“It happens all day,” Tom Morello says, speaking about the number of requests he gets from artists looking for him to sprinkle his secret guitar sauce on new pieces of music. “I do a lot of it, too,” he says. “I’ve donated guitar solos to younger bands. They’re fans of Rage Against the Machine or Audioslave, and they want me on their songs.”

He admits he can’t accept every request that comes across his desk. “Hey, I’ve got a lot going on,” he says with a laugh. “These days, I’m driving my kids to a lot of high school baseball games.”

Recently, the guitarist received an offer he couldn’t refuse when noted video game composer Masayoshi Soken reached out and asked if he’d consider contributing a song for the latest update of Final Fantasy XIV.

Morello admitted that he wasn’t much of a gamer, but he understood the significance of the Final Fantasy franchise, and he was delighted at the prospect of working with Soken.

There was just one problem, however; Morello would have to turn in a ready-to-go track within 36 hours. Fortunately, the guitarist was already working on some new music with producer Tyler Smyth, so the prospect of banging out a banger wasn’t out of the question.

“I said to Tyler, ‘I’ve got a hot riff, and you’ve got some beats. Maybe we can do this,’” he says. The producer then rang up his friend Caleb Shomo, singer with the metalcore band Beartooth, and asked, “Do you want to make a song with Tom Morello right now?”

In no time at all – 48 hours, to be exact – the collaboration yielded the monster jam Everything Burns, a feral blend of rap-metal and electronica that features, one might expect, one hell of a gargantuan riff.

When you’re noodling, do you have some sort of litmus test that makes you go, “That combination of notes does the job”?

It’s not overthought. Sometime around maybe 1991 [or] ’92, I began to be able to write music that I loved, and was able to tap into some of the essence of the Tony Iommi and Jimmy Page-ness of it all. From that time, these big-ass riffs have kind of been low-hanging fruit. It’s like, “Stick to the dots, try a little syncopation and don’t be afraid to be equal parts funky and heavy.”

Is it deceptively easy? One wrong note could make all the difference between a classic riff and one that’s just “eh.”

Oh, sure. Some of the longer riffs through my history, like Testify or Down Rodeo, where there was sort of a more simple version of the riff, I said, “Well, if it’s going to happen four times in a row, perhaps it’s a journey that stays true to coming back to the one, but then adds some extra heavy metal flavor along the way.”

So in the case of Everything Burns, you already had the riff.

It was around in a rudimentary way, and it was sort of looking for a home. I have a lot of riffs hanging around, and this was one that Tyler and I had been tinkering with. When this opportunity came up, I was like, “Okay, hold on one second. Let’s see if Beartooth wants to jump on.”

At what point did you realize that the combination of you, Tyler and Caleb was working?

It was maybe two hours after Tyler reached out to Caleb. Caleb dropped everything to do this. He’s a great singer, and he’s also a producer himself. He’s got a studio. He wrote and produced the vocals to it, came back in about two hours with a first draft, and I was like, “Holy shit, that’s a jam!”

I did notice the lack of a solo. Is that something you wrestled with?

I wouldn’t say “wrestle.” There was, however, a version of it that had sort of a more expansive middle section. At the end of the day when we were mixing, it felt like it didn’t add to the power of the song. It felt more like I was just sticking a solo in.

When I was A/B-ing in my car, I liked the version that, while it doesn’t have a guitar solo, it’s about as guitar-y as anything I’ve ever done. There’s no lack of guitar on this song.

As for solos, there will be plenty more to come, let me tell you. I’m in the midst of working on what will be my first solo rock album. I made some Americana albums and some EDM-influenced records, but I want to make a record that is going to be an unapologetically Tom Morello solo rock record.

Any idea when we might see that?

In this day and age, what is an album? We’ve released three singles from this album over the course of the year and a half. There’s a lot of intense work ahead. I hope I’ve got maybe three or four songs in the can and another sort of five or six in the hamper. I’ve got a lot of touring coming up this summer. I’d love to try to get it out before then.

And you’ve been touring with your son.

That’s something I’m most excited about, continuing the collaboration with my son, Roman, who has become quite a technical guitarist. He’s been a collaborative partner on a couple of songs, and that will continue. [Laughs] One of my favorite parts about working with Roman is that if we have disagreements, I’m able to send him to his room.

You can’t do that with everyone.

No, I can’t. [Laughs]

• This article first appeared in Guitar World. Subscribe and save.

It started life as the worst guitar its owner had ever played, and was modified with a grab bag of parts from bargain bins. It features arguably the most provocative slogan to be scrawled on a guitar since Woody Guthrie added “this machine kills fascists” to his acoustics in 1943. And it’s covered in cartoon hippos.

As an instrument, Arm the Homeless is an unlikely candidate for the signature guitar treatment – but 30 years at Tom Morello’s side has cemented it as one of rock’s most iconic electric guitars.

This is the divining rod that brought the world explosive riffs like Bombtrack and the radical toggle-switching technique and whammy whoops in Know Your Enemy, which lit the molotov cocktail that was Rage Against the Machine’s 1991 debut (Killing in the Name came courtesy of Morello’s drop-D tuned Sendero Luminoso Telecaster – surely on the cards for its own replica down the line).

Bulls on Parade, Sleep Now in the Fire, Guerrilla Radio, and Audioslave’s debut album – written before ATH’s successor, the Soul Power Strat, came on the scene – were all chiseled into shape by Morello’s hands on this guitar – or, as he calls it, his “artistic co-worker”.

“We’re collaborative partners,” he tells me over Zoom. “The chemistry that that guitar and I accidentally backed into has forged this career of 22 albums, thousands of shows… and a lot of dangerous music.”

With no brand name to speak of, fans wondered if an authentic Arm the Homeless replica would ever become a reality. Ibanez had previously made a backup version. But Fender ended up winning the gig, after Morello and CEO Andy Mooney met via – what else – a school fundraiser.

The Soul Power Strat was their first collaboration in 2020, bottling the early-noughties magic of Morello’s main squeeze in Chris Cornell-fronted supergroup Audioslave. Mooney hinted that a Fender Arm the Homeless was on the cards. That was five years ago. But the new guitar proved to be a difficult birth: this was no cookie-cutter Stratocaster. It required a whole new approach.

“The challenge with Fender was: ‘How do we recreate something that is so imperfect?’” Morello laughs. “For example, I have no idea what that neck is. It was the one that I got on a particular day. They got a machine over there that makes a bunch of different necks. They don't got one that makes this.”

Fender persevered. After “20-25 iterations”, they mastered the neck, along with the guitar’s many idiosyncrasies: the indestructible killswitch, the Gotoh locking tremolo, EMG pickups and, of course, the hippos, hammer and sickle, and rabble-rousing slogan. Heck, the strings are even uncut at the headstock end – to our knowledge, it’s a first for a production-line guitar.

Like all of Morello’s signature gear, there’s a charitable component to the release. Part of the proceeds will be going to teen homeless shelter Covenant House and LA’s Midnight Mission shelter, where the Morello family volunteer on a regular basis.

“If you're going to put ‘Arm the Homeless’ on a guitar, I want to make sure there's a component of giving back. I want to make sure that there's a Robin Hood factor to this as well – that while we're making this guitar for fans and collectors who want this thing, we're going to be able to give back to people who are in need.”

I sat down with Tom Morello to find out how Fender got the details right and why, for a man who once declared that “gear doesn’t matter”, he’s finally coming round to the importance of his most iconic guitar.

Walk me through the process of recreating Arm the Homeless with Fender: how did it start?

When we were talking about doing the guitar, I said, “OK, this is a bigger challenge because, while the Soul Power guitar is complicated, it uses parts that exist in the world. The Arm the Homeless guitar is from the island of Misfit Toys.”

It has a neck that I found in a used neck bin at some off-brand store. Originally I had it made at a local guitar shop in Hollywood, and it was the worst guitar I'd ever played in my life. I didn't know. I made all the wrong choices with regard to fretboards, frets, whammy bars, electronics, everything about it. Over the course of the next few years, I changed everything out multiple times looking for a sound I never found.

And probably in late 1988 or so, I just gave up. And I was like, “I'm going to stop whining, and I'm going to start creating. I've spent all my money on making this guitar. I had no more money left. This just has to be my guitar. I'm stuck with it. So I'm going to start writing songs.”

And that's exactly the Arm the Homeless guitar. I drew the hippos on it back then. A couple of years later, I scrawled Arm the Homeless on it in Magic Marker, and from that day to this, that's what it is.

I wanted this guitar to be absolutely interchangeable for me. I wanted to use this guitar without losing any miles per hour. The neck on the Fender Arm the Homeless guitar must have gone through 20-25 iterations to get it just right. I was always sending it back. I'm like, “Well, nope, nope, nope.” We finally got that right.

The Gotoh whammy bar was not exactly the one that anybody wanted, but that's the one that worked for me. One thing that I ended up loving about it was the imperfections of it. After a while, the actual bar becomes really loose in there. Not what you want with a whammy bar… or do you?

Because I was able to use that to create some sort of helicopter sound, some sort of monkey sound – there was something in that particular whammy bar that, because it's the one that I was stuck with, I made the most of, and it helped me forge my signature sound.

What about the pickups? It’s an unusual configuration.

It's two EMG pickups, and the pickup in the neck position is basically a single-coil pickup disguised as a humbucker, and that is what provided the springiness to the riffs in a lot of those songs, from Fistful of Steel to Sleep Now in the Fire, Guerrilla Radio, and that, I think, really differentiated my sound from a lot of metal players. It allowed the songs to lock in with the rhythm section in a very different way than a lot of metal or nu metal players would.

The bridge pickup was my tip of the cap to my metal roots. It's the distorted sound of Know Your Enemy. It's the outro to Bullet in the Head. It's the sound for all of my guitar solos – when I kick on the echo pedal and just start space-jamming.

The toggle switch, too. The normal toggle switch that is in a Gibson guitar or whatever, if you use it like God intended, which is a lot, it'll burn out. It'll burn out quick. The toggle switch that is in my Arm the Homeless is the one in this, so you can just go to town on that baby.

Did you road-test the guitar at all?

The final prototype that I approved I've been using in concert on the last tour this year. So I feel great about it. It's interchangeable down to the aesthetics of the guitar.

The other day, we were shooting some promos, and I was at Cello Studios where we made a number of Audioslave and Rage Against the Machine records. I put three of the Fender Arm the Homeless guitars and the real one down on the mixing board. And I brought people, and I was like, “Pick the real one.”

And I'll tell you, here's the clue: the only distinguishing characteristic sonically or visually, is that on the real Arm the Homeless guitar, couple decades ago, a dog chewed the headstock. So there are teeth marks on the headstock. I think it was a dog. It's hard to say whether it was a fan or whether it was a badger, but there's teeth marks on the headstock of that one. But other than that, they're absolutely identical.

You say you've been stealth-playing the replica on tour – did anyone notice?

Zero. Zero percent. You'd never know. I mean, I don't know! And as far as feel and tone and whatnot, we got that right a while ago, getting the neck good. That took the longest, because that's a really unique part of it. It's tapered in a way that had allowed me, when I was practicing eight hours a day shredding scales, to be able to do that.

But also, the feel of a guitar ends up suggesting riffs. It ends up suggesting ideas. And if it were more of a thicker neck, it was more of a baseball neck, or wider in the wrong places, it never would have suggested Bulls on Parade. It never would have suggested People of the Sun.

What do you remember about the moment you first wrote ‘Arm the Homeless’ on the guitar?

I scrawled the words on it at a Rage show. It was the afternoon. We were playing at the Whiskey that night. We were opening for two other bands at the Whiskey that night, and that would have been in probably early ’92.

I was sitting on the dirty carpet in my little apartment in West Hollywood, and there were a couple markers around. They happened to be black and red, or it would have been something else at the time. I like slogans that are provocative.

And I love the juxtaposition of something that says “Arm the Homeless” with these cute, smiling hippopotamuses. That feels like multiple facets of my personality – those boxes are checked.

As you say, the Fender recreation looks remarkably faithful. There are a couple of very small changes, though: the Fathead Sustainer on the back of the headstock and the big hippo on the back of the guitar are both absent. What prompted those tweaks?

Well, the Sustainer on the back of the headstock of the real one never did anything. It was a pain in the ass to put that thing on. It was a pain in the ass to take it off. So I just literally never took it off. It literally did nothing. Literally nothing. So we're like, “Oh, like, I'll spare people having that.”

And then the hippo on the back. One of the reasons why I didn't put that on is because one of the features of this guitar through the last 10-15 years is when I'm showboating and playing with my teeth, I will write some sort of city-appropriate or political news cycle-appropriate thing on the back of it, and flip it over and read that so that, to me, didn't feel like it was any important part of the guitar at all.

I should say, another one of the motivations, not the principal motivation, but on the page of motivations, was all of the horrible knock-off Arm the Homeless guitars that exist in the world. There's a bunch of them out there.

People think they're getting my guitar because they're able to get the artwork sort of right, and I just think it's awful to have fans ripped off like that, to think that they're getting something that really is the Arm the Homeless guitar. It's not this one. I am the guy who made the Arm the Homeless guitar. This one is it.

You resisted signature gear for decades. What prompted that shift? Because now you've got pedals and plugins as well.

Because the stuff is exact. Here's the thing that I was always happy to put out and promote in the world: my music, because it's mine. My videos, because they're mine, or my bands, right? My ideas, because they're mine.

I was approached countless times: “Will you endorse this amp or this guitar or this pedal?” And I didn't want to do it because I didn't play it. I'm very conservative with my gear. It's the same guitar from ’87 till now. It's the same amp from ’88 till now. It's the same pedals from ’91 till now. So the only time when I've put stuff out is when it is exactly my gear.

The guitar is built in Mexico. Did you ever consider a high-end Fender Custom Shop version with all the relic’ing and road wear?

No, I didn't. Let the relic’ing and road wear be your own. Here it is. Now it's up to you to let your dog bite it.

The guitar must have been through its fair share of scrapes over the years. Dog bites aside, do any others stand out?

Oh, I mean this guitar has been at every show that I have ever played, outside of maybe a handful of Nightwatchman protest solo acoustic shows. So it’s seen it all. Some people get very emotional about their guitars, like, “Oh, this is my baby.” And I was always like, “This is a tool. This is an instrument. This is a battering ram for justice and big riffs.”

And over time, I gotta admit, I've become somewhat emotional about it. I play at night [at home], and I'm like, “We've been through a lot.” It is a long, long relationship that I have with this guitar, and it really is a relationship.

It's not just a thing; the way that it is, and the unique journey of how it arrived, is what helped me find my sound in the world, is what helped me become the artist that I am. And everything that's flowed from that, from the bands that I've been in to the ideas that I've been able to get out in the world, from the solos I've been able to shred standing next to Bruce Springsteen. You know, it's not just, “Hey, I'm doing this.” We are collaborative partners.

Does that mean you'll be retiring the original Arm the Homeless?

Well, it's taking a step back. Like the Jerry Garcia guitar or Prince’s guitar or Bruce Springsteen’s, the Arm the Homeless guitar is a working guitar in a real punk-rock context.

I play a lot of shows. Yes, there are festival headlining shows. Yes, there are shows with crews and whatnot. But I play a lot of shows for the people. And we were doing something in New Jersey within the last year, where I was walking backstage, a bunch of people walking around, I just saw the Arm the Homeless guitar, like, in a hallway, and I just went “Ah!” If I had wanted to steal it, I could have walked right out the door with it right then.

So I thought that the [original] Arm the Homeless guitar needs to maybe come out for special occasions. I used it the other day. I played Purple Rain at the Hollywood Bowl with a celebration of Black music and film. And it came out for that one, but now it's gonna come out for special occasions.

Musically speaking, what can we expect next from you? Can we ever expect to see you in a full-band context again, like Rage and Audioslave?

I'm in the midst of working on my first solo rock album, poaching riffs from my son, Roman, who's got the hot hand these days. And over the course of the next couple of months, releasing some more singles from that upcoming record. There's a full fall of acoustic, electric shows in Canada, East Coast, North American Tom Morello and friends tour playing in India at the end of the year.

I wrote a musical that's opening in Chicago called Revolutions, which has some songs from my career that Arm the Homeless guitar has created. And so it's a very, very busy time. I feel very, very comfortable in not being in a band. You know, if something comes up, I'm always willing to look at it, but I've got a lot of stuff on the docket as it is.

• The Fender Tom Morello “Arm The Homeless” Guitar is available now. See Fender.com for more.

After years of speculation, Fender has granted Tom Morello fans’ wishes and announced a replica of his Arm the Homeless electric guitar – the misfit six-string that fueled Rage Against the Machine and changed the face of rock guitar as we know it.

Fender has replicated every part of the one-of-a-kind instrument, which was Frankensteined together by Morello after he commissioned a custom guitar and hated every single part of it. Over several years, he would swap everything, settling with the iconic configuration that hasn’t changed over the past three decades.

There’s the EMG pickup combo – an 85 in the bridge, H humbucker-sized single-coil in the neck. The indestructible toggle switch. Gotoh’s Floyd Rose-alike locking tremolo with the rattly whammy bar.

The striking aesthetics are replicated, too: Morello’s hand-drawn hippos, the “Arm the Homeless” slogan in black and red permanent marker, all atop a blue ice metallic finish. And yes, in what’s possibly a first for a production-line guitar, the strings are uncut at the hockey-stick headstock.

In fact, the neck shape was the hardest thing to get right – after all, this was a knockoff Kramer neck that Morello found in a bargain bin. It took 20 to 25 iterations for Fender to nail the formula, but now the replica and the original are so interchangeable that Morello has been stealth-testing it on tour – and no-one, not Arm the Homeless die-hards (guilty) or even his bandmates, noticed.

“Zero. Zero percent. You'd never know. I mean, I don't know!” Morello told Guitar World. “The final prototype that I approved I've been using in concert on the last tour this year. So I feel great about it.

“It's interchangeable down to the aesthetics of the guitar. We were shooting some promos, and I was at Cello Studios where we made a number of Audioslave and Rage Against the Machine records. I put three of the Fender Arm the Homeless guitars and the real one down on the mixing board. And I brought people, and I was like, ‘Pick the real one.’”

But, as he reveals, there is one distinguishing characteristic between the original and the new guitar – and it’s a highly unusual bit of wear.

“On the real Arm the Homeless guitar, a couple decades ago, a dog chewed the headstock. So there are teeth marks on the headstock. I think it was a dog. It's hard to say whether it was a fan or whether it was a badger. But other than that, they're absolutely identical.”

There are a couple of teeny tiny differences on the rear of the guitar, too. There's no Fathead Sustainer on the rear of the headstock (“It literally did nothing”) or giant hippo on the back of the body – but the latter is normally covered up with a political statement that Morello flips to the audience while playing with his teeth.

And, unlike many of Fender’s recent Mexico-built signature models, the guitar is box-fresh and isn’t relic’d in any way. As Morello puts it, “Now it’s up to you to let your dog bite it.”

As per the guitarist’s other signature gear releases, proceeds from sales of Arm the Homeless will go to charity organizations Midnight Mission and Covenant House, which help those experiencing homelessness.

The Fender Tom Morello “Arm The Homeless” Guitar is available now for $1,699. Head to Fender.com for more info.

Read Guitar World’s full interview with Tom Morello.

Joe Satriani has paid tribute to late Soundgarden frontman Chris Cornell with an instrumental cover of Audioslave’s Be Yourself.

The track, which also features drummer Kenny Aronoff, is part of bassist Mark Menghi’s King Ultramega project – an ongoing tribute to the singer in honor of Soundgarden’s Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inauguration in November.

Satriani eases back on the fretboard fireworks in the cover, translating Cornell’s vocal line and Tom Morello’s sparse lead lines into more of a laid-back, low-gain bluesy vamp than you might expect from an Audioslave cover.

Only when it gets to Morello’s wah-wah solo does Satch engage the drive and add some modal embellishments, otherwise dialing into the pure melody of Cornell’s vocals.

“[Chris Cornell] was a brilliant vocalist and communicator,” says Satriani. “He often used his voice like an instrument, shaping the tone of his voice like a guitarist would finesse riffs and phrases.

