Concert review: Chris Cornell, ASB Theatre

Chris Cornell was in fine voice in Auckland. File photo/Getty

With his brown curls, scruffy jeans and black boots, Chris Cornell looked every inch the towering Grunge God as he strolled onto ASB Theatre's main stage at 8.15pm and waved to the crowd to cheers of, "I love you Chris".

Cornell, performing the first of three sold out Auckland shows in ASB Theatre's spacious confines, was appearing under a much different guise to his usual gig hollering in front of grunge powerhouse Soundgarden.

As the bleeding heart on the stage back-drop behind Cornell illustrated, this was an intimate sit down show of acoustic jams, a chance to see a grunge veteran cherry-picking songs and stories from his diverse musical history as well as playing a few choice, occasionally surprising, covers.

Like his last solo appearance in 2011, we were expecting Cornell to be funny - and he was.

On his own, perched on a giant chair while surrounded by racks of guitars and a shelf full of vinyl, Cornell acted like he was in his lounge, cracking a joke about Paul McCartney's ex-wife Heather Mills, taking a dig at Neil Young's harmonica head rig, and keeping up the banter with the crowd over their love for his occasional stage mate, a musician who went only by the name 'Brian'.

We were expecting plenty of stripped back grunge anthems as well, and there were a few of those: Doesn't Remind Me from his days in Audioslave was an early highlight played so fast and furiously Cornell broke his guitar, a brilliantly energetic reworking of Soundgarden's Rusty Cage, as well as the double-up of Wooden Jesus and Hunger Strike, two songs from his early grunge supergroup Temple of the Dog.

Although, with just four songs from the 26-strong selection chosen from his day job in Soundgarden, fans may have come away feeling just a little bit disappointed that there weren't just a couple more thrown into the two-and-a-half-hour show.

But Cornell made up for that in unexpected ways, like those covers, including the expected (Led Zeppelin's Thank You) and the unexpected (Prince's Nothing Compares 2 U), and a selection of tender heart songs, many of which were taken from Cornell's mellow solo album Higher Truth from earlier this year.

They were scattered throughout the set, like gentle opener Before We Disappear, the soaring tones of Nearly Forgot My Broken Heart, and the album's title track Higher Truth, which closed the show with a dramatic flourish.

It showed Cornell wasn't afraid to get a little loud at times, his warm, husky tones occasionally punctuated with that iconic Soundgarden scream, like the remixed outro of Blow Up the Outside World, the wonderfully downtuned riff of Seasons from the 1993 Singles soundtrack, or the soaring chorus of Hunger Strike that's probably still ringing around the ears of everyone in the crowd.

But the best bits were when Cornell got that wounded heart of his out and put it on his sleeve. As a grunge troubadour, he just can't be beat.

* Chris Cornell performs at ASB Theatre again tonight and tomorrow.

Who: Chris Cornell
Where: ASB Theatre, Auckland
When: Thursday, November 26