketing campaign for Revelations. A special marketing campaign preceded the new album's release in August, when the art concept was featured on Google Earth as a fictional utopian island, Audioslave Nation, created in the South Pacific. Several songs from the upcoming album appeared on movie and video game soundtracks; "Wide Awake" and "Shape of Things to Come" were featured in Miami Vice, while "Revelations" was on the soundtrack of Madden NFL 07. Revelations was released on September 5, 2006. The album entered the Billboard 200 at No. 2 and sold 142,000 copies during its first week of release. It became the band's least commercially successful album; dropping even faster than Out of Exile, its sales were down 65 percent the following week, achieving gold certification a month later. The album showed funk, soul and R&B influences that were non-existent for the band before; Morello referred to the new sound as "Led Zeppelin meets Earth, Wind & Fire". Additionally, several songs took a more overtly political stance than previous Audioslave releases. The album received a similar critical response to Out of Exile with the majority of reviewers praising the band's integrity on the record. The new funk and soul influences were also welcomed favorably; Allmusic called the album Audioslave's "most colorful, diverse, and consistent record yet." Many others, however, saw it as "just another rock record", and musically not much different from the previous album. Cornell decided to delay the Revelations tour until 2007, because he wanted to "let the album come out " and also concentrate on his second solo album. The rest of the band went along; Morello also revealed his plans to release his debut solo album in early 2007. The second, and final single from the album, "Revelations" was released in October 2006 with an accompanying music video a month later. On January 22, 2007, Rage Against the Machine was announced to reunite for one show only, at the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival, on April 29. Less than a month later, on February 15, Cornell officially announced his departure from Audioslave, issuing this statement: Due to irresolvable personality conflicts as well as musical differences, I am permanently leaving the band Audioslave. I wish the other three members nothing but the best in all of their future endeavors. He stated that, as far as he was concerned, Audioslave had disbanded, and that a greatest hits collection would be issued in the future, because of label commitments. Post-breakup (2008–2016) Morello and Cornell initially disagreed over the particulars of Cornell quitting the group, with Morello claiming that Cornell did not communicate directly with him about leaving, while Cornell countered: "Tom and I did have communications about the fact that I was gonna go make a record, and that I was tired of what ended up seeming like political negotiations toward how we were gonna do Audioslave business and getting nowhere with it." He also added that this process of "doing Audioslave business" led him to go solo. Contrary to some reports, Cornell has stated that the breakup was not about money, but that he was just not getting along with the other members during their later years. Said Cornell, "Getting along as people is one thing. Getting along as a group of people that can work together in a band situation...We weren't particularly getting along well, no. Bands work in a way where everyone at some point has to have a similar idea of how you do things...Three albums into it, it started to seem like our interests weren't as conjoined anymore." In 2011, Cornell revealed further information about the band's breakup; "Personally a lot of it was me trying to land on my feet again. I went through a lot of personal turmoil right around the time Audioslave formed and unfortunately I think that affected the band a little bit in terms of me not really being grounded...I think there was stuff that could have been resolved, and there was drama that was probably unnecessary, typical rock band stuff. I certainly played a role in it. I definitely feel like I was part of a lot of unnecessary stuff. It didn't need to become what it became. You learn with experience." In 2012, Morello said that unreleased material that was not on the three albums could be released in the future at an unspecified point. Cornell and Morello shared the stage together for the first time in seven years, among many musicians, at the 2013 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame concert. Cornell also joined Morello on stage on September 26, 2014, guesting on his solo Seattle show. They played together several Nightwatchman songs, Cornell's usual acoustic covers, and for the first time in eight years, some Audioslave songs. In August 2015, Cornell openly said in interview with Total Guitar that he was quite eager to reunite with Audioslave: "I think it would be great. We did a lot of songs, and with the benefit of not having done anything with those guys for so long, I can't imagine what it would be. It would be a really amazing experience just to get back and work with the same guys again." Soon after, Morello said that he was interested in working with Cornell again, remembering their 2014 Seattle performance with great fondness: "I love Chris and consider him a great friend. The Hall of Fame jam was nice, but a little chaotic. Playing with him in Seattle, that was just fantastic. I love that guy. He's one of the most talented vocalists in the history of vocalists. And to be able to play the songs that we wrote together, it was awesome and so much fun. I hope we do something like that again." Reunion and death of Chris Cornell (2017) On January 17, 2017, it was announced that Audioslave would reunite for their first show in 12 years at Prophets of Rage's Anti-Inaugural Ball, protesting President Donald Trump's inauguration. The event took place on January 20, 2017. Asked in February 2017 if there would be more Audioslave reunion shows in the future, Cornell replied, "It's always a possibility. I mean, we've been talking about it for at least three or four years now. We were talking about actually picking dates, and it just ended up not working out because everybody's so busy. They have another band again, they all have separate bands that they do themselves, I have Soundgarden and a solo career that's taking up a lot of time, and I just did Temple of the Dog. So, it's really honestly as simple as we end up having a window of time where it's comfortable for everybody and we want to do it, because I definitely feel like everybody's up for it." However, on May 18, 2017, three months after making that statement, Cornell was found deceased in his Detroit hotel room, ending the possibility of any future Audioslave reunions with their original lead vocalist. ==Name==

