Like the carnies who infected the countryside of yore, Big Day Out is a traveling festival that skips its way around Australia and New Zealand each year, bringing with it a fist full of musical talent for those Down Under. In its 21st year, the 2012 festival will run from January 20 (Auckland’s MI Smart Stadium) till February 5 (Perth’s Claremont Showground). Today, the first batch of musicians was unveiled, and it is a good start –- Kanye West, Soundgarden, My Chemical Romance are the standouts. The appearance by Soundgarden marks the band’s first Aussie showing in 18 years. So far only 20 of the eventual 60 bands have been announced. A full list of the current lineup is outlined below. Tickets start at $165 and go onsale October 12-14, depending on the city. For ticket information, event dates and additional band updates, visit the Big Day Out site.

2012 Big Day Out Lineup
Kanye West | Soundgarden | My Chemical Romance | Girl Talk | Kasabian | Royksopp | Foster the People | Cage the Elephant | Odd Future | Best Coast | Battles | Mariachi el Bronx | Frenzal Rhomb | The Getaway Plan | Architecture in Helsinki | Hilltop Hoods | The Living End | Boy and Bear | The Getaway Plan | Battles

This week Chris Cornell will be wrapping up his spring solo acoustic trek in San Diego (where’s he played a multitude of Soundgarden classics). After that, he will be reconvening with his former Soundgarden bandmates Matt Cameron, Ben Shepherd and Kim Thayil for the official reunion of the grunge group. It’s been 13 years since they disbanded.

Soundgarden, as has been previously reported, will be kicking their summer tour off in Toronto at Molson Canadian Amphitheater on July 2. The rest of the dates on their month long tour of North America have been confirmed. There are also four shows in Canada on the schedule. Opening acts will include Queens Of The Stone Age, The Mars Volta and Coheed And Cambria.

The outing will wrap up with a special homecoming concert to be held in Seattle. The Meat Puppets and Mastodon will be providing support.

On Monday a presale for the new shows will begin for Soundgarden fan club members and then on May 13-14 will be extended to the public. Soundgarden’s official website has additional information on the strict ticket purchasing process.

On Thursday, over a year after Soundgarden announced their reunion, members from the Seattle rock band announced they would be touring North America this summer. It will be the first time they have done so in nearly 15 years.

The outing’s first four dates that have been announced include July 2 at Molson Canadian Amphitheatre in Toronto; July 13 at Festival Pier in Philadelphia at Penn’s Landing; July 18 at Red Rocks Amphitheatre in Denver; and July 22 at the Forum in Los Angeles.

According to the band’s statement, additional dates will be added soon. On Monday tickets will start to go on sale.

During the early 1990 Soundgarden was one of the leaders of the grunge movement. The band is working on a new studio album. It will be Soundgarden’s first new set since “Down on the Upside” was released in 1996. Following the release of that album, Soundgarden disbanded in 1997 amid internal tensions within the band.

On January 1, 2010 Soundgarden announced they were reuniting. However last year they only performed three full-length concerts. Singer and frontman Chris Cornell just embarked on a solo acoustic sold-out tour. He will be out on the road until May 6.

With the much awaited comeback of Conan O’Brien on late night TV by way of “Conan” on TBS on November 8, Monday, the slate for the show’s first musical guests have already been filled up.

Jack White is slated to perform for the show’s premiere episode.  The red haired talk show host and comedian and the White Stripes front man have a long standing friendship that springs from O’Brien’s “Late Night” days over at NBC.  Among White’s most notable appearances alongside O’Brien was an all-week guest stint in the host’s defunct “Late Night”  show when the White Stripe’s “Elephant” release came out in 2003 and a performance by Jack and Meg which was also last seen in the said NBC talk show.  O’Brien on the other hand was featured in the band’s video for the track “Denial Twist” and has also worked with White in his recording studio in Nashville, Third Man Records, where the funny man not only recorded a live set, but a spoken word track as well.

Whether or not White will be performing alone, with the White Stripes or with Meg remains to be seen, on the other hand, Chris Cornell reunited with his band Soundgarden and is also slated to perform on the talk show’s premiere episode.

Chris Cornell rang 2010 in with a bang, when he announced New Year’s Eve Soundgarden, after a hiatus of 12 years, was re-forming.

Several secret gigs followed including one with the “Nudedragons” anagram and headlining slot at Lollapalooza this summer.    On September 28 fans were treated to the inevitable next step for the group’s reunion: they released “Telephantasm,” a collection that spans the greatest hits of their career.

