SOUNDGARDEN Live Album Planned; New Music 'Very Likely', Says Guitarist KIM THAYIL

Bookie of the Toronto, Ontario, Canada radio station CFNY-FM, broadcasting at 102.1 FM, recently conducted an interview with guitarist Kim Thayil of reunited grunge legends SOUNDGARDEN. You can now listen to the chat using the audio player below (courtesy of JeffGarden.com).

Regarding SOUNDGARDEN's decision to reunite and the band's future plans, Thayil said, "We're doing little projects here and there. The guys have other commitments but this is the thing we're most excited about.

"I don't know at what point we could say we were back together — it was so gradual.

"The band were in talks about attending to our catalogue and merchandise, which had been neglected over the past decade. We wanted an e-commerce profile and we'd never maintained the website we had, and wanted to start a new one. We wanted to take advantage of the way the market had changed — iTunes, Facebook and so on, and put out the records we always promised we'd put out. That's what started the awareness of our legacy. From there it blossomed into the suggestion that we jam together, and perhaps play a live show.

"We had a live album in the can just waiting for someone to mix it. We wanted to do B-side albums and that might be two or three albums. We'll be doing other shows and working on releasing some albums from deeper in our catalog."

According to Thayil, it's unlikely that the resurrected SOUNDGARDEN won't wind up writing brand-new songs. He said, "When we get together to rehearse, it's natural for us, being guys who have a rapport, to start jamming and inventing. We've come up with instrumental, and certainly on occasion, lyrical ideas.

"I'm not confirming anything, but it's impossible for us to get in a room and not come up with ideas. It's very likely in the future, perhaps sooner than later, we'll get together and de-emphasise the rehearsing part and emphasise the jamming part."

Interview (audio):

SOUNDGARDEN made its first national television appearance in 13 years on November 9, when the band performed on the second episode of Conan O'Brien's new nighttime talk show on TBS, "Conan". SOUNDGARDEN reunited earlier this year after splitting up back in 1997, and singer Chris Cornell told The Pulse Of Radio that there was never any juicy story behind their decision to break up. "Nobody really likes the answers they got with why did SOUNDGARDEN break up, because they almost feel like it wasn't tabloid-ish enough," he said. "People seem to want to sort of hear rumors and things that were based on what you normally hear, I guess, which is, you know, 'I hated that guy' or 'that guy hated me' or a specific thing happened one day that was unbelievable or horrible. And, like, none of that existed. We had just been a band, I think, a lot longer than a lot of people knew about."

SOUNDGARDEN played two songs on "Conan": the recently released 1991 studio cut "Black Rain" was broadcast on the show, while the track "Hunted Down" — SOUNDGARDEN's very first single, released in 1987 — was posted online only.

SOUNDGARDEN has played just a handful of gigs since reuniting earlier this year, including a headlining show at this past summer's Lollapalooza festival in Chicago.

The band has yet to announce any full-length tour plans.

SOUNDGARDEN released a CD/DVD retrospective set in late September called "Telephantasm", featuring singles, album cuts, live material and the previously unavailable "Black Rain".