“I took a deep dive into his magical sensibilities and came up with a multi-tracked guitar production approach that I felt would pay proper homage to his brilliance.”

“I remember like it was yesterday,” adds Menghi. “I was on a run through some crazy trail, just zoning out and the original song came on through my headphones… as I was running, I remember hearing Chris sing, ‘to be yourself is all that you can do,’ it was like he was talking to me… then thought to myself, ‘I can totally hear this as an instrumental a-la Satch style…’

“My hope is that whomever is listening to this song hears Chris over Joe’s guitar and understands that we are paying homage to Chris with our take on this tune.”

The song follows King Ultramega’s previous cover of Soundgarden classic Rusty Cage, which featured Mastodon’s Bill Kelliher and Alice in Chains’ William DuVall.

Be Yourself is out now. Proceeds from the track go towards addiction recovery and mental health nonprofit MusiCares.

For nearly two decades with Rage Against the Machine and six years with Audioslave, Tim Commerford has navigated a never-ending quest for the ultimate distortion tone. He's built his own stompboxes. He's tinkered with his amps. He's even wound his own pickups – by hand. And he's as secretive as he is satisfied about the progress of his one-man tone trek.

“I'm like the Pablo Escobar of bass,” he told Bass Player, referring to the notoriously violent drug kingpin. “If a dude works on my pedalboard, it's almost like I have to kill him after he's done. I don't, but a few times I've told people, ‘If you let anyone know what you've done to my 'board, I'm coming back!’”

With his larger-than-life personality, and obsessiveness about his sound, it's easy to see how Commerford has become one of the most distinctive voices in rock bass. But don't be too quick to categorize him: he's also a jazz fan who's studied upright and actively applies the advice of Jaco Pastorius to his bass playing.

Since Commerford first set about establishing a bass sound for Rage by using a Marshall Guv’nor stompbox for riff-rock distortion, he has constantly experimented with his tone and he is quite secretive about his discoveries.

“My setup is my shit; I spent 10 years getting it to be the way it is, and for me to just break it down and tell everyone exactly what I've done, is just blowing it.”

Still, he confided some of his gear secrets to Bass Player.

For Commerford, it all starts with pickups. For a time his main bass was a BEAD-tuned Fender Jazz with an ash body, maple Precision neck, and Leo Quann Badass bridge. That bass contained the pickups from a similar instrument he used on three Rage albums and numerous tours.

“I smashed that bass on MTV and I regret it to this day. It had these '70s Jazz pickups I got in England. When I'm on tour I'll go to all these luthier shops and look for Jazz pickups.”

After Commerford acquired those pickups, he rewound them by hand, which he says gave him more sustain and feedback. “To wind pickups by hand, you have to take your time and slowly stack the wires. It's not the kind of thing you can do in one day; it took me about two weeks.

“I liken it to winding the winch on my four-wheel-drive truck: You don't want to just hit the rewind button and let it stack up wherever it wants. You want it to stack perfectly so it almost looks brand-new. And thicker wire doesn't take as long to wrap. I don’t look for the cleanest sound; I like that edgy, dirty tone. If you use different wire on your pickups, you'll absolutely get a different sound.”

One of Commerford's main musical goals is to fill the sonic space of both bass and rhythm guitar, especially during Tom Morello's guitar solos.

“During the show, I know fools are focusing on those solos, but when Tom goes from rhythm guitar to solo, I jump that shit up to another level, and it sounds like nothing drops out. If I don't already have it maxed out, I will max it out during his solos.”

Commerford achieves his multi-level bass sound with a three-rig setup: one amp and cabinet for a clean sound, one for a middle-of-the-road overdrive, and one for full-on distortion. The clean sound always stays on, and he can kick in the two other layers of grit using a custom pedalboard switching system.

“You can try to figure it out, but there's no way you ever will. I even have cords on my shit that don't do anything!”

Before the switcher splits the bass signal into three paths, it goes through a delay pedal, so that all three parts of the signal are affected when Commerford kicks in the delay. While his clean sound remains stompbox-free, post-switcher distortion and wah pedals feed his two edgier sounds.

Commerford's ultimate secret weapon is a one-of-a-kind, custom-made distortion box, based on a pedal he crafted himself from parts of an old wah pedal. “My distortion comes before everything else. If you have a good distortion box, then all the other pedals work great.

“I always shoot for distortion that sounds like a saw blade without a lot of teeth. It's not like a guitar distortion that goes sshhhhh; it's more like a gritty a-a-a-gghhh! As of late, though, l've been getting more of my distortion by turning up the amp gain and the master volume. That's the best distortion.”

After the distortion stompboxes, Commerford has a pair of bass wahs, one going to each of his distortion rigs. “When I use the wah, it's not just the highs or the mids, it's the whole range. I've got my foot on both wahs at the same time; I put a piece of wood on top of them so I can use them like one pedal.”

Commerford's favorite recorded sound with Rage Against The Machine was on the group's second album, Evil Empire, on which he used two SVT heads and two Classic 8x10 cabinets, both mic'd and direct.

“I let producers use as much DI as they want until I start noticing it. Those clackety sounds that come out of it are not good. With three amps and cabinets, it's like there are two other guys waiting backstage to come back me up. It just thickens things up and brings in more tone. And it's ultimately about the tone.”

“What’s the state of the guitar?” Tom Morello asks. “How is it? Do people still play?” He’s asking because his 13-year-old son Roman has recently been ripping it up, as evidenced by Soldier in the Army of Love, a song they wrote together.

When told by Guitar World that the guitar is alive and flourishing, he replies: “I’m doing everything I can. Roman will be, too. Somebody's gotta break through. Perhaps this Post Malone song… my thought was it could be like the Beat It of pop.”

But the song he’s talking about – and leads him to compare Malone to his late Audioslave bandmate Chris Cornell – remains unreleased. “If you’ve got Post’s cell number, tell them to finish the song because it's an absolute banger!” Morello says. “People will lose their minds!”

The Rage Against the Machine co-founder has had a busy 2024. He’s made appearances on stage with everyone from Jane’s Addiction to Buddy Guy. “If you look at my history of collaboration, there’s crazy diversity,” he says. “From Pete Seeger to Kirk Hammett to Chuck D…

“I’ve made 22 records now, and I’m in the process of making what will be my first real solo rock record. While there will be some collaborations on it, it’s not going to be dependent on one person. But one person I can guarantee will be on it is Roman Morello.”

While he often changes genres, he’s long since stopped changing his rig, which he perfected out of frustration in 1988. “I was having so much anxiety about trying to get a great sound that I wasn’t writing songs or doing anything with the sound I had,” he recalls.

“So I made markings on my amp for the sound and just stopped thinking about it. Those are the same markings on that amp, for the same guitar. They’re the same markings for every Rage record, every Audioslave record, every Prophets of Rage record and every live show I’ve ever played.

“There's a lesson to be drawn from that: sometimes chasing tone or chasing stuff through gear may not be where your creativity can blossom to its highest degree.”

You’ve said your son Roman can shred circles around you. When did you realize he was so talented?

“During the pandemic, while everybody else was learning to make sourdough bread, he was in a room practicing for hours and hours a day. When it began, my kids were not all interested in playing music. But I said to my son – who likes Led Zeppelin – ‘If you can take a couple of minutes away from Zoom school, or playing Fortnite, I’ll teach you the first three notes of Stairway to Heaven.’”

“He thought he could probably spare five minutes of his day, so I taught him the first three notes, and he did pretty well. The next day I said, ‘How about the next three notes?’ He said, ‘Okay, sure.’ On the third day he asked me if he could continue on the journey, and never got off it. Soon we were learning the guitar solo.

“I took guitar lessons when I was 13, and that convinced me to never play an instrument and to put the guitar down for four years! I learned that the genesis of someone playing the guitar is a very, very fragile time.

“So I wanted to make it totally positive. I knew he liked this song, and we were going to make it bite-sized, so it was fun. It’s an instant accomplishment. He just got going with it, and it’s been so great to watch that journey. Pretty soon he was learning Randy Rhoads solos on his own, and then we started writing together.”

How big of an influence has your style been on Roman’s?

“My kids never really knew what I did for a living. Honestly, they’d never heard of Rage Against the Machine. I never played Rage for them, and I never played Audioslave for them, ever. It wasn’t really until 2022, when we began rehearsing for the Rage tour, that they really knew what Dad did for a living. I was just the guy who drove them to all their Little League games!

“To be exposed to that power and those riffs at a time when you’re learning guitar was important. He’s got that Morellian DNA to begin with – but being exposed to five nights in a row at Madison Square Garden was pretty powerful.”

What’s it been like writing with him?

“He began writing riffs kind of in his dad’s vein, and some of them were pretty good. Over time I would hear something coming out of his room, and I’m like, ‘Can I borrow that?’ That’s how we wrote Soldier in the Army of Love. Those riffs are his and I’m the lyricist; that’s my contribution to the song. The rest of it is him, his riffs and his shredding.

“He’s in sort of a sweet spot, where there are great riffs that are low-hanging fruit. So I've been harvesting that fruit for future collaborations. And more recently he wrote the music for the end title of the Venom movie. I sent them about 25 ideas that were just sitting on my phone, and the one they picked was one of Roman’s!”

There’s talk of an unreleased track you did with Post Malone, who you recently compared to Chris Cornell. That’s heavy praise.

“His process was very similar to Chris’ in that, whatever music I threw at him, he would mumble melodies that were pretty damn compelling right off the bat. There was a natural inclination to come up with great melodies; they have that in common.”

Speaking of Chris, what’s the status of the unreleased Audioslave recordings?

“There’s no good reason why they’re not out. Every time this comes up, I get messages from people getting on me! But yeah, there are great songs there. It had to do with band dynamics more than anything else. There’s some great Chris Cornell performances, and great Audioslave songs that are waiting to be unleashed.

“We’ll have to get it together and figure it out. There's nothing preventing those songs from coming out other than us getting our act together and doing it.”

Are there any Rage Against the Machine songs in the vault?

“No, there’s not.”

Over the summer you jammed with Jane’s Addiction and swapped guitars with Dave Navarro. What was that like?

“I’ve been a fan of Jane’s Addiction since they were a club band in Los Angeles, and I’m a huge fan of Dave’s playing in that band. I’ve been on stage with them a number of times. I love the fact that my favorite Jane’s memories are when they're set up in a rehearsal room backstage, where Stephen Perkins and Navarro play through a heavy metal catalog.

“They’re like a jukebox of Maiden, Ozzy, Dio; they know it all and can play it all. Watching them do that was one of my favorite things. But Dave is great – I know we’re both getting up there and we’re just going to shred our butts off together. It’s an honor to rock Mountain Song with those guys any time I have the chance.”

Dave told GW a story about your band Lock Up coming on stage and pretending to be Jane’s way back in the day. What are your memories of that?

“Yeah! Perry Farrell was friends with the singer in my band Lock Up. It was a big New Year’s Eve homecoming show. I think it was ’87 turning into ’88, and the place was packed. Perry asked us to impersonate them and play. I had a Dave Navarro wig, and the singer had these fake braids! I remember coming on, and people were losing it.

“It was the first time I really felt what it was like on stage when someone doesn’t love a band, but the people believe in a band. And I was an imposter out there. I was fake Dave Navarro! We played the song, the lights went out and Jane’s came on and finished it. I think the audience was just bewildered by it, but it was an extremely memorable New Year’s Eve.”

You hopped on stage with Buddy Guy last year. How do you rate your blues chops?

“Buddy Guy is a Chicago staple of history and culture. I was opening up for him in Brazil. His righthand man came over before the show and said, ‘Buddy would like you to join him on stage for a song.’ I said, ‘I would be honored to do so.’

“At 80-something years old, he still has it. He’s a great player, and he has sexual magnetism that is undiminished from his youth – like, ladies are going crazy, you know? But I play a lot of different styles that don’t necessarily litter my records, and it was fun to get up there. I did my best to stay in my box.”

Martyn LeNoble recently offered his memories of you and him working with Layne Staley on The Faculty soundtrack. What are your recollections of making that track?

“That was Layne’s last recording. We were never in the same room, though he recorded his parts up in Seattle. Layne was someone I considered a really good friend, and my memories are ones I cherish. He was so funny; he had such a great sense of humor, he was so smart, and he had this great, self-effacing sense of humor. We would argue laughingly for hours about which one of us was more metal.

“My memory of that was that we put together the track for this thing, and Layne was not in a great place. It was sort of hard to get the vocals finished. I will say that I think he did a great job; it’s his swan song as a recording artist.”

Fender has talked about wanting to produce more replicas of your guitars. Could that include a replica of Arm the Homeless?

“The only time I’ve done an endorsement is when it’s really my thing, like the Soul Power one. They promised me they would make it exactly like the guitar – and they did. It’s crazy just how identical it is to that guitar that played on all the Audioslave records. I don’t have a vast collection of notable guitars, but I’m open to the idea.”

Why don’t you like endorsements?

“I did a distortion pedal [MXR Power 50], and that sounds exactly like the sound of my amp. The thing I don’t like about endorsements is that when I saw them as a kid, my favorite players would be selling a new guitar that was not the brand of the guitar that they played on the albums that I liked. It just didn’t feel right to me.

“So when it’s my song, my book, my movie; when it’s my pedal, when it’s my guitar, I’m happy to endorse it to the moon – but that’s all. Everybody’s got to make up their own mind about what’s for sale and what’s not. Convincing people to buy a product that’s not the one they like on your work always felt a little funny to me.

“Having said that, I will proudly proclaim my son Roman just became a Marshall endorsee. And I stand behind his decision!”

There’s a lot of new gear out there. The tendency is to want all of it. Is there anything you’re especially jazzed about?

“I don’t have that problem – you say we want to try all of it; frankly, I want to try none of it! I am still crafting and harvesting new and exciting music from the gear I’ve been using since 1988, and some of it from before. If somebody’s got some awesome new pedal or whatever, send it my way and I’ll plug it in; but I’m not looking for new stuff.”

Why haven’t you strayed from that rig?

“I made a personal, artistic decision long ago. I had a Marshall half-stack that got stolen, and I had a recording session the next day. I had to buy something and they had a solid-state head or a tube head. I bought the tube head, which is a 50-watt Marshall 2205 channel switching head.

“They had one 4x12 cabinet, which was a Peavey. That was my gear. And I had a guitar made by a custom maker that I hated everything about. I changed everything except the block of wood, and I couldn't stand my sound. I was trying for a sound in my head that I was never going to get.

“I was so frustrated. I was buying gear, different guitar necks, different pickups. I spent one day – which was a life-changing day – in a rehearsal room on the Eastside of LA, where I worked on my sound for about two-and-a-half hours. I finally gave up. I was like, ‘I’m never gonna love the sound that I get out of this guitar and this amp. I’m gonna stop thinking about it. This is going to be my sound.’”

Steve Stevens recently reminded GW that you had a big hand in getting Randy Rhoads inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. And you’ve been championing Iron Maiden of late. What are your feelings about the Rock Hall?

“A lot of great bands have gotten into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame more recently, in part because they’ve had stronger advocates in the room. I’m one of those advocates. I have to give credit to the Hall of Fame – they put me in the room because I complained so damn much!

“When I toured with Bruce Springsteen, at every hotel bar I’d make a case to his manager, John Landau, who’s on the nominating committee for the Hall of Fame. My argument was: if you’re a kid playing little league baseball, your dream is that you might one day end up in Cooperstown, in the Baseball Hall of Fame.

“But if you’re a hard rock guitar player, you don’t care about the Hall of Fame because none of your favorite bands are in there. To John’s credit, he put me in the room and said, ‘Make your case.’ I did for Kiss, Rush, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Judas Priest and Randy Rhoads.

“It really opened the door and people’s minds and hearts to the idea that it shouldn’t be such a precious curated thing, and that an entire genre of music was been overlooked. But I will say that one thing that people get wrong is that the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame should be just for rock ’n’ roll bands.

“That’s not what it’s for. Public Enemy is more rock ’n’ roll than 95 percent of all the hair metal bands that ever picked up an instrument, you know? It’s music that has spirit to it, like a youth spirit… I think rock ’n’ roll should have a very, very broad sense. I think there’s room for a lot of different genres.”

So how are you going to get Maiden in?

“I have a hit list! The last one on my extended Mount Rushmore hit list is Iron Maiden. It’s strategic. This year I’m all in on Maiden. I know they don’t care – I don’t care that they don’t care because I think it’s the place where they belong.”

You’ve just played two shows to celebrate Wayne Kramer. What does his music mean to you?

“First of all, MC5 was punk rock before there was a name for it. They were the cornerstone – they built the scaffold on which punk rock exists. Without them, there is no Rage Against the Machine, no System of a Down, no Clash, Sex Pistols, Ramones; none of that.

“Their fearlessness, both musically and politically, was hugely inspirational to me. Their live recording of Kick Out the Jams might be the greatest moment of rock ’n’ roll that's ever been captured. It was the first time anybody cussed on a record and the first time anybody had the audacity to say that human liberation can be found in what we’re doing in this room tonight.

“That’s why I think they got into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame this year – though sadly it’s after all the members had passed away. But Wayne was a great friend of mine; he was one of the best humans I ever knew. He went from selling drugs, being in prison, and being a real rascal to someone who saved hundreds of people’s lives.

“He created this organization called Jail Guitar Doors. The shows sold out in two minutes, so I’m glad to raise money for a great organization in honor of Wayne.”

• Tom Morello’s new album is due out in 2025.

There have been all kinds of Fender Stratocasters through the 70 years since its release, some traditional, some modern, while others, such as Tom Morello’s Soul Power Strat, embrace the modular aspect of Leo Fender’s design and are modded into something new.

Yes, it’s still a Strat – a Designer Series Strat, to be precise – but as the Rage Against the Machine guitarist tells us, it is a Strat with a whole raft of changes to facilitate his unorthodox style, and usher in a new era for him artistically as he hooked up with the late Chris Cornell and co for Audioslave.

This, Soul Power, is the Audioslave Strat, and it is one of the coolest electric guitars in 21st century rock.

Where and when did you buy your “Soul Power” Strat?

“What’s interesting about the Soul Power guitar is that I had never played a Strat before. But around the time Audioslave was forming, I was looking for a new guitar to be my primary form of expression. I ended up going into a Guitar Center in Hollywood, and I found this Strat on the wall and took it home.”

Why did you choose this Strat above the others at Guitar Center?

“I literally saw it as a blank canvas. I wanted to have something totally different from what I’d had previously. I loved its stock form but needed to make it my guitar. I wanted it to be unique to point toward a new batch of songs.

“We were entering this new sonic landscape led by Chris Cornell’s amazing vocals, so I wanted a guitar that could undertake that new level of nuance and undertake new sounds that I hadn’t heard before from my other guitars.”

Did you use this guitar on any notable recordings?

“I used it on songs like Cochise, Like a Stone and I Am the Highway. It was the guitar I used on all three of Audioslave’s records. The Soul Power guitar was the Audioslave guitar!”

What about this guitar felt right in your hands compared to your “Arm the Homeless” guitar?

“I liked that this guitar spoke to me deeply. I’ve been known to scrawl things on instruments, and almost the second I got home, I took a white marker and scrawled ‘Soul Power’ on the guitar because I knew this was going to be a new era and a new band with Audioslave.

“The Arm the Homeless guitar has taken me on one journey, and I’d used that on a lot of stuff. I also used my Telecaster on the Rage Against the Machine stuff, but I wanted this guitar, the Soul Power guitar, to be something different from what that had been.”

What were some of the modifications you made to the Soul Power Strat?

“Soul Power had to be different from the other guitars I had, so within 72 hours of owning it, I added the kill switch for the stuttering sounds, some Seymour Duncan Hot Rails pickups and an Ibanez whammy bar. I also had this idea of the fretboard being like what Ace Frehley would’ve had on, like, [Kiss’s] Alive II, so I believe I had it re-fretted a couple of times too.”

Though you’d never endorsed a guitar before, Soul Power became your first signature guitar with Fender.

“I’d never done any signature guitar stuff before and had never really wanted to do any sort of endorsement. But if I was going to do one, it had to be something I believed in, that was done the right way.

