Audioslave Comes 'Out of Exile'

What a difference a front man makes.

Even though three-quarters of Audioslave comes from the hyper-politicized punk/rap/rock band Rage Against the Machine, lead singer and lyricist Chris Cornell, formerly of Seattle grunge act Soundgarden, has set a kinder, gentler, more optimistic tone for the blended group. (Bassist Tim Commerford, drummer Brad Wilk and guitarist Tom Morello split from Rage’s lead singer Zach de la Rocha in 2000 and soon thereafter formed Audioslave with Cornell.) Gentle doesn’t necessarily apply to its sound, though. Audioslave’s driving rock rhythms and Morello’s blistering, bluesy guitar riffs blend ‘70s hard rock—think Led Zeppelin and Bad Company—with the ‘90s grunge sound of Nirvana and Soundgarden.

No More “Rage”
Even though band members’ political views might still skew toward the nether regions of the political left—for example, Morello is co-founder of the leftist anti-war organization Axis of Justice alongside Serj Tankian of System of a Down, and the band members were guests of Cuba’s Fidel Castro in early May—none of Rage’s political stridency (or foul language) appears on Out of Exile, Audioslave’s sophomore release. (Their eponymous first effort in 2002 went platinum.)

What we get instead is song after song of Cornell’s trademark quasi-obscure lyrics extolling life, loyalty, friendship, fatherhood and faith. For example, the album’s title track talks of a man being pulled out of his lonely self-absorption by the love of a woman (“When I first came to this island/That I called by my own name/I was happy in this fortress/In my exile I remained/But the hours grew so empty/And the ocean sent her waves/In the figure of a woman/And she pulled me out to sea”).

“Be Yourself” tells listeners not to try to live up to others’ expectations, while “Heaven’s Dead” offers words of encouragement to a despondent friend (“Heaven’s dead when you get sad/I see your wishes fly out of time/… I’m on your side/An army of one, onward we’ll ride/And whisper your songs, birds to the air/We’ll bury all of our burdens there”).

Judging by Cornell’s recent past, such lyrics appear heartfelt. He struggled with a failed marriage, alcohol abuse and prescription-drug addiction during the making of the band’s first album and entered rehab shortly after its release. He told Rolling Stone, “This band, whom I didn’t know that well at that point, didn’t have animosity towards me; they weren’t concerned with their careers; they seemed to have actual concern about me and my personal health, and that was motivating.”

Cornell has since remarried and has a new baby with another on the way. Fatherhood seems to suit him, judging by the song “Dandelion,” on which he presents the simple wonders of our world to a newborn and promises to be faithful: “I will ride by your side/Wherever you go/I won’t run or hide/Just letting you know.” (That last line, with its surfer dude-ish flippancy, is at odds with the rich poetic imagery in the rest of the song.)

Life and Faith
The album has one “political” song, “Your Time Has Come,” which enthusiasts are touting as an anti-war polemic. To be sure, the lyrics “50,000 names all engraved in stone/Most of them met an early grave years before I was born” are an allusion to the Vietnam War Memorial in Washington, D.C., but the song is, I think, more properly seen as denouncing the senselessness not just of war but of all the ills that take young lives today, including drug addiction (“One fell asleep in the street and he never woke up”), drug dealing (“One took some bullets in the chest in a deal gone wrong”) and despair (“One got a little too depressed so he went and jumped the gun”).

Most intriguing are Cornell’s suggestions of faith. The bridge on “Out of Exile” sounds like the promised world to come when it says, “Now the spires and the gables/Grow in orchards to the sky/And the blessings on my table/Multiply and divide.” And “The Worm” almost could have been written by Martin Luther: “Was a time early in life/When I hated everything/… I’ve decided to make it right with my/Halo—I’m complete/Halo—with me underneath/Halo—I’m reborn/I can do no wrong.” The song’s chorus is a paean to faithfulness: “You’ll stay the same,” repeated over and over.

Out of Exile strikes only one mildly negative note. While “Yesterday to Tomorrow” certainly encourages living life with gusto, it can also encourage moral recklessness with the line, “Even when wrong we’re right.”

It would seem, then, that Audioslave is more than the sum of its parts. Despite its genesis in two bands known for negativity and questionable worldviews, it has managed to stay intensely—almost disconcertingly—positive.