However, how did Soundgarden reach this point?  According to Cornell, it happened both very rapidly and very slowly at the same time, but at the own pace of the band’s always.

Cornell said, what makes it work is one of our issues was the music business’ cyclical nature.  There’s always a schedule to follow and we always were late for something.  Someone was always saying that we were late.  A schedule of two years would be issued.  Soundgarden really didn’t start out like that.  We’re an indie band.  We would just do things a couple week ahead.  It feels now that we’re back to that place.  We do what we want and when we want to.  The environment is more relaxed.  We were able to put “Telephantasm” together approaching it this way in a short amount of time.

Now that the album has been released to stores, are there plans to do a full tour?  Not quite yet.  We are taking baby steps, well maybe Baby Godzilla steps, said guitarist Kim Thayil, laughing.  However that doesn’t necessarily mean Soundgarden is through with their reunion either.  There’s still lots of vault mining they can do.

Matt Cameron, Soundgarden drummer said, we have lots of unreleased demos which were never put  out.  We unearthed them recently.  They sound very good.  So we will be doing that as well.  They are from one specific recording session.  It was maybe in 1988 or 1989.  There is one set of demos we are looking through.  When we do release the catalog we can hopefully include some demos specific to each of the records.

If Soundgarden fans thirst isn’t slaked by “Telephantasm” there’s more they can look forward too.  There might not be an upcoming tour, however they guys say they will still play one off shows or festival gigs here and there.  However, unlike in times past, they will decide on the particulars.  They will also explore new revenue streams.  This is, after all, a reunion.  Soundgarden after being on the shelf for a dozen years, is looking to take complete advantage of the brave new world.

Cornell laughed and said, maybe we could do “Soundgarden: On Ice.”  “Sound-Capades.”  I would watch that.

Lollapalooza returns to Chicago’s Grant Park on August 6-8 for its 2010 edition of the longest-running outdoor music festival. It comes complete with the newly reformed Soundgarden, Lady Gaga and Green Day. Other key acts include Arcade Fire, MGMT, The Strokes, Phoenix, The Black Keys, Erykah Badu, Spoon, Hot Chip and the New Pornographers. For those looking to fill in the artist blanks, head over to the Lollapalooza site for an exhaustive list of performers.

The newly minted Soundgarden will be the band’s first time back together in 12 years. The previously played the Lollapalooza stage in 1992 and 1996. Green Day debuted back in 1994 when they were still punk and cool, and Lady Gaga took an inauspicious side stage in 2007. Last year’s festival featured big name acts like Jane’s Addiction, Depeche Mode, Lou Reed and Tool.

Tickets are currently on sale. The three-day general admission pass will set you back 215 clams while the bigwigs out there will want to extend your wallet a bit further and plunk down $850 for the VIP passes. Full details are available on Lollapalooza.com.

Soundgarden, grunge rock icons, appear ready to reunite later sometime this year. This is according to Chris Cornell, the band’s frontman, who posted a message online on New Year’s Day hinting that the band might be making a comeback.

On his Twitter account Cornell wrote that their 12 year break was over and school is going back in session. Knights of Soundtable will ride again. In the message there was a link to a new website for Soundgarden where fans are able to sign up to get future updates.

If the reunion does happen, it will be the first time that the alternative rock quartet out of Seattle, comprised of Cornell, Kim Thayil, guitarist, Ben Shepherd, bassist and Matt Cameron, drummer, will have played together live since spring 1997.

According to Billboard Magazine, the band is weighing several offers from some major international and U.S. Festivals. There are routing tour issues that still need to be worked out. This in large part due to existing commitments of Cameron’s to play next spring as well as summer with Pearl Jam.

Since 1998 Cameron has been the permanent drummer for Pearl Jam.

Originally Soundgarden broke up in 1997, the year following the release of “Down on the Upside,” the band’s fifth album. The set peaked all the way to No. 2 on Billboard’s 200, but never matched sales numbers from the previous studio album by the band, “Superunknown” released in 1994. “Superunknown” debuted on US album charts at No.1, spawning three singles in the top ten, which included their number 1 hit single “Black Hole Sun.”