“I’m very proud of the fact that when I did the Soul Power guitar with Fender, they came out exactly like my original guitar. I still have the original at home, and I have one of the ones we did with Fender – and they’re exactly the same.”

You mentioned you still own the original Soul Power Strat, but when did you last play it?

“Around 48 hours ago. [Laughs] I’m working on some new music, and it’s one of the guitars I still play regularly. But it’s funny – I’ve been relegated to being a rhythm guitarist in my house, as my 13-year-old plays my other [signature] Soul Power guitar, and he’s a shredder!”

What does the Soul Power Strat mean to you, considering that most people associate you with Arm the Homeless?

“It’s an important guitar because it represents a transitional period in my career with Audioslave. Soul Power was a new way to express myself during this new phase with this new band that included Chris Cornell, Tim Commerford and Brad Wilk. It became an instrument of liberation, was about inspiration and was not overthought from the second I grabbed it off that wall.”

2024 marks the 70th Anniversary of the Fender Stratocaster – a guitar that has helped shape, steer and inform the very course of popular and alternative music across its seven-decade lifespan.

Over the years, it’s been wielded by countless guitar heroes, including Tom Morello, whose Soul Power Strat is symbolic of some of the Rage Against the Machine and Audioslave titan’s most iconic feats of boundary-pushing guitar playing. 

Speaking in a new interview with Rock Sound to mark the model’s milestone, Morello dove deep into his love for the Strat, and explained what it is about the Big F’s flagship double-cut that makes it so appealing – and completely different from any other electric guitar on the market.

“One of the things that differentiates the Strat from other great electric guitars is the sound of those other guitars leading the player,” Morello explained. “With the Stratocaster, the player leads the sound.”

To articulate his point, Morello referenced the sounds of some of the Strat’s biggest champions, and noted how each individual has been able to definitively carve out wildly distinct sonic paths despite playing the same instrument.

“Off the top of my head, some of my favourite Strat players would be Jimi Hendrix's feedback frenzy and David Gilmour's emotional melodicism,” he continued. “Then there’s Jeff Beck reconstituting the instrument, Wayne Kramer inventing punk rock on it, and Andy Gill with Gang of Four, who used the guitar aggressively. 

“They are all playing Stratocasters but with hardly any sonic bleeds between their styles. So, when I got my hand on the Soul Power Strat, I knew it would allow me to explore myself as an artist in a new way simply by channelling my inner six-string soul power.”

Morello speaks from experience. As he recalls in the conversation, he got his first Stratocaster when he formed Audioslave, during a time when he was looking for a new instrument to guide his playing in new directions. The Strat turned out to be the perfect partner to pioneer his approach.

“When we formed that band, I wanted a different six-string colleague to help me forge my guitar path in that band,” he said. “I got a Strat, and it felt right in my hands. 

“I brought it home and immediately wrote ‘Soul Power’ on it as a North Star to guide my sonic travels with the band. And it really did provide that. 

“It got me out of a sonic safety zone that I had been in with Rage Against The Machine. It allowed me to adapt and play music with Chris Cornell and Timmy [Commerford] and Brad [Wilk] and expanded the possibilities of what it was that I could play.”

It’s set to be a year to remember for Fender, which is poised to celebrate the Stratocaster in style over the next 12 months. The party started early last year with the release of some suitably styled '54 reissue Strats, which were followed by a high-end collection of Custom Shop offerings.

A more futuristic HSS Ultra take on the template arrived earlier this month to continue the momentum, with Fender further fuelling the hype train by recruiting Morello, Nile Rodgers, Mateus Asato, Ari O’Neal and Rei for an all-star jam of Voodoo Child (Slight Return).

Head over to Fender to peruse its full 70th Anniversary Strat range.

Extreme’s Nuno Bettencourt and Gary Cherone jumped onstage with Tom Morello on Friday night (June 2) to cover Audioslave classic Cochise.

The performance took place at the Best of Blues and Rock festival 2023 in São Paulo, Brazil, where both Extreme and Morello were on the bill.

Naturally, the pairing of old guitar buddies Morello and Bettencourt meant the track simply had to have an extended call-and-response solo section, opening with Morello’s groaning lead from the original, before Bettencourt dropped some wailing bends and syncopated funk (even if the sound engineer forgot to crank Nuno up to begin with).

Morello follows up with one of his old tricks – the classic slide + toggle switching = DJ equation – before Bettencourt rounds things out with leads as bluesy as we’ve ever heard from the virtuoso.

It’s business as usual for the rest of the song, as Cherone reaches into his upper register to channel Chris Cornell’s monster vocal range. Props to Bettencourt’s spooky harmonics in the middle eight, too.

In a pre-show press conference, Morello shared his thoughts on Bettencourt: “He's been a huge influence,” he said. “Combining funky music with heavy music and then musicianship with abandon are things that have been involved in this band and I think in Nuno's playing from the very start.”

Bettencourt reciprocated Morello’s praise, joking, “It's funny because when we heard Rage Against the Machine for the first time, we loved it so much that we hated them. We have this saying that Jimmy Page – and I said this to Jimmy Page, I thought Jimmy Page wrote all the great rock ’n’ roll riffs and threw the rest of us all the scraps, the bones. And that was until I heard Rage Against the Machine.

“Every riff was monstrous; it was everything. And the fact that they had a rapper took it to a whole other level of genre and changed the game.”

The performance also marked Bettencourt’s return to the stage after suffering a knee injury that caused him to perform a date sitting down and cancel a subsequent show.

Bettencourt and Morello have performed together on several occasions in the past, most notably on their cover of the Game of Thrones theme tune using Fender’s highly limited electric guitars inspired by the hit HBO show.

Extreme’s new album, Six, is out on Friday (June 9) – last week, the band unveiled new single Other Side of the Rainbow, which Bettencourt says features his favorite solo on the whole album.

Audioslave’s Rick Rubin-produced debut, released in 2002, was a landmark effort for several reasons. For one, it ushered in the rise of the supergroup era, as Chris Cornell joined forces with Rage Against the Machine’s Tom Morello, Tim Commerford and Brad Wilk. But more importantly, it was an absolute monster of a rock record, teaming Zeppelin-esque swagger with grunge’s serrated edge and Morello’s off-the-wall guitar solos.

After a rocky start – the band split up and reformed before they even played a show – the group’s debut effort was trailed by the release of lead single Cochise, which was steamrollered into public consciousness by one of Tom Morello’s all-time great hooks, and one widely heralded as one of the best riffs of the 21st century.

Yet that riff had been waiting on the sidelines for six years before it finally wound up on Audioslave’s debut. Its first outing was never officially released, and it was under a Morello banner you might not be familiar with.

Formed in 1995 and named after the ’70s militant organization, Weatherman was an underground side-project featuring Morello alongside singer Vic Bondi, of Chicago politi-punks Articles of Faith. Very little else is known about the lineup, but its formation took place during the four-year wait between RATM’s debut and its 1996 followup, Evil Empire, which found the band’s members pursuing “different interests” in between recording sessions. Bondi later revealed Weatherman was funded by RATM’s record label, Sony, who were presumably hoping for something to release as they waited for Rage to finish their sophomore effort.

Although the project was short-lived, its impact would prove to be long-lasting: the writing sessions for the three tracks eventually committed to tape spawned a number of riffs that would later feature on the debut Audioslave record – chiefly Cochise, which was then known as Enola Gay, after the aircraft that dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima.

Though the recordings never surfaced via official channels, they eventually leaked onto the web, enabling us to hear Morello’s dry run for his future supergroup.

Enola Gay begins with a fat low E and violent string scrapes before everything stops to make way for that pentatonic riff. Bondi’s lower-range vocal performance doesn’t match Cornell’s Whole Lotta Love-esque wail, but the verse is unmistakably Cochise.

The track’s chorus and solo are again very different to Audioslave’s effort, further embellishing on the low-key intro, but another familiar riff crops up to close – this time The Narrows, from RATM’s 1991 demo tape.

It’s a concept of riff recycling that provides a through-line from Weatherman to Audioslave. Another track from the sessions, Drop, serves up supersized drop-B riffs that would feature in ’slave’s What You Are and Shadow on the Sun. (Action Man, the final song from the sessions, has yet to have any of its irresistible grooves reused – watch this space.)

But it’s the Cochise/Enola Gay riff that’s gone down in history – and perhaps that’s in part because it reminds us of other classic head-bangers: over the years, fans have pointed out its similarities to Pantera’s I’m Broken, Led Zeppelin’s The Ocean and even Soundgarden’s Get on the Snake, not to mention Morello’s own riff for Your Time Has Come, which opens Audioslave’s 2005 followup, Out of Exile.

The track’s legacy, however, is entirely its own. Tony Iommi, one of Morello’s personal riff lords, named Cochise his favorite of the 21st century, and it ranks highly in lists to this day.

A regular show closer during Audioslave’s initial tenure, the track’s final performance took place on January 20 2017 during Prophets of Rage’s Anti-Inaugural Ball at LA’s Teragram Ballroom. It was the band’s first performance in 12 years and prompted talks of a reunion tour, but tragically Chris Cornell would take his life just four months later.

While the song’s origins lie elsewhere, Cochise has come to represent both the birth and the epitaph of Morello’s musical relationship with Cornell – and it all started with that riff.

“Cochise was the introduction to Audioslave, where Chris Cornell, Tim, Brad and I came together,” Tom Morello told Kerrang! in 2021. “Plus, it features one of my favourite riffs that I’ve ever written.

“It was Chris’s outrageously spectacular and terrifying voice, and his rock-god presence matched up with us three players. It was such a great way to show that band to the world.”

A 1979 Gretsch Chet Atkins Tennessean electric guitar once belonging to late Soundgarden frontman Chris Cornell is up for sale on Reverb.com.

The six-string – which has a rather sizable price tag of $395,000 (down from an original price of $500,000) – was heavily used by Cornell during his time with both Soundgarden and Audioslave, both in the studio and onstage. The guitar can also be seen in the music video for Soundgarden’s Rusty Cage.

In terms of specs, the guitar appears to be all-original, with a laminated rock maple neck, rosewood fingerboard and laminated Cherry-finished maple hollowbody. Electronics come by way of a pair of adjustable pickups and a versatile set of controls, including two discrete volume knobs for each pickup, tone selector and pickup selector switches and a master volume control.

The instrument also features an adjustable bridge with chrome-plated metal parts and a Gretsch Bigsby-style tailpiece.

As Reverb notes, despite its age and heavy usage, the guitar remains in “excellent condition," most likely due to the fact it was supposedly Cornell’s “favorite” and was often kept at his home.

According to the Reverb listing, hosted by River City Guitars of Spokane, Washington, the guitar – serial number 29279 – is “fully documented by the superior court of Washington for King County and is unequivocally by law confirmed to be Cornell’s."

River City Guitars says these court documents will be included with the sale of the guitar, in addition to a certificate of authenticity.

For more information, head to Reverb.com.

This 1979 Gretsch Chet Atkins Tennessean is the latest in a series of high-ticket guitars to be put for sale online. Last month, a rare, unbranded Japanese double-cut played by Jimi Hendrix hit the auction block for the second time, after failing to meet its reserve price the first time around.

George Harrison’s Gibson ‘58 “ransom” Les Paul – used as a bargaining chip to ensure the recovery of the Beatles legend’s stolen Lucy guitar – also recently sold for more than $300,000.

Aside from his politics, Tom Morello is known for two things: one is, naturally, those regime-toppling riffs, and the other is his adventurous sonics, which boldly took the guitar into the realm of the DJ.

When Rage Against the Machine’s self-titled debut dropped in 1992, it was a wakeup call to guitarists taken in by the raw, unprocessed guitar tones that dominated the alt-rock revolution of the early-’90s. It was bold and defiant: it flew in the face of convention and helped to stitch together the hip-hop and metal influences the band wore so lovingly on their sleeves.

And while Morello would go on to share a wealth of sonic tricks over the decades that followed – with Rage, and later, Audioslave, Prophets of Rage and solo projects – he previewed many of those trademark sounds right at the outset of RATM’s career.

During the 1993 tour in support of the band’s debut, Morello and his iconic Arm the Homeless ‘mongrel’ electric would routinely take an extended solo spot during Bullet in the Head – and the guitarist, clearly eager to share his discoveries with the world, seized the opportunity to stun audiences with guitar tones quite unlike anything they had heard before.

The best example of this solo is heard during a show at Melkweg, Amsterdam in February 1993, which features on the band’s Japan-only Live & Rare compilation (now available on streaming platforms), and later resurfaced on the 20-year anniversary reissue of their debut.

Sadly, there’s no video of this particular set, but there is footage of another Netherlands gig that features this expanded spot at Pinkpop festival that same year (although it’s not the finest example of Morello’s closing ‘conventional’ guitar solo).

The lead can be broken down into five constituent parts, four of which showcase the unconventional techniques Morello would employ in later RATM and Audioslave cuts.

Several of these utilize the Morellian foundation of toggle switching (achieved by setting the volume on one pickup to zero and the other to full and rapidly switching between them), but – get this – not one features his pedalboard staple, the DigiTech Whammy.

The marathon solo begins with a dash to the 4x12 to generate the feedback required for Morello’s toggle-switching, Floyd Rose-shaking siren wail, which wound up on record in 1999’s Sleep Now in the Fire.

Another toggle-happy line is up next, this time featuring a healthy dose of wah pedal, which approximates the descending solo on the studio version of Bullet in the Head – a similar effect can be heard during Guerrilla Radio.

Audioslave fans might recognize what follows: the love-it-or-hate-it ‘laughing monkey’ solo from 2006 groover Original Fire, achieved by depressing the tremolo system all the way and slapping the strings against the pickups.

A ringing low E ushers in the arrival of a move Morello would go on to employ at pretty much every show of his career: it’s the Bulls on Parade toggle-scratch, a studio version of which would appear three years later.

Finally, there’s a brief blast of ’80s metal-style alternate picking to bring the one-minute solo home, and call time on Morello’s DJ guitar excursions.

In modern parlance, the lead is a baller move and a serious flex: Morello was here to lay down the groundwork for the future of guitar playing – and, as it turned out, his own recorded output, too.

And while some may disagree with calling this his ‘best’ solo – shredders will point to Take the Power Back and Know Your Enemy, while Killing in the Name remains the Whammy pedal moment – it is perhaps the ultimate example of the ingenuity he brought to the electric guitar.

Morello discussed his approach to breaking the shackles of traditional guitar playing with Total Guitar last year.

“Once I had the blinders off and realised the parameters of rock and roll guitar playing were not just Chuck Berry to Eddie Van Halen, I started practicing sounds – whether that was DJ scratching or wild boars rutting at the zoo or the helicopters overhead,” he recalled.

“Even if I couldn’t exactly mimic those sounds, practicing non-guitar noises led my playing in an entirely different direction. It felt like that lane was open. There was no-one else in it. I started constructing a whole sonic world out of these barnyard animal noises, old war films and Public Enemy records.”

Oh, and in case you’re interested in the leads that inspired Morello, he once named his favorite guitar solos of all time (none of which resembles a laughing monkey, for the record).

Jim Dunlop kicked December off with the launch of the MXR Power 50 Overdrive, a signature Tom Morello overdrive pedal designed to distil the tone of the Rage Against the Machine guitarist’s long-running Marshall JCM800 2205 and Peavey 4x12 amp rig into a pedal. Now the man himself has put the stompbox through its paces in its first official demo.

In the clip, Morello demonstrates his tones from his original rig, before showcasing how the pedal incarnation stacks up through a variety of different combos, including a Vox AC30, Mesa/Boogie Lone Star, Fender Hot Rod Deluxe, and even his son's 8” Fender Frontman 15-watt bedroom amp.

Utilizing his trademark Arm the Homeless electric and an identical pedalboard for each setup – connected to the Power 50’s onboard effects loop, which emulates the way Morello runs his effects through his Marshall – the results are uncanny.

Of course, there’s always the argument that tone is in the fingers, but even so, the sag and snap of that Morellian crunch is very much in evidence, whatever amp the pedal is plugged into.

The Power 50 utilizes a MOSFET-based circuit to emulate the preamp of Morello’s JCM, ​​and also features its full complement of controls, including Gain, Bass, Middle, Treble, Volume, and Presence.

“The Power 50 Overdrive emulates the amp setup that I’ve used since 1988,” Morello says. “I’ve made 21 studio albums, and that amp, that head, and that speaker, and that tone has been on 21 of them. It’s been my signature identifiable sound since Day One of my career.

“If you want to have the sound that has been on those records, you don’t need to find an amp and speaker cabinet from 1988. You can get that sound with the Power 50 Overdrive, no matter what your setup is.”

The MXR Tom Morello Power 50 Overdrive is available to preorder now, priced at $189.99 street.

Morello recently released his second solo record of 2021, The Atlas Underground Flood, which features his long-awaited collaboration with Kirk Hammett and Alex Lifeson.

Tom Morello had big plans for 2020 – first and foremost, a world tour with a reunited Rage Against the Machine that would’ve seen him rocking stages from Pittsburgh to Prague, Kansas City to Krakow. 

Instead, like all of us, he was stuck at home. “Pretty frankly, it was a time of great anxiety and depression,” Morello admits to Guitar World.

But then something shocking happened. “Weirdly,” he continues, “inspiration came... from Kanye West.” 

Let us state for the record that, no, Morello has not collaborated with the hip-hop icon. Rather, he found encouragement in something West had said in an interview. 

“He was talking about how he recorded the vocals to a couple of his big hit records on the voice memo of his phone,” Morello recalls. “And I thought to myself, well, I have a voice memo on my phone. Can I just record guitar riffs that way? So I did.” 

Those riffs, he continues, “sounded kind of great, so I started sending them out to various engineers and producers around the world. And that was the genesis for The Atlas Underground Fire.”

The follow-up to Morello’s 2018 solo effort, The Atlas Underground, the new The Atlas Underground Fire is built on a similar foundation, with Morello collaborating with a variety of musicians in a wide range of genres, from rock (Bruce Springsteen and Eddie Vedder on a cover of AC/DC’s Highway to Hell), metal (Bring Me the Horizon on Let’s Get the Party Started) and country (Chris Stapleton on The War Inside) to punk (Refused’s Dennis Lyxzén on Save Our Souls), alternative (Grandson on Hold the Line) and reggae (Damian Marley on The Achilles List). 

“It was sort of a free-for-all creative process,” Morello says. “The Atlas Underground project allows me to go well outside my safety zone.”

That’s particularly evident in Morello’s deep exploration of electronic music – the new record features a slew of artists that inhabit various corners of the EDM world, including Mike Posner, Phantogram, Protohype and Sama’ Abdulhadi – which he says is foundational to the Atlas Underground spirit.

“What I’ve tried to do is create this alloy between two worlds. It’s a cyborg – you don’t know where the guitar ends and the EDM begins. To me, that feels like an exciting future for the electric guitar.”

As for what The Atlas Underground Fire offered Morello in the present? “It allowed me to get out of the bunker,” he says. “It was a way to create connections and find a musical community in a time of absolute isolation. Really, it was a life raft for sanity.”

Is The Atlas Underground Fire a record that would have been made had it not been for the pandemic?

“Heavens no. This is a record that was born of lockdown. From the time I was 17 years old to the time that the world shut down in March of 2020, I’ve had a nonstop creative motor on me of writing, recording and performing. And it all came to a screeching halt.

“For the first four months or so I was absolutely adrift. You know, I have a nice studio in my house, but I don’t know how to work it. Like, I don’t know how to move any of the buttons around. So I was like, ‘I’m not going to be able to play shows. I’m not going to be able to record music.’ 

“But then I was reading an interview where Kanye West said he recorded the vocals to a couple of his big hit records using the voice memo on his phone. So I did that.”

I’m imagining you seated in front of a big mixing desk, surrounded by gear in your fully stocked studio... with a little phone propped up on the console for you to record into.

“[Laughs] Yeah. On a little folding chair. My laptop’s open so I can have, like, the BPMs in my ears or whatever, and the phone is balanced on the edge of the laptop on a chair facing the amp. But you know, there’s no manual that says, like, ‘The voice memo of your iPhone needs to be 8.4 inches away from the top left speaker...’ I just set it up on a chair. And I’ve gotta tell you, the guitar sounded pretty freaking great. 

