In what was widely predicted to be a short-lived supergroup/side-project, Audioslave has instead gratifyingly yielded a bonafide band. The follow-up to their promising, if not quite artistically congealed '02 debut finds singer/songwriter Chris Cornell contributing a slate of songs that would have done his former Soundgarden proud, while guitarist Tom Morello and his former Rage Against the Machine bandmates cast them in a focused rhythmic groove that suggests that the old school can still yield a timely lesson or two. Cornell's best songs may still lurk in the shadows (the funeral hypno-blues of "Heaven's Dead," the martial metal of antiwar opener "Your Time Has Come," "The Worm" as anthem for self-loathing), yet they're now brightened with such surprisingly sunny fare as "Dandelion," "Doesn't Remind Me"'s charged, existentialist daydream and even a hook-rich, dangerously optimistic back-to-the-future power ballad in "Be Yourself." Morello's work on the title track and elsewhere is a study in taste and less-is-more efficiency, a telling hint of how forcefully these iconic '90s stars have sublimated their egos as their new music has blossomed.
Track listing:
All lyrics by Chris Cornell, with music written and arranged by Audioslave.
"Your Time Has Come" – 4:15
"Out of Exile" – 4:51 Listen (help·info)
"Be Yourself" – 4:39 Listen (help·info)
"Doesn't Remind Me" – 4:15
"Drown Me Slowly" – 3:53
"Heaven's Dead" – 4:36
"The Worm" – 3:57
"Man or Animal" – 3:53
"Yesterday to Tomorrow" – 4:33
"Dandelion" – 4:38
"#1 Zero" – 4:59
"The Curse" – 5:09