After the band broke up, Cornell released a total of three solo albums. He was also the lead singer for Audioslave, a supergroup. Cornell fronted members from Rage Against The Machine and they released three albums. Since the disbandment of Soundgarden Thayil has contributed to different musical projects, including works from Presidents of the United States of American and SunnO))). Thayil was also a guitarist for a heavy metal project of Dave Grohl’s called Probot. They released one album in 2004, which was self titled.

Cameron, in addition to working with Pearl Jam, also worked with Shepherd on Hater, their side project. They released two albums. Their self title debut of 1993 along with “The 2nd” released in 2005.

Chris Cornell, best remembered as lead vocalist for both Soundgarden and Audioslave is currently prepping for a spring tour to sing tracks from his forthcoming album “Scream”.

The tour will work its way from Texas, with a show in Austin on March 27, crossing the eastern border until it finds its way in the mid-west where the tour will come to a close in Chicago on April 19.

“Scream” is Cornell’s third solo album after playing team leader for two bands for most of his career.  Cornell is taking things to a new level with his new record as he collaborated with an unlikely producer – hip-hop and R&B genius Timbaland who is best remembered for working with pop artists like Justin Timberlake and the Pussy Cat Dolls.

“He [Timbaland] would bring in a beat, an idea, I would write to it and sing it, and we would move on kind of to the next thing”, said Cornell in a Pulse of Radio interview in response to those who wondered what went down during the creative process between the two artists.  The result was a classic Chris Cornell rock sound with a pinch of R&B just to spice things up.

“Scream” was originally planned to be released in the fall but was reportedly moved up for a spring release, March 10 to be exact.  The album is Cornell’s follow-up to “Carry On” which was released in 2007. Cornell’s debut solo album, “Euphoria Morning” was released in 1999.

Cornell’s website allows fans to listen to the tracks from his new album via online streaming.  While the tracks “Scream”, “Watch Out” and “Ground Zero” can already be downloaded via the iTunes store and at Amazon.com.

Grammy award winner Chris Cornell who previously fronted Audioslave and iconic rock outfit Soundgarden, both of which are now disbanded, is taking his solo career to new heights, with an extended tour and an album that will knock the socks off his fans.

As reported earlier, Cornell’s third solo album “Scream” was produced by R&B giant Timbaland who turned the rocker’s album into a fusion of heavy metal with a funky and street attitude.  And to support the forthcoming record, Cornell will be going on a heavy-laden North American tour with Timbaland accompanying him for most of the early dates in the US.

The addition of 13 Canadian outings, this time without Timbaland, will have Cornell battling out the treacherous weather up north while blasting out with hits taken from his new album and some of his greatest hits in the past as well, as he hinted in his blog:

“Already working on some songs that I haven’t played in at least 10 years, one song that I haven’t played more than one time live in my life, and I have a short list that we will be able to get to over the next month of touring. I have to say, though, ‘Scream’ is what’s up for me. I have been rehearsing the whole album start to finish and it’s insanely fun.”

Meanwhile, release date for “Scream”  is still slated for November 4.  “Scream” Is Cornell’s follow-up to 2007’s “Carry On”.  Cornell released his solo debut effort in 1999 entitled “Euphoria Morning” while gearing up with the debut of his newly formed band back then –  Audioslave.

You can preview tracks from “Scream”  via streaming by visiting Cornell’s website.  You can also download three tracks from the album – “Ground Zero”, the title track “Scream” and “Watch Out” through Amazon.com and via the iTunes store.

With his new album “Scream”  due to be released on November 4, rock icon Chris Cornell will be embarking on a 13-city tour come next month to promote the album.  He will be accompanied by R&B and hip-hop genius Timbaland in more than half of the shows.

As previously reported, Timbaland produced Cornell’s upcoming third solo effort which turned the rocker’s album into a fusion of R&B and heavy metal rock – something that he has never done before and is way different from his first two solo records and from anything he has done with both Soundgarden and Audioslave.  Cornell describes the album as “the best work I’ve done in my career”, he said in a radio interview in Ryan Seacrest’s “On-Air” show.

The tour will be launched on October 17 in Denver and will run its course westward until it hits Seattle as its last stop on November 2.  A meet-and-greet event with Timbaland is also scheduled along with the album tour.  Visit the artist’s and the album’s website for more information.

For those who can’t wait until “Scream”  hits stores, three tracks from the album – “Watch Out”,  “Ground Zero” and the title track “Scream” are already available for download from both the iTunes store and from Amazon.com.  You could also preview all the tracks from the new album via online streaming from the artist’s website.