“And a couple months in I did get a little mic to put on the actual phone. One of the guys that I work with was finally like, ‘Dude, we’ve gotta help you out in some way!’’

How did working in this way influence the record?

“It really affected the way I play and write. Because this is, what? My 21st studio album? And probably 20 of those records were made with four or five people in a room. I couldn’t do that this time. So necessity being the mother of invention, the process wasn’t, ‘Hey, let’s jam, let’s get a vibe in the room and see how it’s going.’ 

“It was ‘Here’s the four biggest, hairiest, gnarliest riffs that I came up with today. Who should I send those to?’ And maybe I’d send those to Bring Me the Horizon. And then the next day maybe it was, ‘I’ve got an idea for the solo for Highway to Hell. I’ll send that to Bruce Springsteen.’ Every day was kind of this creative oasis in the middle of all the chaos.”

So you weren’t necessarily writing with specific collaborators in mind?

“No. It was really just a free-for-all creative process. For example, the song that starts the record, Harlem Hellfighter, I had four or five big-ass riffs that were low-hanging fruit on that particular day. And so I sent them to Jon Levine, who’s a producer friend of mine that I’ve always wanted to work with. I said, ‘What do you think of these?’ And he’s like, ‘I’ll get to work.’ And he sent me back a track that I could play over. 

“Then the next day I had a few riffs that Bring Me the Horizon responded to, and that song was recorded on three continents – South America, Europe and North America. We just sent tracks back and forth. 

“Actually, a number of the songs had very sort of extraordinary recording circumstances. Mike Posner, on Naraka – which is the Hindu word for ‘hell’ – from the time we began working on the song until to the time we finished it, he summited Mount Everest. Some of those vocals were recorded at 25,000 feet.”

Mike Posner is one of several “non-rock” artists on The Atlas Underground Fire. What excites you about bringing the electric guitar into these other sonic realms?

“I firmly believe that the electric guitar is the greatest instrument to ever be invented by mankind. There is no instrument with more power and nuance. There’s nothing like the electric guitar – you can go anywhere with it, from a gorgeous Segovia classical piece to, you know, Sepultura destroying a stadium somewhere. 

“But I think the electric guitar has a future, not just a past. And so working with artists who push me beyond what I’ve been comfortable doing before is very important to me. I always want to anchor the thing with the Sabbath/Zeppelin/Deep Purple riffs that are my bread and butter, but I never want to be stagnant. I always want to challenge myself and try to play stuff that I never imagined.”

That seems to be an ongoing theme throughout your career.

“Well, there’ve been countless times when people have counted the electric guitar/rock ‘n’ roll out, you know? And one of those times was when people were like, ‘You can sample electric guitar, so you don’t need a guitar player anymore. A DJ can do that.’ So I said, ‘Well, I’m going to be the DJ, only with a Marshall stack and my bare hands.’ 

“Then when electronica came along there were all these acts like the Crystal Method and the Prodigy that were great rock ‘n’ roll bands that didn’t necessarily have guitar in them. And I would approximate the sounds and the textures of that vibe, only, again, using my guitar and my bare hands.

“There was a reason why all those Rage Against the Machine and Audioslave records said, “All sounds made by guitar, bass and drums.” Because I was literally stealing from other genres, but finding a way to make it come through a Marshall stack.

Looking at the more traditional rock aspects of The Atlas Underground Fire, you bring in Bruce Springsteen and Eddie Vedder to duet on a cover of AC/DC’s Highway to Hell. What’s the backstory there?

“Well, Bruce and Eddie and I have a history with Highway to Hell. When I was playing with the E Street Band in 2014, we were in Perth, Australia, the home of Bon Scott, and I wanted to pay my respects at his grave. 

“So I’m wandering around this Perth-ian graveyard at, like, 11:30 at night, and I’m unable to find it. I’m out there for about an hour, and then out in the distance comes this motorbike, like this little light in the cemetery. And this dude rides up – a heavy-set dude with a German WWII motorcycle helmet on and a T-shirt that reads ‘I don’t give a shit, but if I did, you’re the one I’d give it to.’ 

“I’m like, ‘This guy is going to know where Bon Scott’s grave is!”

Did he?

“Sure enough, he did. So he shows me, I pay my respects, and I go back to the hotel. And when I get there I see Bruce in the bar. And I’m like, ‘Bruce, since we’re here in Australia, do you think there’s any way that the circle of the E Street Band and the circle of AC/DC might overlap?’ And he goes, ‘I never really thought about that before, but I’ll think about it now.’ 

“And over the course of the next few days, we started rehearsing Highway to Hell at soundcheck. Then we were playing this huge soccer stadium in Melbourne, and Eddie Vedder happened to be at the show because he was on a solo tour at the time. And I had an idea. 

“I knock on Bruce’s door and I say, ‘We are in Australia, the land where AC/DC is king. What if we open the show with Highway to Hell with Eddie Vedder?’ And he was like, ‘That sounds like a good idea!’ And we did. And if you think you’ve seen an audience go nuts? You haven’t – unless you were there on that night. It was crazy.

“So when I was making this record with a lot of great young artists on it – Phantogram, Grandson, Mike Posner, Protohype – I knew I wanted a song with my rock brothers on it. And I reflected back to that night and the transcendent apex moment of rock power that that felt like. 

“I put the track together, sent it to Bruce. He sang two takes, and then I sent that to Eddie. And that’s how it came together.”

What gear did you use on the record?

“Well, the advantage of being kind of trapped in my studio was that I would just go in there and pick up a guitar to be the flavor of the day. Some of the music was recorded on the ‘Arm the Homeless’ guitar. Some of it was recorded with that guitar of mine that looks like an SG, but it’s not – it’s a $50 Kay, my first guitar. 

“I used my Audioslave-era Les Paul that I burned the Budweiser logo off of, the Soul Power [Stratocaster] guitar, the ‘Sendero Luminoso’ Telecaster, the Jimmy Page [Gibson EDS-1275] double-neck... There was a complete freedom in the recording of the ideas on whatever day. 

“It was just like, ‘I’m here alone, what guitar do I want to play? I’ve got 90 minutes until the grandmas and kids start screaming, so let’s get in as much rock ‘n’ roll as I can!’”

How about amps?

“Pretty much just my regular Marshall half stack, the [JCM800] 2205. That’s where the folding chair was – in front of that amp – so that’s where I rested my phone, and that became the setup. 

“As far as effects, a big part of the record was done with one of those little [Electro-Harmonix] POG pedals. It allows you to kind of sound like two guitars and a distorted bass all at once, and so I relied on that pretty heavily. 

“I also had the [Way Huge] Swollen Pickle [fuzz pedal], and then the Space Station, which DigiTech made in 1994 or something, trying to copy all my sounds and jam it into one shitty pedal. [Laughs] I still use that one.”

Although you were more or less using your traditional gear, do you feel the tones came out differently due to the fact that they were being recorded through your phone?

“It is a little bit different. But it is what it is. And there’s something very liberating about that. I’ve always been about embracing limitations, and this was a pretty significant limitation. Not sonically, because the guitars from beginning to end sound pretty great, and they do it sometimes in different and unexpected ways, which I think is healthy.

“But the way I had to create changed the way I created. Normally if I’m doing a guitar solo I’ll record a bunch of takes and listen back to them, and maybe there’s some piecing together of this part and that part. But this time I would just blow into the phone and go, ‘Let’s call that one Wednesday.’

”Like, the Highway to Hell solo? That was a Wednesday, man. It was great to be able to let go like that and let the chips fall where they may. It felt like there was a lot of very intuitive playing on this record, and there were a lot of riffs that went in different directions than they would have had I spent a lot of time overthinking things.”

Not only were you attempting to reevaluate the role of the guitar in popular music, but also how, as a rock guitar player, you can create with and record the instrument in the studio.

“Oh, absolutely. I mean, the first cornerstone of my playing is unapologetically and uncompromisingly big rock ‘n’ roll, and I will never budge an inch on that. That’s what I get off on the most, going back to the first AC/DC and Kiss and Led Zeppelin posters on my wall. That just feels right and feels like home. 

“At the same time, the other cornerstone of my playing has been to just disregard anything that has to do with tradition, whether it’s melody or tone or sound, or even what part of the guitar to look at as a sound-maker.

You hear that on The Atlas Underground Fire.

“That’s been the common thread through everything, whether it’s an Atlas Underground record or an Audioslave record. I need to feel a jam move air, but I also want it to challenge me. Vernon Reid called it the ‘What the fuck’ factor, you know? Like, when you put on a record and you hear what must be a guitar but can’t possibly be a guitar, you’re like, ‘What the fuck?’ 

“I remember thinking about that over and over again as a young person, and as a young guitar player. Every record I make, I try to have as many 'What the fuck?' factors as possible.”

• Tom Morello's The Atlas Underground Fire is out now via Mom + Pop Music.

Ernie Ball Music Man has announced a new limited edition run of Tim Commerford signature StingRay bass guitars. 

The four instruments all feature a range of customizations favored by the Rage Against the Machine and Audioslave bassist, who has a long-running association with the StingRay bass.

Most notable among the signature tweaks is an adjustable plastic thumb rest – what Commerford dubs ‘the curve’ – that allows Commerford to anchor his thumb in his preferred position.

As Commerford points out in the video above (approx. 5.55) you can lower the thumb rest to be flat to the body with the turn of a few screws, making adjustment a breeze for pick players. 

Alongside this is a classic string-through body bridge, but it’s been tweaked with mute pads, which Commerford uses to damp down unwanted frequencies when he’s playing with distortion.

There’s also a sculpted five-bolt neck joint, which allows for improved access to the neck’s dustier regions, with Commerford's trademark tattoo etched into the neckplate.

Electronics-wise, the bass is available in passive and active configurations, both with a single neodymium StingRay humbucker.

Commerford says: “I literally was like 18 years old when I saw a Music Man StingRay. It was a blonde StingRay with a black pickguard, and it was at a pawn shop. I scraped up the money and I got it, and that bass became the bass I used to record the first Rage [Against The Machine] record and it was a big part of my life.”

The four models are limited to just 50 instruments each, including a 50 full scale active basses in black, 50 full scale passive basses in natural, 50 short scale active basses in natural and 50 short scale passive basses in vintage sunburst.

The collection will be available exclusively from Music-Man.com. We'll take one of each, thanks...

This archive feature was first published on GuitarWorld.com in April 2012.

In pursuit of becoming a better, more well-rounded musician, I believe the most essential tool for any guitar player to utilize is live performance. While that may sound painfully obvious, I have encountered many talented “bedroom shredders” who find it impossible to translate their woodshed chops to the stage environment. 

A great many variables come into play when performing live that just cannot be approximated in any other way, be it jamming to CDs in your bedroom or playing in a garage or rehearsal room with your entire band.

For me, playing in front of an audience was crucial to my development as a guitarist. I first began to play live while in a series of cover bands in college, and my abilities as a player increased exponentially. 

For one, playing live helped me weed through many of the technical as well as creative obstacles that pop up in the live setting. Something as simple as remembering to secure the guitar cable by bringing it through the guitar strap (down at the strap button on the lower bout) is something I had to learn the hard way. 

I think we all know the horror of the guitar cable being inadvertently yanked out of the guitar while flying through the air doing backflips, right?

Another painfully obvious idea is to make sure you have fresh-or at least working batteries in all of your pedals. This line of thought can be applied to every supplemental piece of gear: be sure to have extra strings, cables, fuses, power strips, extension cords, etc. 

You can't expect the club, keg party or Bar Mitzvah where you are performing to have any of these things handy when you find yourself in need. 

It's great to be able to effortlessly peel off 64th notes while jamming along to Steve Vai's Flex-Able, but forgetting about these aforementioned small details can mean the difference between creative success and dismal failure in a live venue.

One of the main reasons playing live improved my abilities as a player is the powerfuI synergy that exists between a band and a live audience. That type of energy and awareness can never be duplicated in a rehearsal room. 

I'll admit to having had some deeply satisfying playing experiences while jamming alone to Albert King records, but nothing can beat playing live for pure excitement and exhilaration. It is truly a "trial by fire" experience.

We all remember the very first time we stepped in front of an audience to play. For me, it was while I was in a high school band called the Electric Sheep, which featured Adam Jones, later of Tool.

As good as we may have been, our collective playing ability dropped by about 50 percent whenever we played live. This is simple because we were no longer in the safe, comfortable environment of my mom's basement.

Suddenly, we were confronted with nerves, broken cables, faulty outlets, broken strings and all sorts of obstacles that hindered our performance. But the more we played live, the most comfortable and confident we became onstage. I soon began to develop a tight rapport with my guitar. 

For me, developing a command over the technical idiosyncrasies of live performance led to much more satisfying playing experiences overall.

It was no different when Rage Against the Machine first began playing live. There was a high degree of frayed nerves associated with our first performance, which took place in the highly pressurized environment of a living room in Huntington Beach, California. 

Our very first song was Take the Power Back, which begins with a funky bassline. Because we were all so hopped up about finally playing in front of an audience, bassist Tim Commerford started the song at three times the normal tempo, and it was a full-scale musical disaster. 

But a negative experience is part of the learning curve it provides; getting that type of crisis out of the way is essential to the development of a band. Becoming more comfortable in front of an audience allowed us, as a band, to progress.

At that first performance, even though Tim started the song way too fast, as soon as the beat dropped in, the place exploded instantly, there was a huge mosh pit in the middle of the living room – I still don't know how the damage was explained to this poor kid's parents! 

For our band, that gig was a cathartic experience. That living room explosion was the culmination of all the years of hard work. Personally, I had spent so much time getting my “live” chops together, through a series of often very crummy bands. 

With Rage, my journey brought me to music that I really believed in, and music that we, as a band, played great together. With Rage, there was also an instant connection between band and audience, and that connection only fueled our mission to keep writing songs and keep working hard.

Soon, wherever we went to play – be it talent night at Al's Bar in downtown LA, or opening up for Tool at a major venue – we maintained a “scorched earth” policy. 

Our attitude was, “We're not sure who is going to make it out alive tonight, because we are going to bring some heavy shit!” Though that kind of confidence and intensity level grew from the relationship we had with the audience, it was initially forged by a so lid underpinning of confidence in our own abilities. 

In time, you become resolute in the knowledge that you will give everything to the music and perform on a high level.

Each progressive move to a larger venue is like moving past locks in a dam. It's like the water level rises each time: you have to wait until your nerve and your skill level rises high enough before opening the door to the next level. 

Soon, we progressed to headlining clubs to headlining sold-out clubs to opening for lce-T's Body Count to eventually playing in front of hundreds of thousands of people at huge European festivals.

In time, a band's assuredness becomes almost unshakable. Rage could be in the midst of a disastrous show, like playing in the middle of a typhoon in Korea, and I'll look ahead on the setIist and see that we are going to end with Killing in the Name. 

I know that all of the lights in the hall will come on, 30,000 middle fingers will be raised in the air and the entire audience will look like it's on a trampoline. That's when I say to myself “Thank goodness!” because I know that everyone will leave with a big, beaming smile.

Playing live on a regular basis will invoke a rising tide of confidence for you, and for your band as a whole. Your “floor” becomes higher: as time goes on, your basic “starting point” becomes much more evolved, and much more together. 

You know you will be able to deliver the goods on a high level, no matter what. And that level only continues to grow. When my rig gets rolled out, either for the Tonight Show or for sharing the stage with U2 in front of 150,000 people, I know that everything will be all right because the groundwork has been well-laid.

2020 held a lot of surprises, but one of the gear world’s biggest shocks was the arrival of an official signature guitar from Tom ‘I don’t do signature models’ Morello: the Fender ‘Soul Power’ Stratocaster. And now that door is open, it seems Fender could be lining up another collaboration with the Rage Against the Machine guitarist – but it might not be the model you expect.

In a new video posted to his social channels, Morello tears through the main riff from Lightning Over Mexico, taken from The Catastrophists EP, his new collaborative effort with EDM mainstays The Bloody Beetroots. But the guitar he’s using for his playthrough is most definitely not his go-to ‘Sendero Luminoso’ Telecaster.

With its double-bound black-finished body and mirror scratchplate, the guitar in Morello’s hands is essentially a ‘Soul Power’ Telecaster, minus the Sharpied slogan – such a guitar never existed during his tenure with Chris Cornell-fronted supergroup Audioslave, and points towards a new collaboration with Fender.

Other notable features include a killswitch mounted on the guitar’s lower horn, a six-saddle hardtail bridge, non-locking Fender tuners, The Atlas Underground sticker and what appears to be a Fender Vintage Noiseless bridge pickup – of course, two VN single coils previously appeared in the SP Strat.

Sure, it could be a one-off custom job. But given Fender CEO Andy Mooney has previously stated that Morello has signed on to recreate all his guitars, we wouldn’t rule out all-new designs, either.

And while the ‘Sendero Luminoso’ Telecaster is the guitar that lit the drop-D flame in Killing in the Name and a host of incendiary RATM and Audioslave jams, it was nothing more than a stock 1982 Tele – an all-new Telecaster offering is arguably a more enticing proposition.

Suffice to say, we’re looking forward to Morello’s future collaborations with Fender, and we’ll be bringing you more news on the ‘Soul Power’ Telecaster as soon as we have it.

Life is full of mysteries that run the risk of never being answered: What is the meaning of life? Is there an afterlife? Why does Tom Morello never cut his electric guitar strings? 

Lucky for us, that last age-old question has been well and truly answered after Morello made an appearance on the Stern Show, during which he revealed the tale behind why he opts to leave the loose ends of his guitar strings on.

After talking to Morello about his 1980s garage band Electric Sheep – and before quizzing about his early Rage Against the Machine years – Howard Stern decides to shoehorn in a more pressing question. 

“By the way,” he asks, “why do you not cut your strings? Why do you always have your strings sticking out? I feel like it’s an accident.” 

In response, the Rage guitarist reveals that it is “no accident”, and goes on to say that he initially “didn’t cut the strings because I thought it looked cool.” 

However, the aesthetic addition was met with fierce opposition from his musical peers, who told the budding youngster to “cut your damn strings!”, informing him he had to be in the “baddest band in town” if he wanted to get away with it.

“I was shamed by a musician friend,” recalls Morello. “He said, ‘Who do you think you are? Do you think you’re in the baddest band in town?’ I thought, ‘I’m definitely not,’ so I cut my strings.” 

Such ridicule would be enough to deter anyone from leaving on their guitar strings, and would encourage most to ditch the idea of having them as a spiky statement piece.

So, what did Morello do? Well, he formed the baddest band in town, of course.

“Years later, when I was in Rage Against the Machine, I was in the baddest band in town," explains a vindicated Morello. "And so I let my strings go.”

At long last, the mystery has been solved, and if anyone calls you out for not cutting your strings, just prove them wrong by forming a band, touring the world and becoming one of the fiercest groups around.

Admittedly, it sounds a little harder than Morello made it out to be. Perhaps just cut your strings instead.

He’s the Harvard alumnus, political activist and eternal square peg whose sonic adventurism with Rage Against The Machine and Audioslave tore up the rules of electric guitar. 

Now, as Tom Morello releases a new photobook spanning his three-decade career, he shares memories of obsessive practice, bad gigs and nights behind bars…

Kid Rock

“As a kid, I had a little acoustic guitar that I probably plucked Smoke On The Water on. But at that age, I had no ambitions beyond jumping around on the sofa with it. Then, at 15, I had a couple of guitar lessons that didn’t really take because they wanted to teach me how to tune the guitar and play the B major scale – and I wanted to learn Black Dog and Detroit Rock City. But from 19 years old, I became obsessive-compulsive. Guitar felt like a religious calling. It bordered on some kind of mental disorder. I couldn’t not do it. It was a compulsion that steered my life.”    

High Flyer

“In my high-school band, we practised so hard to play Born To Be Wild for a battle of the bands. When we got on stage, the piano player played the wrong chords, the bass player came in on the wrong note – it was a very inauspicious beginning to my musical career. 

“But we were on a riser. And so when the chorus came in I leapt off the riser – and the place went apeshit. It was like, ‘We’ve spent four months learning the song but what we should have been practising is jumping up and down.’ It was a lesson I haven’t forgotten. I always had that track-and-field background, and for some reason, from early on I could always play guitar while aloft.”