The original idea for the band's name was "Civilian", but it was dropped when members found out that it was already taken. Morello later discredited the story, contradicting Commerford and Cornell, and commented that "Civilian" was merely a rumor circulating at the time. He stated: "The band has only ever had one name, and that is Audioslave." Morello described the origin of the "Audioslave" name to LAUNCHcast as follows: That was Chris' suggestion that sort of came to him in a vision. We're all on the two-way pagers, and Chris one night said, "I got it. It's Audioslave." We were all, like, "All right, fantastic." ... To paraphrase Elvis Costello, talking about band names is like dancing about architecture—there's just no point in it because the band name becomes the music and the people. After the name was announced, it emerged that it was already being used by an unsigned band from Liverpool. The two bands worked out a settlement, with the American Audioslave paying $30,000 in a deal that allowed each band to use the name. To avoid confusion, the Liverpool band would rename themselves "The Most Terrifying Thing". The name was mocked by critics due to its uninspired nature, and was regarded as one of the worst in contemporary rock music, or even of all time. Pitchfork called it the "most asinine bandname of the year," and Chuck Klosterman of Spin magazine chided it as "one of the dumbest band names in recent rock history." ==Musical style and influences==

Audioslave's musical style has generally been regarded as hard rock, By combining 1970s style hard rock riffing with alternative rock, Audioslave created a distinctive sound. This mix was driven by Cornell's wide vocal range, Morello's innovative guitar solos and the robust rhythm section of Wilk and Commerford. Morello, although stating he "never felt musically limited" in Rage Against the Machine, did say that he had "a lot more scope to explore with Audioslave" and a "wider musical territory". This meant that the instrumentalists had the opportunity to write slow and melodic songs, something they had not done before. As opposed to de la Rocha's lyrics, Cornell's were mostly apolitical; Morello referred to them as "haunted, existential poetry". They were characterised by his cryptic approach, often dealing with themes of existentialism, love, hedonism, spirituality and Christianity. For Revelations, which was influenced by 1960s and 1970s funk, soul and R&B music, Morello used vintage guitars and amplifiers and Cornell adopted his "seventies funk and R&B-flavor vocals". He also cited Sly & the Family Stone, James Brown and Funkadelic as influences on the funk overtones on the album. Just as Rage Against the Machine did, Audioslave also included the statement "All sounds made by guitar, bass, drums and vocals" in their albums' booklets as Morello's guitar work often caused listeners to believe that the band used samples, synthesiser effects or different turntable techniques to produce certain sounds. ==Songwriting and recording process==

