Soundgarden has not yet revealed what its plans are in the wake of frontman Chris Cornell's suicide Wednesday (May 17) night in Detroit. But prior to the tragic loss, guitarist Kim Thayil told Billboard that projects -- both new and archival -- were in the works.
Among those is another set of new material to follow-up 2012's King Animal, which has been in motion, at its own pace, for awhile. "It's been a couple years of intermittent songwriting sessions," Thayil said shortly before the start of Soundgarden's spring tour. The group has to work around Cornell's solo shows and drummer Matt Cameron's commitments to Pearl Jam, of course, but Thayil said that, "We look for opportunities where all four of us are available and then we get together and we show each other what we've been working on, what we've been writing on our own and see if there's anything that can be contributed from that sharing process. And then we like to jam and see if any ideas come out collaboratively that we can work on."
Thayil revealed that "there's some songs that have been demoed. I think Matt's demoed some things completely, stuff he's recorded on his computer. Chris has demoed a few things. He's written lyrics for ideas that I've written and that Ben and Matt have written. There's some things that have been documented in rehearsal. There's some things that are at the demo stage. There's some that are still in the developmental stage -- ideas that we've jammed on that we're working on arrangements for.