Cheap Thrills

“I had a bad experience when I bought my first $50 Kay. The sales rep was mocking me, saying the action was ridiculously high – ‘but I guess you’re not gonna play very extensive leads anyway, are you?’ I had more than one chip on my shoulder but that stuck with me. 

“That Kay was my main guitar until I got a Gibson Explorer. Then it sat for 30 years at my mom’s house in Illinois. Until one day, I sat bolt-upright in bed, went back to Illinois, got that Kay, gave it to my tech and said, ‘Let’s see what we got here.’ I actually used it on The Atlas Underground [2018]. Cheap guitars can be great. I mean, my ‘Creamy’ guitar cost $40, and that – through a 20-watt solid-state Marshall practice amp – won Rage our first Grammy for Tire Me.” 

Hard & Fast

“When my friends began loving punk-rock, leaving behind their Spandex and heavy metal, I still wanted to have one foot firmly in both worlds. I never gave up Sabbath, Maiden, Priest, the Yngwies and Vais – while at the same time, embracing the rawness of punk. 

“You know, The Clash is my favourite band of all time. And Joe Strummer, as far as guitar players go, is both the greatest and someone who could barely play, to the standards of the readers of Guitarist magazine. In rock ’n’ roll, it’s much more about the spirit of what you’re doing, rather than the technical ability. But I wanted to have both.”

Up All Night

“Studying at Harvard while playing rock ’n’ roll was challenging. It was a pretty significant jump in workload and brain bandwidth. And then, added to that, was my obsessive-compulsive practice regimen. I would finish my studies at two in the morning then practise until 6am, like it was nothing. Just alone in a stairwell, day after day. 

“It did not necessarily help with my social skills, relationships or job opportunities. In my four years at Harvard, I maybe missed two days of practice, through some really debilitating sickness. And then I felt really guilty about missing those two days!” 

Hair Today, Gone Tomorrow

“Moving to Los Angeles in the 80s was dreary. I’m a real type-A personality, so I was like, ‘I’m gonna put together a band with neo-Marxist politics and Black Sabbath riffs.’ I put an ad in the paper to that effect and my phone was not exactly ringing off the hook. 

“I thought I was gonna move out there and it was gonna be a world of Steve Vais and Yngwie Malmsteens. But it was all about this very particular image. It was the height of Faster Pussycat and the Sunset Strip bands. No-one wanted to play with me. I remember making plans to jam with some metal band but before it happened their manager called to ask, ‘First of all, how long is your hair? Not that long? Then we’re not interested.’”

Going Underground

“What I didn’t know was that there was this underground LA scene bubbling up, with bands like Jane’s Addiction and the Red Hot Chili Peppers, that had a very different aesthetic. I joined a band called Lock Up, who didn’t care how long my hair was, they just thought I was a ripping guitar player. 

“That underground scene introduced me to the idea that you could match heavy riffs with intelligent lyrics and imagery, and not be ashamed. So when Lock Up broke up, I was determined to never play the game and never write or play a note of music I didn’t absolutely believe in.”

Square Pegs

“I was fortunate, in Zack De La Rocha [vocals], Brad Wilk [drums] and Tim Commerford [bass], to find musicians who felt the same as me. That had no commercial ambitions whatsoever. There was no hope of a record deal. There were no bands playing in clubs that looked like us, you know, a militant Chicano rapper, a half-black guitar-shredding guy, a Jewish drummer and an Orange County weightlifting bassist. 

“And so we made the music for that first Rage Against The Machine record in total innocence. We rehearsed at this industrial park in the San Fernando Valley, and I remember the first person we ever played for was this guy who worked down there. He sat down, we played him four songs, and afterwards he stood up and said, ‘Your music makes me want to fight!’”

Sound & Vision

“In the earliest days of Rage, I was still practising eight hours a day, you know, full-on Randy-Rhoads-poster-on-the-wall kind of shredding. Then we played some worthless college gig, opening up for two cover bands and they both had a shredding guitar player. 

“I was watching these two guys soundcheck and I thought, ‘Well, there doesn’t need to be a third.’ So during my eight hours, I began practising the eccentricities in my playing, experimenting with the toggle switch – or if I made a mistake repeating that mistake 16 times and making it the cornerstone of the song. 

“With some of my Rage solos, there is technique involved. I still had my 80s gunslinger mentality tucked away in there somewhere, you know, to be the fastest draw. But it was much more a matter of imagination and creativity than technical ability.”

Step On It

“I’ve been accused countless times of using a ton of effects – but I’ve used the same four pedals for the last 30 years. It’s a wah, a Whammy, a delay and a phaser. It’s just about finding different applications for the same old shit. 

“The electric guitar is a relatively new instrument on the planet. It’s just a piece of wood, with six strings, a few electronics. But you can manipulate it. As soon as I had that revelation in Rage, it was like, ‘I’m the DJ in the band but rather than sampling I’m gonna use my bare hands to create this new vocabulary for the electric guitar.’ 

“My influences were Dr Dre, Jam Master J and a trip to the zoo, you know? So the combo of the big, heavy Sabbath-Zeppelin riffs, with this otherworldly R2-D2 stuff, it really felt like I’d found my voice on the instrument. There was no-one else in that lane.”

Take The Power Back

“I’ve been arrested four times for civil disobedience. The feeling evokes what it might have been like to be in jail in Martin Luther King’s time, where you’re singing songs with your comrades, and you’re on a mission, and you knew that morning that you were gonna be in jail that night. 

“Rage’s protest gig outside the Democratic National Convention in 2000 was really hairy. It felt like we could all die. There were tens of thousands of people hemmed in and the police gave everyone a five-minute warning to disperse – then attacked the crowd after about 30 seconds. My girlfriend, who’s now my wife, got hit with a baton. We were trying to get out with our lives, you know?”

Sonic Boom

“We were very fortunate with Audioslave. It was our collective belief that for a band to find its greatness, it has to be authentic. When Tim, Brad and I originally formed Audioslave with Chris Cornell in 2001, it was my intention that it would be even more political than Rage. 

“But it soon became clear that wasn’t the direction we wanted to go. The principal difference between Rage and Audioslave is not politics. The music in Rage is very James Brown and hip-hop-based – it all comes back to the ‘1’. In the entire catalogue of four Rage Against The Machine albums, there might be zero chord changes. 

“It’s relentless. But with Audioslave, to provide Chris with the harmonic interplay that would allow him to weave great melodies, we had a very different sonic palette. You know, songs like I Am The Highway, Like A Stone or Be Yourself were chord based. That pushed us and made for three exciting records.”

American Graffiti

“The guitar is just another canvas to express yourself. I had already painted four cute little hippos onto one of my guitars. Then just before Rage played our first headline club gig at the Whisky A Go Go, I was sat there on my floor and I scrawled ‘Arm The Homeless’ onto it. To me, it’s the juxtaposition of these happy floating hippopotami and this kind of situationist, outrageous screed written on the guitar.

“It represented pretty well who I am. That writing has been on there 30 years. In a way, a guitar is a divining rod to bring down truths from the heavens. And I needed a different divining rod for Audioslave, and that was the ‘Soul Power’ Strat. I customised the toggle switch, the pickups, the whammy bar – and it reflected the change.”

Folk You, I Won’t Do What You Tell Me

“I’ve always been drawn to heavy music. First it was metal, then it was punk, then it was hardcore hip-hop. But I discovered folk music late and when I did it was early Dylan records, Springsteen’s Nebraska, Woody Guthrie, stuff like that. 

“And I realised that folk music is the heaviest of all, because the right couplet, matched with the right minor chord, can keep you up five nights in a row. In order to convey what I want to as the agitprop folk troubadour in The Nightwatchman, that’s going to require an acoustic guitar. That’s still a very important part of my musical life.”

Sky’s The Limit

“Trust me, there are plenty of new guitar sounds still to discover. I guarantee you that. I got new shit coming and there’s some pretty crazy guitar tones. It’s a lifelong quest to expand the boundaries of what I consider the greatest instrument ever invented, which is the electric guitar.

“While musical trends come and go, and while guitar music ebbs and flows on the charts, there is nothing – nothing – in the history of live or recorded music like the sound of a distorted electric guitar and the beat dropping with it. There’s great music of many other kinds – country, classical, jazz and hip-hop. But there’s nothing that approximates that adrenaline surge.”

Turning The Page

“When I look through my new photobook, Whatever It Takes, it reminds me of what a crazy mosaic my career has been. It’s like this bizarre quilt of rock ’n’ roll and political activism, with Rage, Audioslave and gigs with Springsteen, bad outfits and picket lines. To me, it’s just my life and I live it day by day. But when you assemble it all into one tome – it’s kind of staggering, you know?” 

• Tom Morello's new photobook, Whatever It Takes, is out now through Genesis Publications.

Despite his arsenal of oddball electric guitars, Tom Morello’s Rage Against the Machine career tends to be linked with two main instruments: his Arm the Homeless Frankenstein creation and ‘Sendero Luminoso’ Fender Telecaster.

The latter is the guitar responsible for the RATM debut’s drop-D juggernauts, including the band’s landmark single Killing in the Name. But, as it turns out, it wasn’t the only guitar used on that particular track.

In a recent Instagram post, Tom Morello let fans into the history of his relationship with the Gibson Les Paul, which dates right back to the very first Rage Against the Machine demo.

“In the studio with this old friend yesterday,” Morello commented. “Bought this guitar in 1992 from West LA Music. After borrowing an engineer’s Les Paul to do overdubs on the Bullet In The Head demo I decided I needed my own Les Paul.

“Why did I choose this one? Because it was the color of Taco Bell hot sauce, a staple food group of mine at the time. It became my principal overdub guitar and is heard on Killing In The Name, Freedom, Township Rebellion and many others, backing up my Tele. Still sounds great.”

So, for anyone wondering how Morello’s riffs sound quite so thick on that album, there’s your answer. As many engineers and producers will attest, combining single coils and humbuckers always yields good results.

Eagle-eyed Morello fans will note that the ‘Del Taco’ Les Paul Standard, as Morello has dubbed this particular guitar in the past (brand loyalty be damned), was used live during Audioslave’s 2005 tour to perform a number of Soundgarden tracks, including Spoonman and Loud Love.

The guitarist’s most famous Les Paul is the ‘Budweiser’ LP, which had its promotional beer branding burned off by Morello in a parking lot. It became his main guitar on Audioslave’s final album, Revelations.

You might recall Tom Morello gifting 10-year-old viral star Nandi Bushell his signature Fender Soul Power Stratocaster, after the Rage Against the Machine guitarist witnessed her incendiary cover of his band’s Guerrilla Radio, in support of Black Lives Matter.

Now, Bushell has put his gift to the test in a storming performance of the track that first introduced Soul Power to the world: Audioslave’s monstrous 2002 hit Cochise.

As with her Guerrilla Radio performance, Bushell plays electric guitar, bass and drums on the track, even employing a drum stick to recreate Morello’s iconic string-slapping ‘helicopter’ intro.

Morello himself has praised the performance, stating “That guitar is in good hands!”, while RATM/Audioslave drummer Brad Wilk commented, “You are awesome Nandi!”

In an interview with Guitar World, the TxLips Band leader Gabriella ‘Guitar Gabby’ Logan said of Bushell, “I can only imagine the inspiration other girls will feel watching her videos.

“I have so much respect and admiration for her. She’s putting on for the girls of the current generation and the ones behind her. And you have to remember she inspires not even young girls but adults as well. Honestly, I’m inspired by her every day.”

The launch of a production-line Tom Morello Soul Power Stratocaster was one of the biggest surprises of the gear year, but according to Fender CEO Andy Mooney, it’s the first of many signature models for the Rage Against the Machine and Audioslave star.

In an interview with Loudwire, during which he showcased several new and rare Fender models, Mooney explained how the Soul Power signature Strat came about, and what’s in the future for the company’s collaboration with Morello.

“I have a 13-year-old daughter, and 18 months ago, I went to the annual fundraiser for her school, and lo and behold, there was a Tom Morello guitar there, signed by Tom up for auction,” Mooney recalls. “And along with it was an hour’s lesson from Tom. So there was no way I was not going to get outbid on that.

“At the end of the session, he said to me, ‘What’s that? What are you playing?’ It was a Chris Shiflett signature guitar. He goes, ‘Oh, you do signature guitars?’ I go, ‘Yeah, we don’t do that many.’ And he goes, ‘Well, would you do mine?’ And I go, ‘You’re serious? You want us?’

“He said, ‘Yeah, I’d like to do them all, because they’re my guitars. Beginning with Soul Power, because that really was an Audioslave guitar, and I’ve moved on from there.’ And I’m like, ‘Of course!’”

Surely, Morello’s iconic RATM parts guitar, Arm The Homeless, is next in the running. Should a signature model ever come to fruition, fans may have expected Ibanez to be the brand for the job, given the Japanese company made Morello’s Arm The Homeless backup, a Roadstar model that also came adorned with hippos. Assuming Fender does indeed make a replica, we’d expect these to be included as a decal, as with the Soul Power.

Another likely candidate is the 'Sendero Luminoso' Telecaster - a stock 1982 Tele that Morello used for just about every drop D-tuned song he played throughout his career.

On his new relationship with Fender, Morello recently told Guitar World: “I’ve never done any signature guitar before, never done any endorsements.

“The one thing I have always done endorsements for is my music, which is something that I make, and something I believe in. So until I had a guitar that I made and I believe in, I wasn’t going to do that.

“This is a guitar that I am very, very proud of, but I would never have done if there was not a crucial charity/social justice component to the whole procedure.”

Presumably we can expect similar charitable donations with Morello’s future Fender collaborations.

During the rest of his Loudwire interview, Mooney demonstrates a number of Fender models by playing a few of his favorite riffs, including Black Sabbath’s Paranoid, Deep Purple’s Black Night and Jimi Hendrix’s Little Wing.

The CEO then moves into altogether heavier territory, with Alice In Chains anthem Man In The Box, Rage Against the Machine’s Killing in the Name, and even a bit of Pantera’s I’m Broken and Slipknot’s The Devil in I.

For more info on the Soul Power Stratocaster, head over to Fender.

Although Rage Against the Machine’s eagerly anticipated reunion tour dates have been postponed, the launch of Fender’s Tom Morello signature Soul Power Stratocaster is still going right ahead - and the man himself has given Guitar World an exclusive interview to share a little background on the signature guitar nobody thought would happen.

In the video, Morello details what made him finally sign up to release a replica of the guitar that fueled Audioslave hits such as Cochise and Like A Stone.

“I’ve never done any signature guitar before, never done any endorsements,” Morello says.

“The one thing I have always done endorsements for is my music, which is something that I make, and something I believe in. So until I had a guitar that I made and I believe in, I wasn’t going to do that.

“This is a guitar that I am very, very proud of, but I would never have done if there was not a crucial charity/social justice component to the whole procedure, and to that end, we’re giving away hundreds of guitars to two organizations.”

These guitars will go Wayne Kramer’s Jail Guitar Doors, which uses six-strings as a means of rehabilitation for prisoners, as well as the Fender Play Foundation, which donates instruments to local youth organizations.

Morello goes on to detail the modifications he made to the instrument, how he feels about the original being featured in the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art, and whether he still stands by his comment that "gear does not matter".

The Tom Morello Stratocaster is available now for $1,299. For more info, head over to Fender.

NAMM 2020: Although Rage Against The Machine have only just reunited, it seems Audioslave is also on the agenda for firebrand guitarist Tom Morello, as he used his recent Guitar Revolution camp to announce a production-line version of his iconic Soul Power Stratocaster.

The news comes via an Instagram post from YouTuber Ryan ‘Fluff’ Bruce, an instructor at the camp, where he stated, “Today, Tom Morello and Fender unveiled the Soul Power signature production model”.

Now, that’s not entirely true, because Fender has yet to comment on the post, but we’re likely to find out whether it’s for real at the NAMM show next week.

The Soul Power Strat was Tom Morello’s main guitar throughout his time in Chris Cornell-fronted supergroup Audioslave, and was used for all songs in standard tuning on the group’s self-titled (2002) and Out Of Exile (2005) albums, including singles Cochise, Like A Stone and Your Time Has Come.

Morello’s original guitar was an FSR Aerodyne Strat, which he had fitted out with an Ibanez Edge locking tremolo system (which would likely be replaced with a Floyd Rose on a production run), Seymour Duncan Hot Rails in the bridge position, and his trademark kill switch.

If the production-line Soul Power Strat does indeed come to fruition, that leaves us with two questions:

1. Will Morello begin playing the Soul Power Strat with Rage Against The Machine?
2. Can we expect the “great Audioslave material in the vault” to finally see the light of day this year?
3. Will the 'Soul Power' branding come as a separate decal?

We’re looking forward to getting to the bottom of this one in the coming days, but given Morello recently teamed up with Fender to promote its Game of Thrones models, the signs certainly look positive...

BackStory Events and Guitar World invite you to join us for the live stream of our exclusive interview with legendary musician Tom Morello, co-founder of Rage Against The Machine, Audioslave and Prophets of Rage. The interview will take place at 11:30 a.m. EST this Tuesday, May 14, live from The Cutting Room in New York City.

We’ll talk about his recent release, The Atlas Underground, stories from the road and much more. Morello will be interviewed by author and journalist Brad Tolinski. The event is part of the BackStory Events online series and will be live streamed by Guitar World magazine.

To find out more, visit tommorello.com or backstoryevents.com.

The video will appear below once we go live.

Last night, Wednesday, January 16, friends, family and former band mates of late Soundgarden and Audioslave frontman Chris Cornell convened at the Forum in Los Angeles for the "I Am the Highway: A Tribute to Chris Cornell" concert event.

Among the artists that performed during the star-studded evening included Metallica, Foo Fighters, Tom Morello, Jerry Cantrell, Melvins, Queens of the Stone Age’s Josh Homme, Perry Farrell, Maroon 5’s Adam Levine, Ziggy Marley, Miley Cyrus, Brandi Carlile and many more. The event also featured a partial reunion of Temple of the Dog, which featured Cornell alongside members of Pearl Jam and Soundgarden, and a show-closing set from Cornell’s Soundgarden band mates.

As previously reported, the evening benefitted the Chris and Vicky Cornell Foundation (chrisandvickycornellfoundation.org/) as well as The Epidermolysis Bullosa Medical Research Foundation (www.ebmrf.org), a nonprofit dedicated to raising funds and awareness for this painful and debilitating genetic disorder, a very personal cause that Cornell cared deeply about and supported through his commitment to helping others.

You can check out Metallica’s set above and the Foo Fighters’ four-song performance below.