All of Audioslave's lyrics were written by Cornell, while all four members—as a band—were credited with writing the music. Their songwriting process was described by Wilk as "more collaborative" and "satisfying" than Rage Against the Machine's, which was "a battle creatively". Cornell also felt the same way; he saw Soundgarden's songwriting method inferior to Audioslave's. Rick Rubin, producer of the band's first two albums, was also lauded as "a great collaborative partner" and was likened to "the fifth Beatle" by Tom Morello. The time spent on songwriting by the band was always short. They wrote 21 songs in 19 days for the first album and exceeded that rate for the second album by having a song or sometimes two written every day. This method was adopted for the third album as well. Cornell's battle with drug addiction and alcoholism was a defining factor in the writing and recording process of the debut album. He said he was "never able to write effectively" while drinking, and attended rehab after recording Audioslave. Although Morello stated that Revelations was "the first record [Cornell] didn't smoke, drink or take drugs through the recording," he later clarified his statement by saying: "Chris was stone sober during the making of our Out of Exile album. Chris was also sober during the making of Revelations and prior to recording he gave up smoking as well." ==Politics==

(orange shirt) with Not in Our Name volunteers at an Axis of Justice tent at the July 13, 2003 Lollapalooza festival in Columbus, Ohio In contrast to Rage Against the Machine, Audioslave's music was mostly apolitical. Cornell stated he did not want to become the new singer of Rage Against the Machine or any political band, but he would play benefits the other band members wanted to play. Despite his reluctance to write political lyrics, he himself never discounted the possibility; he already touched upon political issues in Audioslave's "Set It Off"—a song inspired by 1999's WTO riots (the "Battle of Seattle")—then later wrote an anti-war song, "Sound of a Gun", and what Morello called "the most political song Audioslave's ever written," "Wide Awake" for Revelations. "Wide Awake" was an attack on the Bush administration's perceived failures over the consequences of Hurricane Katrina. The band was openly anti-Bush and against the Iraq War from the beginning; on March 17, 2003, only hours after President Bush announced plans to invade Iraq, the band performed live in Hollywood with messages reading "How many Iraqis per gallon?" and "Somewhere in Texas, a Village is Missing an Idiot," scrolled across the stage. The music video for "Doesn't Remind Me" was also critical of the Iraq war. Wilk called Bush "a fucking scam" in an interview, criticizing the Bush administration's rationale for war in Iraq. During the time of the second album's release, several politically charged Rage Against the Machine songs resurfaced in Audioslave's live set. Although the members committed to not making political statements during their Cuba tour, Commerford stated in an interview that the concert made Audioslave more politically active than Rage Against the Machine ever was. While in Cuba, Cornell said that he takes "every aspect of human life" into consideration, when it comes to writing lyrics, and that he would write about the experience in a song, or more songs. This culminated in the political influences on Revelations, although he did not write about Cuba specifically. He asserted that he felt Audioslave can be a band like U2, which is "not overtly political, but Bono gets a lot done." That year, the band played at two more concerts organized to raise political awareness: Live 8, which aimed to end global poverty, and the Hurricane Katrina benefit concert, ReAct Now: Music & Relief. Audioslave was prominently involved in the Axis of Justice, a non-profit organization formed by Tom Morello and System of a Down's Serj Tankian to "bring together musicians, fans of music, and grassroots political organizations to fight for social justice." Axis of Justice tents were set up at almost every Audioslave show, and with the exception of Commerford all band members appeared on the Concert Series Volume 1 CD/DVD charity album released in 2004. ==Awards and nominations==

{| class="wikitable sortable plainrowheaders" ==Members==

• Chris Cornell – lead vocals, occasional guitar (2001–2007; 2017, died 2017) • Tom Morello – guitar (2001–2007; 2017) • Tim Commerford – bass, backing vocals (2001–2007; 2017) • Brad Wilk – drums (2001–2007; 2017) ==Discography==

Studio albums • Audioslave (2002) • Out of Exile (2005) • Revelations (2006) ==References==