Audioslave: Audioslave : Music Reviews : Rolling Stone

Album Reviews

The new-old Nirvana music is hitting stores, Pearl Jam have a new album, and the early-Nineties revival seems to be close to achieving critical mass. Enter Audioslave, a supergroup fusion of Rage Against the Machine with Soundgarden singer Chris Cornell. On first listen to this blend of rap, rock and roil, the alt-rock gene seems to have won the day. One key track is "Exploder," where stinging, whiplash riffs betray a link between Soundgarden and Rage that nobody noticed: They both thought Led Zeppelin were a funk band. If angst-shattering catharsis is what you're after, "Light My Way," which ricochets and recoils like a ball-peen-hammer party in your parents' bedroom, will do the trick. There's even something for the ladies: "I Am the Highway" is a genuine pretty power ballad -- this isn't the return of alt-rock, it's the last revenge of testicle-grabbing, limo-ridin', Gibson-guitar-hero hair metal. It's a pretty tune, but also pretty hard to take seriously after listening to such words as "I am not your autumn moon/I am the night." Elsewhere, guitarist Tom Morello's outer-space feedback histrionics threaten to steal the show -- his most astonishing effect is the satellite wail and whoop he makes on "Like a Stone." Do Audioslave rock? Sure. Is that enough? Well, no. In their past lives, the members of this band were enraged. Now, fierce as they might sound, Audioslave just seem sorta engorged.

PAT BLASHILL
(RS 910 – November 28, 2002)