"I Am the Highway: A Tribute to Chris Cornell" complete setlist:

Melvins (Buzz Osborne, Dale Crover, Steven Shane McDonald, Jeff Pinkus)

-       Kicking Machine

-       With Your Heart Not Your Hands

-       Leech

-       Heart Of Honey

-       Spoonman

Rita Wilson

-       The Promise 

Nikka Costa and Alain Johannes

-       Disappearing One

Chris Stapleton

-       The Keeper

Foo Fighters (Dave Grohl, Taylor Hawkins, Nate Mendel, Pat Smear, Chris Shiflett, Rami Jaffee)

-       No Attention

-       Earache My Eye

-       Girl You Want

-       Everlong (Acoustic)

Josh Homme

-       Rusty Cage

Adam Levine, Jesse Carmichael, and Stone Gossard

-       Seasons

Miley Cyrus

-       Two Drink Minimum

Audioslave (Tom Morello and Brad Wilk)

-       Cochise (with Geezer Butler and Perry Farrell)

-       Be Yourself (with Geezer Butler and Juliette Lewis)

-       Set It Off (with Chris Chaney, Sam Harris and Tim Mcllrath)

-       Like A Stone (with Chris Chaney and Brandi Carlile)

-       Show Me How To Live (with Robert Trujillo and Dave Grohl)

Toni Cornell and Ziggy Marley

-       Redemption Song

Metallica (James Hetfield, Lars Ulrich, Kirk Hammett, and Robert Trujillo)

-       All Your Lies

-       For Whom the Bell Tolls

-       Master of Puppets

-       Head Injury

Ryan Adams (Daphne Chen, Richard Dodd, Eric Gorfain, Leah Katz, and Don Was)

-       Dead Wishes

-       Fell On Black Days 

Temple of the Dog

-       Preaching The End Of The World (Nikka Costa, Alain Johannes, Stone Gossard, Brendan O’Brien, and Josh Taylor)

-       Can’t Change Me (Nikka Costa, Alain Johannes, Stone Gossard, Eric Avery, and Josh Freese)

-       Hunted Down (William DuVall, Jerry Cantrell, Stone Gossard, Jeff Ament, and Josh Freese)

-       All Night Thing (Fiona Apple, Brendan O’Brien, David Garza, Jeff Ament, and Matt Chamberlain)

-       Reach Down (Miguel, Nikka Costa, Stone Gossard, Brendan O’Brien, Jeff Ament, and Matt Cameron)

-       Say Hello 2 Heaven (Miley Cyrus, Brendan O’Brien, Stone Gossard, Jeff Ament, and Josh Freese)

-       Hunger Strike (Brandi Carlile, Chris Stapleton, Stone Gossard, Brendan O’Brien, Jeff Ament, and Matt Cameron)

Soundgarden (Kim Thayil, Ben Shepherd, and Matt Cameron)

-       Rusty Cage (with Taylor Momsen)

-       Flower (with Marcus Durant)

-       Outshined (with Marcus Durant and Stone Gossard)

-       Drawing Flies (with Taylor Momsen, Buzz Osbourne, Matt Demeritt, and Tracy Wanamae)

-       Loud Love (with Taylor Momsen, Tom Morello, and Wayne Kramer)

-       I Awake (with Taylor Hawkins and Buzz Osbourne)

-       The Day I Tried To Live (with Taylor Hawkins and Buzz Osbourne)

-       Black Hole Sun (with Brandi Carlile, Peter Frampton, Tim Hanseroth, and Phil Hanseroth)

The Foo Fighters, Metallica and Ryan Adams will be among the musicians that will gather for a special tribute performance to late Soundgarden frontman Chris Cornell. The event, titled “I Am the Highway: A Tribute to Chris Cornell,” will take place at the Forum in Los Angeles on January 16. Also included on the star-studded bill will be members of Cornell’s bands Soundgarden, Audioslave and Temple of the Dog. The event will be hosted by Jimmy Kimmel and will feature other surprise guests.  

Tickets will go on sale on Friday, November 16 at 10 A.M. PST here.

“We are honored to have all these amazing artists and friends come together to pay tribute to and show their love and appreciation for Chris, his music and the mark he’s left on the world.  We look forward to sharing this night with all the fans,” said Chris’ wife, Vicky Cornell. 

The host committee includes Vicky Cornell, Tom Morello, Matt Cameron, Brad Pitt, Josh and Kathryn Brolin, Jimmy Kimmel, Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson, Courteney Cox, Kaley Cuoco, David Spade, John Carter Cash, Linda Ramone, Andrea & Paul Joseph, Cynthia Pett, Peter Berg, Sam and Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Marc Gurvitz & Julianne Phillips, Ron Laffitte, Michael Rapino, Brent Smith and Lisa Engel, Michele Bernstein, Patrick Whitesell, Scott Sartiano, Michael Cooper, Nicholas Karayiannis, Eric Esrailian, and Paul and Renee Haas.

In keeping with Chris’ vision to protect the world’s most vulnerable children, the evening will benefit the Chris and Vicky Cornell Foundation (chrisandvickycornellfoundation.org/) as well as The Epidermolysis Bullosa Medical Research Foundation (www.ebmrf.org), a nonprofit dedicated to raising funds and awareness for this painful and debilitating genetic disorder, a very personal cause that Chris cared deeply about and supported through his commitment to helping others.

As previously reported, a new career-spanning Chris Cornell album will be released on November 16. The self-titled effort features unreleased studio and live material, and will be available as a 17-track album and a 64-track limited-edition deluxe box set.

You can check out full Chris Cornell details and track listing here, and preorder the album here. 

Before his tragic death last May at the age of 52, Soundgarden and Audioslave frontman Chris Cornell contributed to Johnny Cash: Forever Words, an album of adaptations of Cash's poems that also features Elvis Costello, Willie Nelson, the Jayhawks, Rosanne Cash and Kris Kristofferson, among many others.

Now, Cornell's contribution to the album—a haunting cover of Cash's "You Never Knew My Mind"—has been released. You can hear it above.

Cash himself covered Soundgarden's 1991 song, "Rusty Cage," for his 1996 album, Unchained. In a 2016 interview that was posted to YouTube yesterday, along with the release of the cover, Cornell said that Cash was "One of the bigger presences in my life, in terms of an artist that I'm a fan of."

"The very first challenge really was crossing that threshold of changing one word," Cornell said of the process of adapting Cash's poem to music. "I think I had to cross that right away, where I'm thinking 'I want to make a good song out of this, so that's going to have to be repeated, and this line's going to have to happen twice,' and that was a little scary."

Johnny Cash: Forever Words is set for an April 6 release via Legacy Recordings. You can preorder it here, and watch the full interview with Cornell below.

We will never know what went on in the mind of Chris Cornell after he left the Detroit Fox Theater on the night of May 17. He’d just played a well-received show with his iconic grunge-era band, Soundgarden. But just a few hours later, he was found dead on the bathroom floor in his room at the MGM Grand Detroit hotel. A coroner later ruled his death a suicide by hanging.

Cornell’s passing, at age 52, was all the more shocking for its unexpectedness. Accounts of that final show vary. Some witnesses say Cornell appeared to be in good spirits. Others sensed that something was off. But then, hindsight is always 20/20.

Cornell possessed one of the most distinctive voices in rock music—powerful enough to cut through the thickest wall of grunge guitar squall, yet subtly expressive, dappled with a broad spectrum of emotional colors. A prolific songwriter as well, his down-tuned dolor and jagged rhythmic sensibilities did much to set the tone and pace for American rock in the Nineties.

Ultimately, though, an artist’s songs and performances give us only a partial insight, at best, into his heart and mind. Reclusive and even agoraphobic at times, Cornell suffered from periods of depression as well as alcohol and drug-related issues. But he’d put some of that behind him when he became sober in 2002.

“He was a complex and gentle soul,” Cornell’s fellow Nineties rock icon Perry Farrell tweeted after the news of the singer’s death went public. Smashing Pumpkins drummer Jimmy Chamberlin paid tribute to Cornell’s substantial contribution to rock music, calling him “Truly one of the greatest singers of our generation, and a kind soul.”

Cornell was a key figure in the emergence of the Seattle grunge sound that became the predominant force in guitar-driven rock music of the Nineties.

Seattle is also where he was born, on July 20, 1964, and where he grew up as part of a large, Catholic family.

“It was lower-middle-class white,” he later said. “At the time I was growing up, it was the tail-end of the baby boom, so there were tons of kids in the neighborhood. Tons of boys, young and old. So there were tons of drugs—the definitive Seattle neighborhood. I went from being a daily drug user at 13 to having bad drug experiences and quitting drugs by the time I was 14, and then not having any friends until the time I was 16. There was about two years where I was more or less agoraphobic and didn’t deal with anybody, didn’t talk to anybody, didn’t have any friends at all. All the friends that I had were still fucked up with drugs and were people that I didn’t really have anything in common with.”

Music is what pulled Cornell out of seclusion. He started out as a drummer, playing in cover bands the Jones Street Band and the Shemps. The latter group would later morph into Soundgarden, originally consisting of Cornell, guitarist Kim Thayil and bassist Hiro Yamamoto. Forming in 1984, Soundgarden would become one of the first bands later associated with the grunge scene in Seattle.

Early in his musical evolution Cornell discovered the power of his formidable multi-octave vocal range. “The first band I was ever in, I sang lead vocals behind the drums,” he recalled, “and I would get good reactions. And I started thinking, Shit, maybe I should just try this.”

In 1985, Soundgarden brought drummer Scott Sundquist into the fold, allowing Cornell to move up front and center as the band’s lead singer. He also began playing rhythm guitar, more or less as an extension of the songwriting he was doing with the band.

“I’ve been more of a songwriter and singer than an instrumentalist, and actually learned to play the guitar by writing songs,” he said. “I never practiced anything. I would just sit and come up with notes and chords until I thought there was a song in there. And then I’d have to practice just so I could play it right.”

Songwriting came easily right from the start. “The first day we jammed with Kim, we wrote three songs,” Cornell remembered; “and the second time we wrote five. And within two months we had 15 songs. And that’s how Soundgarden started.”

The band’s early musical direction was more post-punk, with less of the sludgy metal-centric style for which they would become famous a few years down the road. Cornell spoke of listening to Elvis Costello and the English Beat during this period. He told one journalist that he had no interest in Seventies heavy metal at that time in his life. “Not even slightly,” he emphasized.

But then, he explained. “we wrote one song called ‘Incessant Mace’ pretty early on that sounded blues based. It was very slow. Lyrically and vocally, it was very European Gothic. But I guess because we’re American and because of our influences as kids, it sounded to people more like Sabbath or Zeppelin, and people would hate it. That was the first reaction, really—that this was the most uncool thing anyone could do at this point in music in this city. That was a turning point in our career as a band. Because we could play any atonal, postpunk, ridiculous, quirky shit, and everyone thought it was great. But we’d play that song, and it would create more of a reaction. So we started doing that more.”

Soundgarden signed with the Seattle indie label Sub Pop in 1987, releasing their debut EP, Screaming Life, that same year. Sub Pop would become ground zero for the emergent grunge scene. Kurt Cobain later said that Soundgarden’s presence on the label was the main reason he wanted Nirvana to sign to Sub Pop. But by the dawn of the Nineties, Soundgarden had moved on to A&M Records, becoming the first band from the Seattle grunge scene to score a major label deal.

Their 1991 album (and second for A&M), Badmotorfinger, became one of the defining discs of the new decade. By this point, the classic Soundgarden lineup of Cornell, Thayil, bassist Ben Shepherd and drummer Matt Cameron had fallen into place. And Cornell had emerged not only as the group’s dynamic frontman but also its main songwriting voice, with songs like “Outshined” and “Rusty Cage,” which are notable for the adventurous alternate guitar tunings that would become a hallmark of the grunge sound.

The year 1991 also saw the release of a self-titled album by Cornell’s side band Temple of the Dog. The group was conceived by Cornell as a tribute to his close friend Andrew Wood of the bands Mother Love Bone and Malfunkshun, who had died of a drug overdose. The Temple of the Dog album featured performances by all members of the band that would become Pearl Jam—one more way in which Cornell was a major catalyst in bringing Seattle grunge into the mainstream.

But the album that had even a greater impact along those lines was Soundgarden’s 1994 classic Superunknown, which contained Cornell’s compositions “Black Hole Sun,” “Spoonman,” “My Wave,” “The Day I Tried to Live” and “Fell on Black Days.” Soundgarden were riding high, but Cornell later spoke of falling into a depression during this period. Always withdrawn, he had trouble dealing with his fame; and the suicide of Kurt Cobain in 1994 had affected him deeply. But the depression seemed to stem from an even deeper source, which Cornell tried to address in “Fell on Black Days.”

“I’d noticed in my life there would be periods where I would feel like things aren’t going so well, but they weren’t based on any particular thing,” he said. “There wasn’t a catastrophe, there wasn’t a relationship split, nobody got in a car wreck. My outlook just changed. It was kind of a terrifying thought. I wanted to write a song about that.”

A preoccupation with depression and the darker corners of the psyche were another hallmark of grunge—one that resonated deeply with the generation coming of age in that period. But all of that darkness would take its toll. Drug overdoses and/or suicide would claim the lives of many of grunge’s key exponents, including Cobain, Scott Weiland, Layne Staley and now Chris Cornell. Attempting to quantify the bottomless pit of depression in one interview, Cornell said something truly chilling, in retrospect.

“You’ll think someone has run-of-the-mill depression, and the next thing you know they’re hanging from a rope.”

Equally ominous is the song title “Pretty Noose,” one of several major Chris Cornell compositions on Soundgarden’s 1996 album Down on the Upside. Others include “Burden in My Hand” and “Blow Up the Outside World.” When the latter song prompted a journalist to ask if Cornell really wanted to blow up the outside world, he said, “All the time, so it doesn’t encroach on me—you can hibernate and not have to worry about it.”

The feral yowl and guttural growl of Cornell’s remarkable voice made him one of the greatest hard rock/metal vocalists in the tradition of soulful belters like Paul Rodgers. But he had more than just one dimension to his musical talent. He reportedly wanted to move away from a heavy guitar direction with Soundgarden, which reportedly led to clashes with Kim Thayil and the breakup of the band in 1997.

Cornell bounced back with his debut solo album Euphoria Morning in 1999. Four more solo discs would follow, culminating with 2015’s Higher Truth. These albums showcase many sides of Cornell’s musical muse, from moody psychedelic rock to tuneful acoustic guitar-driven pop. He found another creative outlet in performing solo acoustic shows, elements of which are captured on his 2011 live album Songbook. But he never entirely turned his back on heavy rock, joining forces with Rage Against the Machine guitar ace Tom Morello, bassist Tim Commerford and drummer Brad Wilk to form the band Audioslave in 2001. The collaboration would produce three well-received albums. Morello later said that the first time Cornell stepped up to the mic to sing with Audioslave the result was “transcendent.”

But the early 2000s was also a troubled time for Cornell, who entered a rehab facility, undergoing treatment for alcohol and prescription drug addiction. He emerged sober in 2002. He divorced his first wife—Susan Silver, who was also Soundgarden’s manager—in 2004, and subsequently married Vicky Karayiannis that same year and embracing her Greek Orthodox religious faith.

It seemed like he was getting his life together. And by the second decade of the 21st century Cornell had established himself as a multifaceted musical artist with a rich history and back catalog. He reunited with Soundgarden in 2010, which led to the band’s 2012 album King Animal and several tours. And he got back together with Temple of the Dog for a tour in 2016. His final performance with Audioslave took place on January 8 this year, when the band reunited to play a show in protest of Donald J. Trump’s presidential inauguration. There were also reports that a new Soundgarden album was in the works this year.

But Cornell’s darkness had not departed entirely. He suffered from anxiety and took the prescription drug Ativan to help him cope with it. Following the Soundgarden show at the Detroit Fox Theater on May 17, Cornell had a phone conversation with his wife from his hotel room. She later reported that his speech was slurred, and he said he “might have taken an extra Ativan or two.” He repeatedly told her “I’m just tired,” before hanging up abruptly.

Suicidal thoughts are one of the known side effects of Ativan. Concerned for her husband’s well-being, Vicky Cornell called his bodyguard on the tour, Martin Kirsten, asking him to check on the singer. Kirsten had to kick open the door to Cornell’s room to gain admittance. When he did so, he found the singer lying on the bathroom floor, with blood running from his mouth and a red exercise band around his neck. Cornell had apparently attached a carabiner—a type of hook used in rock climbing—to the bathroom door frame, then attached the exercise band around his neck to the carabiner to hang himself. Paramedics arrived on the scene a little before 1 a.m., but were unable to revive Cornell. He was pronounced dead at 1:30 a.m.

News of Cornell’s passing shocked the rock community, which had already been shaken by the deaths of Prince and David Bowie last year. The possible role of prescription drugs in the deaths of both Prince and Cornell is particularly disturbing, underling a problem that has reached crisis proportions in our society. But Cornell’s legions of fans may draw comfort and solace from the body of music he left behind, and the knowledge that his place is rock history is assured.

The family of Chris Cornell has issued a statement that questions a coroner’s report that he took his own life early Thursday, May 18. According to the report, Cornell's death was a suicide by hanging.

“Without the results of toxicology tests, we do not know what was going on with Chris—or if any substances contributed to his demise,” read the family's statement.

The family also said Cornell, who was 52, had a prescription for Ativan and might've taken a higher dosage. Ativan is a tranquilizer and anti-anxiety medication that often is used as a sleeping aid. According to the statement, Kirk Pasich, an attorney, said Ativan can cause paranoid or suicidal thoughts, not to mention impaired judgment.

Vicky Cornell, Chris' wife, said, “Chris’ death is a loss that escapes words and has created an emptiness in my heart that will never be filled. As everyone who knew him commented, Chris was a devoted father and husband.” There are three Cornell children in the picture—Christopher, 11, and Toni, 12, plus Lillian, a 16-year-old daughter from Chris' previous marriage to Susan Silver.

Vicky said Chris flew home from Soundgarden’s tour the weekend before his death to spend time with his family before heading back to the Midwest for more shows.

“When we spoke after the [Detroit] show, I noticed he was slurring his words; he was different,” Vicky said. “When he told me he may have taken an extra Ativan or two, I contacted security and asked that they check on him.

“What happened is inexplicable, and I am hopeful that further medical reports will provide additional details. I know he loved our children and he would not hurt them by intentionally taking his own life. The outpouring of love and support from his fans, friends and family means so much more to us than anyone can know. Thank you for that, and for understanding how difficult this is for us.”

For the complete statement, head here. While we're at it, here's another clip from Wednesday night's Soundgarden show:

A representative for the Detroit Police has told Variety that Chris Cornell's death is being investigated as a suicide, although he emphasized that it's too early to make any conclusions.

“At 12 a.m. [local time], we received a 911 call from the MGM Grand Casino Hotel,” the Detroit Police director of media relations told Variety. “It appears as though a family friend was checking up on Cornell at his wife’s request. He went to hotel and discovered him unresponsive on the bathroom floor. Police made the location with EMS, and he was pronounced dead at the scene.

“At present our investigation is leaning toward the possibility of suicide, but we must wait for a medical report to determine the cause of death. At this time we cannot release too much information about what we observed in Cornell’s hotel room or what led us to this conclusion.”

A different police representative told Variety that the singer was found with a “band” around his neck.

It also has come to light that the very last song Soundgarden performed last night (which was, of course, Cornell's final performance) was Led Zeppelin's "In My Time of Dying," which features the opening lines: "In my time of dying, I want nobody to mourn / All I want for you to do is take my body home."

Cornell and Soundgarden have performed the song in the past, but it's interesting that they employed it as their closer last night at Detroit's Fox Theater. Cornell was found dead just a few hours later.

"Honestly something looked off last night with him," show attendee Joey Mugan told CNN. "I just didn't think about it because the show was great." Mugan was able to grab the set list from the front of the stage, and you can see it here. Note that it does not conclude with "In My Time of Dying."

Below, check out Jimmy Page's Twitter tribute to Cornell—plus two exclusive Guitar World videos from 2015 that show Page being interviewed by Cornell at the Ace Hotel Theater in Los Angeles. You can find the rest of this interview on YouTube.

Singer Chris Cornell, best known for fronting Soundgarden and Audioslave, died Wednesday night, May 17. He was 52.

Cornell was in Detroit performing at the Fox Theatre with Soundgarden, which had kicked off a U.S. tour last month.

Brian Bumbery, Cornell's representative, called the singer's passing "sudden and unexpected" in a statement to CNN.

"His wife Vicky and family were shocked to learn of his sudden and unexpected passing, and they will be working closely with the medical examiner to determine the cause," Bumbery's statement read.

"They would like to thank his fans for their continuous love and loyalty and ask that their privacy be respected at this time."

Cornell was scheduled to perform again this Friday in Columbus, Ohio. He actually posted a message to Twitter just a few hours before his death was reported, writing, “#Detroit finally back to Rock City!!!”

Born and raised in Seattle, Washington, Cornell formed Soundgarden with guitarist Kim Thyail and bassist Hiro Yamamoto in 1984. Soundgarden were the first grunge band to sign to a major label (A&M in 1988), paving the way for Nirvana, Pearl Jam and Alice in Chains. They'd go on to become a major part of the Nineties grunge movement despite disbanding in 1997. They eventually returned in 2010 with a string of festival performances and tours—and released a new album (King Animal) in 2012.

In 2001, Cornell teamed up with three former members of Rage Against the Machine to form Audioslave. They released their most successful single, "Like a Stone," in 2003 and broke up in 2007. On January 20, 2017, three days after announcing their reunion, Audioslave performed together for the first time in over a decade at Prophets of Rage's Anti-Inaugural Ball.

Cornell also sang the theme song to the James Bond movie Casino Royale and enjoyed a successful solo touring and recording career, often appearing solo with an acoustic guitar.

Last year, he spoke about how playing acoustically has tied together his entire career. "In some strange way, it’s made sense of my 30-odd years of song writing," he told The Independent.

"All the different bands and solo projects and everything in-between are all so varied and eclectic. I wanted to string all that together somehow in an acoustic show and I think it's the first time that it can all be in one show and make sense."

Cornell graced the cover of Guitar World (with Soundgarden) several times over the decades, and GW readers even voted him "the greatest rock vocalist of all time" around four years ago.

Stay tuned for updates and more details.

Audioslave reunited for the first time in more than a decade on January 20 for an Anti-Inaugural Ball performance at the Teragram Ballroom in Los Angeles.

Clips of the band performing their hits “Cochise,” “Like a Stone” and “Show Me How to Live” are streaming below.

The hard-rock act rose to power in the 2000s in the aftermath of Rage Against the Machine and features Soundgarden vocalist Chris Cornell and former Rage members Tom Morello, bassist Tim Commerford and drummer Brad Wilk. Morello, Commerford and Wilk currently perform together with Prophets of Rage, featuring Public Enemy members DJ Lord and rapper Chuck D and Cypress Hill rapper B-Real. Prophets of Rage served as the night’s headliner.

The Audioslave reunion was launched to protest the U.S. presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, which also took place on Friday.

“The Anti-Inaugural Ball is a celebration of resistance,” reads a band statement. “Resistance to racism. Resistance to sexism. Resistance to homophobia. Resistance to bullying. Resistance to environmental devastation. Resistance to fascism. Resistance to Donald Trump.

“We are staring down the barrel of a dystopian nightmare unless we act NOW, unless we fight back NOW. We intend to create ‘No Trump Zones’ across the country; in our homes, our schools, our places of work, and our concert stages. Bad Presidents make for great music. Join us as we get loud and stand together to defend our rights, our country, and our planet.”

Audioslave were joined by rapper Vic Mensa, Jackson Browne, Jack Black and the Los Angeles Freedom Choir.

The band has not indicated if the reunion will last beyond Friday night’s show. Both Cornell and Morello have indicated they want to revive the group but are involved in other projects. Cornell is currently recording a new Soundgarden album and working with Commerford’s band, WAKRAT.

Guitar World readers have dubbed a fellow guitarist—Soundgarden's Chris Cornell—rock's greatest singer.

Earlier this week, Cornell battled it out with an undisputed rock legend, Led Zeppelin's Robert Plant, in the final matchup of our month-long readers poll, the Greatest Rock Singers of All Time, which we launched in late September in partnership with Samson.

The final matchup lasted two days, but in the end it was a 60/40 split in favor of Cornell, the celebrated Soundgarden and Audioslave singer and solo performer. You can check out our final bracket below.

In 2011, the powerful-voiced Cornell came in at No. 9 in a similar poll launched by the gang at Rolling Stone—just ahead of Nirvana's Kurt Cobain and a notch behind the Beatles' John Lennon. Besides Soundgarden and Audioslave, Cornell has worked with members of Rage Against The Machine, Santana, Pearl Jam and hip-hop producer Timbaland, to name just a few.

When we launched the poll, we were certain that, even though our core readership is made up of guitarists from different genres, locations and age groups, you'd have strong opinions about the skills (or lack thereof) of some of rock's most legendary singers. Based on the many comments posted on our poll stories and via Facebook, we were correct.

Although we had hundreds of rock singers to choose from, we narrowed it down to 16 names, all of which were carefully chosen by Guitar World's editorial staff. We took great care in choosing what was essentially a Sweet 16 starting point. Rock singers from every decade, starting with the 1960s, were represented, as were several rock sub-genres.

Here were our 16 rock singers in alphabetical order:

Phil Anselmo, Randy Blythe, Kurt Cobain, Chris Cornell, Bruce Dickinson, Ronnie James Dio, Rob Halford, James Hetfield, Mick Jagger, Maynard James Keenan, Freddie Mercury, Jim Morrison, Ozzy Osbourne, Robert Plant, Axl Rose and Bon Scott.

From there, we drew singers' names out of a hat (It was, in fact, a Black Sabbath baseball cap) to help us create our opening 16-singer bracket, the fully updated version of which is available for your viewing pleasure below. Obviously, none of these of singers were ranked or coming from a previously compiled list, so we chose purely random matchups to have as little impact as possible on the final outcome.

As always, thank you for all your votes and comments!

Here are the top five singers, according to your votes:

• 01. Chris Cornell
• 02. Robert Plant
• 03. Freddie Mercury
• 04. Bruce Dickinson
• 05. Ozzy Osbourne

FINAL RESULTS: Samson/Guitar World Greatest Rock Singers of All Time Readers Poll

Well, it's all come down to this.

About a month ago, GuitarWorld.com launched a new readers poll in partnership with Samson: the Greatest Rock Singers of All Time Readers Poll.

We were certain that, even though our core readership is mainly made up of guitarists from different genres, locations and age groups, you — like us — have strong opinions about the skills (or lack thereof) of some of rock's most legendary singers. Based on your many comments on our poll stories and via Facebook, it looks like we were correct!

When we launched the poll, we had hundreds of rock singers to choose from — but narrowed things down to 16 names, all of which were carefully chosen by Guitar World's editorial staff. We took great care in choosing what's essentially a Sweet 16 starting point. Rock singers from every decade, starting with the 1960s, were represented, as were several rock sub-genres.

Here were our 16 rock singers in alphabetical order:

Phil Anselmo, Randy Blythe, Kurt Cobain, Chris Cornell, Bruce Dickinson, Ronnie James Dio, Rob Halford, James Hetfield, Mick Jagger, Maynard James Keenan, Freddie Mercury, Jim Morrison, Ozzy Osbourne, Robert Plant, Axl Rose and Bon Scott.

From there, we drew singers' names out of a hat (It was, in fact, a Black Sabbath baseball cap) to help us create our opening 16-singer bracket, the fully updated version of which is available for your viewing pleasure below. Obviously, none of these of singers were ranked or coming from a previously compiled list, so we chose purely random matchups to have as little impact as possible on the final outcome. We were actually pretty pleased with the way the bracket turned out.

Now, however, Round 1, the Elite Eight and the Final Four rounds have come and gone, and it's time for the ultimate showdown! And, as we said earlier, it's all come down to this: Robert Plant of Led Zeppelin against Chris Cornell of Soundgarden and Audioslave.

We admit we're a little surprised that these two names wound up in our ultimate showdown. As it turns out, the match we imagined would be the perfect final shootout — Freddie Mercury Vs. Ronnie James Dio — took place many matchups ago, with Mercury winning and advancing to the Final Four. Then Chris Cornell came along and knocked the late Queen singer out of the poll.

Note that you can vote only once in this matchup (once per device, that is). You'll just need to decide which singer has or had the most to offer within his genre and time period, which one has or had more natural talent or technical skill, which one had the biggest influence on other singers or rock in general — maybe which one was simply the stronger frontman.

Latest Final Four Results

Winner: Chris Cornell (51.51 percent)
Loser: Freddie Mercury (48.49 percent)

The Samson Greatest Rock Singers Ultimate Showdown!
Robert Plant Vs. Chris Cornell

ROBERT PLANT

Born: August 20, 1948, West Bromwich, Staffordshire, England
Associated Acts: Led Zeppelin, Band of Joy, the Honeydrippers, Page and Plant
Website:robertplant.com

Quote: "I don't know how much more expressive you can get than being a rock and roll singer."

CHRIS CORNELL

Born: July 20, 1964, Seattle, Washington
Associated Acts: Soundgarden, Audioslave, Temple of the Dog
Website:chriscornell.com

Quote: "To me, music shouldn't be ego-driven. When you go out on stage and play songs, it is. But when you're sitting in a room, writing songs, it's a completely different process. It's a completely different place. It's a creative place, a musical place. It has nothing to do with who likes what."

Voting Closed!

Winner: Chris Cornell (59.62 percent)
Loser: Robert Plant (40.38 percent)

Thanks for voting! Check out our current matchup (and every matchup that has taken place so far) right HERE.

The BracketCheck out the latest version of the 16-singer bracket below. We'll update it after each Samson Greatest Rock Singer of All Time matchup.October 30, 2013, Samson Greatest Rock Singers of All Time Readers Poll

Why should guitarists have all the fun?

GuitarWorld.com recently launched a new readers poll in partnership with Samson: the Greatest Rock Singers of All Time Readers Poll.

We're certain that, even though our core readership is mainly made up of guitarists from different genres, locations and age groups, you — like us — have strong opinions about the skills (or lack thereof) of some of rock's most legendary singers.

And although we had hundreds of rock singers to choose from, we decided to narrow things down to a mere 16 names, all of which were carefully chosen by Guitar World's editorial staff. We took great care in choosing what's essentially a Sweet 16 starting point. Rock singers from every decade, starting with the 1960s, are represented, as are several rock sub-genres.

Here are our 16 rock singers in alphabetical order:

Phil Anselmo, Randy Blythe, Kurt Cobain, Chris Cornell, Bruce Dickinson, Ronnie James Dio, Rob Halford, James Hetfield, Mick Jagger, Maynard James Keenan, Freddie Mercury, Jim Morrison, Ozzy Osbourne, Robert Plant, Axl Rose and Bon Scott.

From there, we drew singers' names out of a hat (It was, in fact, a Black Sabbath baseball cap) to help us create our opening 16-singer bracket, which is available for your viewing pleasure below. Obviously, none of these of singers are ranked or coming from a previously compiled list, so we chose purely random matchups to have as little impact as possible on the final outcome. We're actually pretty pleased with the way the bracket turned out.

Round 1 and the Elite Eight round have come and gone, and the Final Four round is almost over! Today it's Freddie Mercury of Queen against Chris Cornell of Soundgarden and Audioslave.

You can vote only once per matchup (once per device, that is). Remember that, as with any music poll, sub-genre might occasionally clash against sub-genre, so you'll just need to decide which singer has or had the most to offer within his genre and time period, which one has or had more natural talent or technical skill, which one had the biggest influence on other singers or rock in general — maybe which one was simply the stronger frontman.

Latest Results

Winner: Robert Plant (64.34 percent)
Loser: Bruce Dickinson (35.66 percent)

Today's Samson Greatest Rock Singers Final Four Matchup (2 of 2)
Freddie Mercury Vs. Chris Cornell

FREDDIE MERCURY

Born: September 5, 1946, Stone Town, Zanzibar City, Tanzania
Died: November 24, 1991, Kensington, England
Associated Acts: Queen
Website:freddiemercury.com

Quote: "We're a very expensive group; we break a lot of rules. It's unheard of to combine opera with a rock theme, my dear."

CHRIS CORNELL

Born: July 20, 1964, Seattle, Washington
Associated Acts: Soundgarden, Audioslave, Temple of the Dog
Website:chriscornell.com

Quote: "To me, music shouldn't be ego-driven. When you go out on stage and play songs, it is. But when you're sitting in a room, writing songs, it's a completely different process. It's a completely different place. It's a creative place, a musical place. It has nothing to do with who likes what."

Voting Closed!

Winner: Chris Cornell (51.51 percent)
Loser: Freddie Mercury (48.49 percent)

Thanks for voting! Check out our current matchup (and every matchup that has taken place so far) right HERE.

The BracketCheck out the latest version of the 16-singer bracket below. We'll update it after each Samson Greatest Rock Singer of All Time matchup.October 25, 2013, Samson Greatest Rock Singers of All Time Readers Poll

Why should guitarists have all the fun?

GuitarWorld.com recently launched a new readers poll in partnership with Samson: the Greatest Rock Singers of All Time Readers Poll.

We're certain that, even though our core readership is mainly made up of guitarists from different genres, locations and age groups, you — like us — have strong opinions about the skills (or lack thereof) of some of rock's most legendary singers.

And although we had hundreds of rock singers to choose from, we decided to narrow things down to a mere 16 names, all of which were carefully chosen by Guitar World's editorial staff. We took great care in choosing what's essentially a Sweet 16 starting point. Rock singers from every decade, starting with the 1960s, are represented, as are several rock sub-genres.

Here are our 16 rock singers in alphabetical order:

Phil Anselmo, Randy Blythe, Kurt Cobain, Chris Cornell, Bruce Dickinson, Ronnie James Dio, Rob Halford, James Hetfield, Mick Jagger, Maynard James Keenan, Freddie Mercury, Jim Morrison, Ozzy Osbourne, Robert Plant, Axl Rose and Bon Scott.

From there, we drew singers' names out of a hat (It was, in fact, a Black Sabbath baseball cap) to help us create our opening 16-singer bracket, which is available for your viewing pleasure below. Obviously, none of these of singers are ranked or coming from a previously compiled list, so we chose purely random matchups to have as little impact as possible on the final outcome. We're actually pretty pleased with the way the bracket turned out.

Round 1 has come and gone, and the Elite Eight round kicks off today! As always, you can vote only once per matchup (once per device, that is), and we'll post two or three matchups per week, continuing with today's Elite Eight shootout, Chris Cornell of Soundgarden and Audioslave against Ozzy Osbourne of Black Sabbath.

Remember that, as with any poll, sub-genre might occasionally clash against sub-genre, so you'll just need to decide which singer has or had the most to offer within his genre and time period, which one has or had more natural talent or technical skill, which one had the biggest influence on other singers or rock in general — maybe which one was simply the stronger frontman.

Latest Results

Winner: Freddie Mercury (60.76 percent)
Loser: Ronnie James Dio (39.24 percent)

Today's Samson Greatest Rock Singers Elight Eight Matchup (4 of 4)
Ozzy Osbourne Vs. Chris Cornell

OZZY OSBOURNE

Born: December 3, 1948 (age 64), Aston, England
Associated Acts: Black Sabbath, Ozzy Osbourne
Website:ozzy.com

Quote: "All that stuff about heavy metal and hard rock, I don't subscribe to any of that. It's all just music. I mean, the heavy metal from the Seventies sounds nothing like the stuff from the Eighties, and that sounds nothing like the stuff from the Nineties. Who's to say what is and isn't a certain type of music?"

CHRIS CORNELL

Born: July 20, 1964, Seattle, Washington
Associated Acts: Soundgarden, Audioslave, Temple of the Dog
Website:chriscornell.com

Quote: "To me, music shouldn't be ego-driven. When you go out on stage and play songs, it is. But when you're sitting in a room, writing songs, it's a completely different process. It's a completely different place. It's a creative place, a musical place. It has nothing to do with who likes what."

Voting Closed!

Winner: Chris Cornell (55.47 percent)
Loser: Ozzy Osbourne (44.53 percent)

Thanks for voting! Check out our current matchup (and every matchup that has taken place so far) right HERE.

The BracketCheck out the latest version of the 16-singer bracket below. We'll update it after each Samson Greatest Rock Singer of All Time matchup.October 22, 2013, Samson Greatest Rock Singers of All Time Readers Poll

Why should guitarists have all the fun?

GuitarWorld.com recently launched a new readers poll in partnership with Samson: the Greatest Rock Singers of All Time Readers Poll.

We're certain that, even though our core readership is mainly made up of guitarists from different genres, locations and age groups, you — like us — have strong opinions about the skills (or lack thereof) of some of rock's most legendary singers.

And although we had hundreds of rock singers to choose from, we decided to narrow things down to a mere 16 names, all of which were carefully chosen by Guitar World's editorial staff. We took great care in choosing what's essentially a Sweet 16 starting point. Rock singers from every decade, starting with the 1960s, are represented, as are several rock sub-genres.

Here are our 16 rock singers in alphabetical order:

Phil Anselmo, Randy Blythe, Kurt Cobain, Chris Cornell, Bruce Dickinson, Ronnie James Dio, Rob Halford, James Hetfield, Mick Jagger, Maynard James Keenan, Freddie Mercury, Jim Morrison, Ozzy Osbourne, Robert Plant, Axl Rose and Bon Scott.

From there, we drew singers' names out of a hat (It was, in fact, a Black Sabbath baseball cap) to help us create our opening 16-singer bracket, which is available for your viewing pleasure below. Obviously, none of these of singers are ranked or coming from a previously compiled list, so we chose purely random matchups to have as little impact as possible on the final outcome. We're actually pretty pleased with the way the bracket turned out.

Remember that, as with any poll, sub-genre might occasionally clash against sub-genre, so you'll just need to decide which singer has or had the most to offer within his genre and time period, which one has or had more natural talent or technical skill, which one had the biggest influence on other singers or rock in general — maybe which one was simply the stronger frontman.

Let's get started! As always, you can vote only once per matchup (once per device, that is), and we'll post two or three matchups per week, continuing with today's shootout, Chris Cornell of Soundgarden and Audioslave against Randy Blythe of Lamb of God.

Latest Results

Winner: James Hetfield (66.27 percent)
Loser: Maynard James Keenan (33.73 percent)

Today's Samson Greatest Rock Singers Round 1 Matchup (7 of 8)
Chris Cornell Vs. Randy Blythe

CHRIS CORNELL

Born: July 20, 1964, Seattle, Washington
Associated Acts: Soundgarden, Audioslave, Temple of the Dog
Website:chriscornell.com

Quote: "To me, music shouldn't be ego-driven. When you go out on stage and play songs, it is. But when you're sitting in a room, writing songs, it's a completely different process. It's a completely different place. It's a creative place, a musical place. It has nothing to do with who likes what."

RANDY BLYTHE

Born: February 21, 1971, Richmond, Virginia
Associated Acts: Lamb of God
Website:lamb-of-god.com

Quote: “Folks think that everyone in a professional band sleeps on mattresses made out of hundred-dollar bills and just sits back chilling when they aren’t on tour, spending all their free time screwing models and cashing massive royalty checks. I got bad news for the kids who want to try and do this thing for a living — it ain’t that way."

Vote Now!

Winner: Chris Cornell (89.47 percent)
Loser: Randy Blythe (10.53 percent)

Thanks for voting! Check out our current matchup (and every matchup that has taken place so far) right HERE.

The BracketCheck out the latest version of the 16-singer bracket below. We'll update it after each Samson Greatest Rock Singer of All Time matchup.October 10, 2013, Samson Greatest Rock Singers of All Time Readers Poll

With all the usual talk of "the death of rock and roll" going around, Soundgarden frontman Chris Cornell thinks the abysmal state of pop music just might be what the doctor ordered to restore the rock scene to vitality.

"A big reason grunge became so big so fast is because people were so sick of what was out there," he recently told The Sun. "It's the same thing now. You have a better chance of a very healthy and vital rock scene coming out today because there's something to react against. Contemporary pop music couldn't be any worse than it is now."

The singer did admit he saw multi-platinum singer Adele as one of "bright spots" in today's pop music landscape, adding, "They’re actually songs and she can really sing. So obviously the biggest market still responds to a human being creating music.”

You can read more here.

Soundgarden are currently working on their first album of all-new material since 1996's Down on the Upside (buy on iTunes).

Tom Morello has just posted the latest installment of "The Nightwatchman Speaks," a video series in which he answers fan questions on a variety of topics.

In this edition, Tom gives a great piece of advice on how to balance learning music theory with finding your individual voice, and details how he fell in with the East L.A. rock scene in the early '90s.

Watch the video below for these answers and more, including finding out if he ever gets annoyed by all the Rage Against the Machine questions (Hint: Yes.)

Bruce Springsteen has started premiering tracks from his new album, Wrecking Ball, one-per-day online. Today's track, which is only available for 24 hours, is "This Depression," which features Rage Against the Machine guitarist Tom Morello. Listen below, courtesy of exclaim.ca.

Last week, The Boss released a new music video for the song "We Take Care of Our Own." Watch it here.

Wrecking Ball is due out on March 6.

What is it about supergroups that we love so much?

Ever since Cream (unofficially, the rock world's first super group), exploded onto the scene in 1966, music fans have been enticed by amalgamations of talent drawn together to create fantasy bands greater than the sums of their parts.

So rarely, however, do these collaborations work out. More often, the intense creative spirits within these groups are accompanied by intense egos. Infighting is virtually inevitable, and once-promising unions disappear faster than you can say Izzy Stradlin.

Your No. 1 album of 2002 was one of the most hotly anticipated records of that year, a debut molded by a collection of gifted musicians still riding their creative peaks. It's a great example of a supergroup's possible synergy ... delivered not long before they burned out.

Thanks for voting!

Rage Against The Machine guitarist Tom Morello has revealed that he will be releasing a comic book series. Titled Orchid, the first installment of the series will be released by Dark Horse Comics on October 12.

The artwork for the series will be provided by Scott Hepburn and Shepard Fairey.

According to Rolling Stone, Orchid is "a fantasy epic set in future, is the story of a 16-year-old street prostitute who discovers she has a greater calling than what has been imposed on her in a nightmarish world full of ferocious new animal species that prey on humans while the rich harvest the bodies of the poor."

Tom Morello will also be recording a song for each issue, which will provide a soundtrack to the series.

In a new interview with Music Radar, Tom Morello talks about bringing electric guitars and a full-band feel to his Nightwatchman solo project.

While Morello is bringing in more familiar elements of his sound to the Nightwatchman's forthcoming album, World Wide Rebel Songs, he doesn't want anyone to expect that it will sound like his previous bands.

"At its heart, this is still very different from a Rage record or an Audioslave album or what have you," Morello explains. "The same guy who nervously yet bravely stepped up to the open mic nights with an acoustic guitar is definitely there. But I felt fine with bringing out the heavy artillery when needed. Sometimes big messages need a big sound."

"I like so many aspects of the guitar hero culture," he continues. "Getting on stage and rocking an arena is an experience that so few get to realize. When you see waves of people involuntarily reacting to the vibrations coming from your guitar and amp, it's the answer to countless teenage dreams."

You can read the full interview here.

World Wide Rebel Songs is due out in August.

When it comes to the electric guitar, Tom Morello has been breaking the rules since his early days with Rage Against the Machine. The axman talks about the Nineties alt-rock revolution and his latest iconoclastic musical projects.

The early Nineties produced many guitar heroes, but perhaps no one had the impact of Tom Morello. As Rage Against the Machine’s axman, Morello displayed not only a strong grasp of metal and punk guitar riffage but also an idiosyncratic sense of tone and hypertechnical sonic mayhem. Using a range of effects, including a Dunlop Cry Baby, an Ibanez DFL Flanger and—most notably—a DigiTech Whammy Pedal, Morello produced otherworldly squeals, barnyard growls, and synthetic DJ scratch tones that were uncannily suited to Rage’s mash-up of metal, punk and hip-hop. On tracks like “Bulls on Parade,” “Killing in the Name” and “Renegades of Funk,” Morello pushed the boundaries of the instrument and the genre in which he worked his magic, influencing other musical innovators looking for new avenues of creative expression.

And to think it all started with the toggle switch on his Gibson Explorer. “Everyone else had those really cool Eddie Van Halen guitars with only one knob,” Morello says. “So I thought, I might as well make use of these knobs, since I can’t afford a different guitar right now. That was when I stumbled on the toggle switch. I combined it with a wah-wah pedal, and all of a sudden there was a noise that I had never heard a guitar player make. It sounded more like a sort of synthesizer.

“I went from having a sneaking suspicion to feeling certain that the odd guitar playing was my voice on the instrument, that it was the thing that I had in common with the guitar players I liked—a uniqueness. I just ran with that, and have been running with that ever since.”

When Rage began a seven-year hiatus in 2000, Morello continued to explore his instrument with Audioslave, featuring Soundgarden’s Chris Cornell, and even expanded his range on acoustic guitar in the guise of his alter ego the Nightwatchman. Rage have been back in action since 2007, but the Nightwatchman lives on—and is apparently evolving into something of an electric guitar hero on his latest album, which Morello has just finished mixing. Tentatively titled Worldwide Rebel Songs, it’s due out sometime in 2011.

“The first song has no acoustic guitar,” Morello says. “And it’s certainly the first Nightwatchman record with blazing Randy Rhoads–style solos. Of course, there are the dark murder ballads about retribution and bitterness that are the Nightwatchman’s stock in trade. But this time I just realized that I could loosen up and incorporate more of a complete picture of who I am.” He laughs. “It’s definitely not austere folk music.”

According to the guitarist, the new album was informed by his annual Axis of Justice benefit tour—where the motto is “Feed the Poor, Fight the Power, Rock the Fuck Out”—as well as his performances of “The Ghost of Tom Joad” live with Bruce Springsteen on a number of occasions throughout 2008 and 2009. “That was the first time I’d sung and played electric guitar,” Morello says of the latter. “It convinced me that I could do it.”

The Nightwatchman isn’t all Morello’s up to: Street Sweeper Social Club, his rap-rock outfit with Boots Riley of the Coup, recently released an EP that includes covers of M.I.A.’s “Paper Planes” and “Mama Said Knock You Out” by LL Cool J. In addition, Rage just played their first-ever South American dates. “I couldn’t be more pleased with how we’re playing and getting along right now,” Morello says. “It’s great to have that be a positive part of my life.”

Morello took a break from his activities to talk with Guitar World about his varied roles as a guitarist and Rage Against the Machine’s role in the Nineties alt-rock revolution.

GUITAR WORLD Rage Against the Machine, Audioslave, Street Sweeper Social Club, the Nightwatchman… You seem to alternate between playing guitar with rappers and with singers. How are the two experiences different?

TOM MORELLO When you’re playing with an MC as opposed to a singer, the first difference is that you need to pay less attention to the harmonic interplay between the melody and the chord changes. You’re creating a sonic texture for someone to flow over, as opposed to chord changes for someone to make melodic choices against. That was actually one of the exciting challenges when we began Audioslave, because in Rage we’d written with a particular template that I think helped the band have a unique sound for a rock band: we rode the one in the same way that rap music and James Brown’s music do, then combined that with super-heavy riffs. We never worried, Is it a cliché to go to the fifth? We’d never go to the fifth; we’d just stay on the one the whole time for maximum power.

Audioslave gave me the chance to branch out and try new things, to be very conscious of the fact that there was a great singer singing over the top of everything. With Street Sweeper, it’s kind of a combination of the two. While Boots is a rapping MC, there are big vocal hooks that are sung by the band, as well. We consciously write music that will allow for choruses where we can sing our asses off.

GW How do you find room for guitar in a cover of a non-rock tune like “Paper Planes” or “Mama Said Knock You Out”?

MORELLO We wanted to turn “Paper Planes” on its head. I’d had the idea to do a cover on the tour that Street Sweeper did in 2009 with Nine Inch Nails and Jane’s Addiction, so I told Boots to give me some suggestions for some contemporary covers to slay the goth kids with. He suggested “Paper Planes” and some Justin Bieber songs; “Paper Planes” got the nod. My job was to recreate on the guitar that sonic background, which in M.I.A.’s song is made with lots of machinery. I had to bring that in an analogous way through a 50-watt stack.

GW When Rage reunited, did it take long for you guys to reestablish your chemistry?

MORELLO Rage is a creature unto itself. It’s like dusting off a Seventies muscle car with a huge engine that’s been sitting in the garage for a while. It might take a while to get the key to turn, but once it does, that motor is roaring.

GW Do you think the band’s music has changed since the end of the original run?

MORELLO Everything we’ve been doing is in the realm of live performance, so the music hasn’t really changed. But what has happened is that, if someone breaks a string or I need a few minutes to change guitars, the band will start playing on a brand-new groove. One thing about Rage was that we’ve always taken chances in the live setting, so it’s very much within us to be spontaneously creative. And when that does happen, all four of us are drawing on the abilities we’ve honed and the experiences we’ve had in the intervening years since 2000. With me it shows itself in the solo section of songs, in my willingness to take chances and go outside—sometimes well outside—the solos that appear on record. I’m constantly playing, whether it’s acoustic Nightwatchman shows, benefit jams with a variety of friends or Street Sweeper Social Club stuff, and a lot of new licks and tricks occur during those jams, which then filter their way into Rage performances.

GW We’re examining the Nineties at Guitar World this year. Rage was an undeniable part of the alt-rock explosion that defined that decade, yet the band’s relationship with the scene always seemed uneasy. Why?

MORELLO There was a frontline of artists who, for lack of a better term, we’ll call the Lollapalooza Nation: Rage, Tool, Jane’s Addiction, Nine Inch Nails, Soundgarden, Nirvana. Something those bands had in common is that we all mixed elements of classic hard rock with a punk rock ethos. We rejected the sterile, contrived parameters imposed by the record industry that brought us Eighties bands like Asia. Then, to our surprise, we found ourselves selling as many records as Poison and playing the same arenas. That caused a crisis of faith in all those bands, which is why you see Kurt Cobain killing himself, Pearl Jam going anti-Ticketmaster, and Nine Inch Nails, Tool and Rage taking four or five years between albums. These bands came out and created an audience but then didn’t serve that audience. So in a record company backroom you’ve got these cigar-smoking guys who’re like, “If only we had a band like Rage but who would show up for photo shoots and write a love song!” And there were plenty of candidates to fill that void in the second wave: the Creeds and the Limp Bizkits. Those bands had the same ambition as the hair-metal bands and were willing to play the game. They wanted the girls and the money and the success and, unlike us, were unburdened by guilt about that.

GW In your view, how is the record industry of the Nineties different from the record industry of today?

MORELLO The record industry has shrunk by something like two-thirds over the course of the last decade and a half. It used to be that a few gatekeepers—the major labels—had the big budgets to make the stars. Some artists would make it through that filter and get the big push from Sony or Warner Bros.—everyone from Rage and the Chili Peppers and Bush and the Rolling Stones. That’s how bands were forged. Now there are no budgets, or if there are it’s all put into the new Lady Gaga single. The labels aren’t trying to sell singles; they’re trying to sell ringtones.

GW Epic Records did pretty well by Rage Against the Machine.

MORELLO Our record company had both Rage and Pearl Jam, and neither band sold few records. But they saw the potential for Led Zeppelin numbers.

GW Were there advantages to that mindset that no longer exist today?

MORELLO While record companies have deservedly taken a lot of heat for the greed that preceded their fall—the consumer gouging, the artist gouging, all the bad karma that just built up over the years—it was those mechanisms that helped bring a lot of great music to the world. So in some ways we could be looking at the death of rock and roll with capital R's. As with the dinosaurs dying off, a myriad of new templates will come in to replace it. Music isn’t less important to people, but there will be less of the international superstar power that was created by those big companies.

GW Which strikes you how?

MORELLO It makes me feel very fortunate that with Rage and Audioslave we were able to make music we believed in, that was important to us, and that it was also able to reach a global audience. If a band like Rage Against the Machine came up today, there’s zero chance it would get the patience and the underwriting it took to break that band.

Originally published in Guitar World, August 2009

Former Soundgarden/Audioslave frontman Chris Cornell scraps his familiar musical style and enjoys an artistic rebirth with Scream, his new Timbaland-produced disc.

Chris Cornell sits in the Guitar World offices, draping his lanky frame on a chair he obviously finds uncomfortable, and ponders the position he’s in—musically, that is.

His new album is called Scream, and belying the title, it’s something he’s doing little of. He’s deep-sixed his trademark paint-peeling vocal wail and is “for once, actually singing,” he says. “I haven’t done a lot of it during my career, and I have to say, it feels pretty good.”

Along with his ferocious vocal style, Cornell has ditched the raging guitar tunes of his past on Scream, an au courant collaboration with noted hip-hop producer Timbaland. (The album’s cover couldn’t be less subtle or symbolic, featuring Cornell in midair, ready to demolish a guitar in a way not seen since the days of Kurt Cobain.) So far, the vast amount of synths, loops and dance beats that make up the album’s musical bed have not connected with fans, and the former Soundgarden/Audioslave frontman finds the situation both perplexing and to be expected.

“Any time you take a left turn as an artist, it’s bound to throw people a bit,” Cornell notes. “Still, I would hope that everybody can get past what I’m not doing on the record and listen to what I am doing. I’m alive on this record! There’s just as much heart in these songs as in anything I’ve ever done.

“See, I’ve already done ‘Black Hole Sun.’ I already did ‘Rusty Cage.’ I don’t need to do them again. The second you start writing to please people, you may as well be a short-order cook. That’s not me.”

GUITAR WORLD You seem to be of two minds about Scream: you understand why your fans don’t “get” it, but it’s troubling to you, too.

CHRIS CORNELL Well, sure. It is troubling to me, but yes, I did anticipate it. I understand why people are surprised at the sound—“Where’s the heavy rock?” “Where’s the big guitars?” But I couldn’t let that be my overriding thought when making the album. In fact, going into it, I pretty much knew that a big portion of my audience might not appreciate it.

GW I know you have to do what you need to do as an artist. Still, there’s art and there’s commerce.

CORNELL I know the math involved, but the minute you think about the commerce side of things, you’re dead. I can think about commerce when touring—there’s budgets for everything on a tour. When making an album, though, it has to start with an album. I can’t make a record trying to please people. I know this sounds like a patented artist response, but I have to please myself.

I think that’s the danger sometimes. People associate me so much with heavy, aggressive guitar music—Soundgarden, Audioslave—that the second I do something else they overreact. “What’s he doing?” “He’s gone soft.” “He can’t do that! That sounds like pop music.” You don’t know how stifling being pigeonholed is until it actually happens to you.

GW I think what’s throwing people is that this is such a radical split from what you’ve done in the past. It’s almost as if Metallica did a folk album.

CORNELL [laughs] You know, if they wanted to do a folk album, I’m sure I’d want to hear it.

GW What made you decide to work with Timbaland?

CORNELL During our discussions we met pretty close in the middle: he wanted to do something that rocked more, and I wanted to do something with more electronics and loops. Plus, I liked not knowing how it would turn out. I’ve made a lot of records where I knew how they would sound before we even went in the studio. I’m not saying they’re bad records, but I can’t say I felt the same amount of danger as I did with this one. Danger’s a good thing for an artist.

GW You like that feeling—“danger.”

CORNELL Sure. If you don’t feel that as an artist, then I don’t know what you’re doing. Just being a homogenized sellout, I guess.

Look, I’m well aware of the flak I’m getting for this record, and I’m okay with it. When you look back at so many records that are now considered classic or great or whatever, it took time for them to find their place. I fully admit that Scream might be ahead of its time. Maybe people will appreciate it in five or 10 years.

I made the record I wanted to make. I didn’t make it to be of its time [or] to work with what’s happening now; I made it because it’s what I felt, what I heard. So people might tune into it a year from now or three years from now. I’m absolutely okay with that.

GW What types of guitars are you gravitating toward these days?

CORNELL I play acoustics a lot. I like smaller-body models—I guess you’d call them concertsized guitars. I have a Martin that’s fantastic. I don’t know the model number or anything, but it’s a fantastic guitar. It feels right against my body; it feels good in my hands. More than that, it gives something back to me. I play it and it gives me songs. It’s a great guitar for story telling. If you can find a guitar like that, you know you’ve picked the right one.

You know how it is: you can go to Guitar Center or wherever, they can have 25 guitars of the same make and model, but you can pick out one of them and that’s the one. It’s not like buying a car. A guitar is a living, breathing thing. Each one is special, which means one can be better than the other. That’s why you should spend a bunch of time in a guitar store. Don’t just pick one up and buy it. The one right next to it might be the keeper.

GW Are you still playing Telecasters? I remember you really gravitated toward them in your Soundgarden days.

CORNELL Oh, I love Teles. I wasn’t using them at first in that band. I started out playing Les Paul Customs; they sounded big and aggressive and sustainy, but not in a heavy metal way. After a while, though, my tastes started changing, and I found that Telecasters gave me this almost Sixties garage rock sound that I really liked. Actually, it was a progression of guitars: I started out with the Les Pauls, then switched to Gretsch Duo Jets, then Jazzmasters, and it was the Jazzmasters that led me to the Telecasters. I found that Teles were very consistent and reliable, no matter what song or tuning we were using.

GW Were Teles a way to sound different from [Soundgarden guitarist] Kim Thayil? He played the Guild S1s a lot.

CORNELL Yeah, he loved using the Guilds. I guess it was a way not to clash with his sound. We were trying to give our records these sonic beds of guitar sounds. If you hear the same guitar sound throughout an entire album, it gets boring.

GW You were first known as a lead singer in the Robert Plant mode, the guy standing at the mic bare chested—the whole rock-god thing.

CORNELL Yeah, I ran from that as fast as I could. As soon as people started seeing me in that light, I pulled back.

GW Is that why you started playing guitar so much? I remember on the Superunknown tour, you were playing guitar live pretty much the whole time.

CORNELL It was partly for that but also because our songs at that point wouldn’t work with just one guitar when we played live.

It’s funny: I pretty much learned guitar from being around Kim. He didn’t sit down and actually show me how to play; I kind of soaked it up like a sponge. His whole approach—gritty yet psychedelic—I dialed right into that. He was very influential. He was encouraging, too. He never felt threatened when I picked up a guitar. Anything I played, if it was good, he was thrilled. Kim taught me an incredible amount about music just by being in the same room with me. The whole band influenced me: Ben [Shepherd, bass] and Matt [Cameron, drums] were very important in shaping me musically.

GW Sounds like you have a lot of fond memories of those days.

CORNELL Absolutely. For some reason, there seems to be this belief going around that we had a bad breakup, which is totally untrue. There was never any bad blood between us. In fact, I spoke with Kim just recently. We’ve always been good friends.

GW How about [Audioslave guitarist] Tom Morello? What did you learn from him as a guitarist? Obviously, his style is miles apart from Kim’s.

CORNELL I don’t know if I learned anything. He’s a tremendous guitar player, obviously, but I think by the time I hooked up with Tom, my own style of playing was formed. Tom reminds me of a low-tech version of the Edge. From what I’ve heard, the Edge is very high-tech with his effects and his pedal boards, whereas with Tom, everything on the floor has a nine-volt battery in it.

GW So what actually happened with you and Audioslave? When I interviewed Tom several years ago, right as you were putting out Revelations, he seemed mystified as to what was happening with the band. He said he hadn’t heard from you…

CORNELL A lot of things happened there, a lot of your usual dysfunctional band things. And a lot of times, it had nothing to do with me. There were a lot of disagreements on how to run things in that band. Musically, for me, the group pretty much had run its course. I think we ended on a high note, though. Revelations is my favorite album of ours.

GW Are you on good terms with Tom?

CORNELL Sure. He’s great. I’d definitely say we’re still friends.

GW What did you think about seeing Tom on YouTube playing in Seattle with three-fourths of a reunited Soundgarden? [Tad Doyle from the band Tad sang lead vocals.]

CORNELL I thought it was terrific! It gave me a warm feeling. I wish I could have been there. I would have jumped onstage in a second.

GW There seems to be something in the air, almost as if people are starting to call out for a Soundgarden reunion.

CORNELL It could happen. I’m never going to count anything out. I’m doing things now that I never thought I would be, so I would never rule out getting back together with those guys.

GW I’m sure you don’t want to talk about your divorce…

CORNELL [laughs] No, I surely don’t.

GW But recently, you got back a bunch of your guitars—14 of them, I think—from your ex-wife. What was the story there?

CORNELL You’re just as likely to find an explanation for that as I am. Suddenly I find myself being sued for my own guitars. [laughs] I don’t know. But I finally got them back, and it was great, like being reunited with old friends.

• Chris Cornell made it official this week and released a prepared statement saying that he would never again perform with Audioslave.
• "Due to irresolvable personality conflicts as well as musical differences, I am permanently leaving the band Audioslave," read the statement. "I wish the other three members nothing but the best in all of their future endeavors."
• Rumors of the band's breakup have been rampant, with both Cornell and guitar player Tom Morello having solo efforts in the works, with Cornell's "Carry On" dropping on May 1 and Morello's effort, "One Man Revolution"--which will be released under the name The Nightwatchman. The announcement that Tom's alma mater, Rage Against The Machine, would be reuniting to play Coachella this year only helped to reinforce the breakup talk. No word yet on whether or not Rage will keep it together to play more dates, despite them having called the reunion a "one-off".

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