Below is a collection of the most interesting replies to my General Journal inbox and our Facebook page.
There are many, many, many more great/fantastic replies in the FB thread here: https://www.facebook.com/MachineHead/posts/10154745571783823
But these are the ones that hit me the hardest for whatever reason.
Reading everyone's replies made me realize that it’s been a very difficult thing to process for many of us. I appreciate the well wishes from everyone. Don’t worry about me, I’m fine. Yes, it triggered something dark inside me, something closer to the surface than I realized. Writing/talking helped me process it.
Talking about it on our group-text helped a lot, talking about it with my guys at practice helped a lot. Writing the journal helped a lot, reading you’re replies helped a lot.
And so I’m sharing your replies to hopefully help anyone else struggling with this.
It needs to be discussed.
His suicide, depression, mental health, whatever we want to call needs to be addressed.
We need to get over our uber-macho, alpha-male-society, and be able to talk about these things. For ourselves, for our kids, for our future.
My oldest son had heard Genevra and I talking about Cornell.
Driving him to school 2 days ago, he asked me how he died. I told him. He didn’t understand why someone would do that.
It was tough conversation. And my first thought was to not tell him what it meant, but then my larger fear went to "what if he feels this way already?” And before you go, “oh kids don’t feel that way, kids are just happy all the time”, I have 2 friends who are going though it with their tween/teenagers. So we spoke about it, and I told him "I hoped that him and Wyatt never felt that way because THAT scared me even more."
It was heavy…
How any parent lives through that I’ll never know.
Back when the news broke, the band/crew were talking over the group-text, Phil shared something amazing with us. It was a post from our long-time friend Steffan Chirazi. He had posted his eloquent thoughts regarding Cornell's suicide (written before suicide was confirmed).
If you read only one of the replies below, scroll to the bottom and read his.
It’s well worth your time.
———————————
From: Paul Miller
Subject: Re: CHRIS CORNELL
To: The General Journals
Yeah man. I know that's not a formal way to start a reply, but that last line, "Listen, Honor, Remember Chris Cornell"... that's the truth.
Did so today. Soundgarden was one of those bands that I listed to and enjoyed, but I didn't run it into the ground. It was great music, and I didn't want to burn myself out on it. It would rotate, but I'd save it for special occasions. When "Black Hole Sun" hit MTV, I'd find myself turning the tv so that I wouldn't get sick of it, but it became unavoidable for awhile (at least here in Indiana).
I appreciate your words. They ring true here, too. Never got that low, but my thoughts have been dark enough. It scares me, too. But, I want to forge ahead for my 5 year old - she is what keeps me runnin'.
All the best to you, and thank you for the music through the years. I'm sure you hear people say that your music helped them through rough times. I believe it. It kept me focused on doing something personally productive to develop my chops as I wore out the cassette of 'Burn My Eyes' while learning to play your riffs! So, thank you for that.
Take care,
Paul
From: Rochelle Mangan
Subject: Re: CHRIS CORNELL
To: The General Journals
Thank you for this, I loved reading it and am enjoying re listening to a lot of the songs and albums you mentioned with a different perspective on them (this is something I enjoy doing with music a lot, listening to things after people have told me their ideas and opinions on them etc).
I just want to say though that I hate the "they had so much to live for" type comments. Even if it's done from an emotional, irrational state, I can't not say something about it.
I will find it hard to express concisely and over email the many reasons why but one of the main things is this.... Mental health is hard to deal with because it's invisible, it's so easy to feel like you're a flawed person somehow rather than recognise you are actually unwell. This can mean that experiencing severe depression or whatever when everything in your life is "going great" can (in my experience) often make it so much more confusing and distressing.
I'm definitely not saying it's harder to deal with if your life's great! But, if things aren't great - you've lost your job, you're struggling with a relationship etc it's easier to sort of say to yourself "well of course I'm struggling". I feel like it's also sometimes easier for others to empathise with you if they can see some logical reasons why. It's also easier to get help from public health services (in NZ anyway).
When I'm in a bad patch and I have good things happening in my life I ALWAYS find it harder to not do damaging behaviours because my external things are so at odds with what's happening internally. It's like a big war going on and it is so confusing, so exhausting, just one massive dangerous mind fuck!
Anyway I hope this doesn't make you feel worse than you may already be feeling, I don't mean it to. I just feel that it's important to say these things sometimes. I know suicide can be confusing to people but as you may know, when you're there, it's not.
Thank you for your ramblings and your even more amazing music. It has definitely kept me alive in a big way numerous times.
Rochelle xxx
From: Anita Hoeve
Subject: Re: CHRIS CORNELL
To: The General Journals
Even though I'm a Machine Head fan from the start, and I really enjoy your journals, I don't normally respond to them. Surely you have better things to do than read all the comments, but wow, this day really sucked, didn't it?
I was utterly shocked to hear about Chris' passing. Even more to learn it was suicide. Feel so sad that he felt this was the only way out. I love his voice, his music, listened to Superunknown just last week.
Between all the social outpourings I read today, yours really stood out. Thank you for your story, your memories. For really taking the time to share them with us. They got to me.
Take care Robb, give your kids and Genevra an extra big hug tonight.
Love,
Anita
From: "Kondalski, Joe"
Subject: RE: CHRIS CORNELL
To: 'The General Journals'
I was at the Fox Theater last night to see Soundgarden, here are a couple of pics from the show.
We were in the front row and Chris gave us fist bumps and was very engaged with the fans during the show.
Ps- these are cell phone pics, I will send some pics from my camera later. Feel free to post this pics anywhere.
From: Fábio Gil
Subject: Re: CHRIS CORNELL
To: The General Journals
From a 34 year old fan boy trying to play it cool: if you need help, go and search for it and solve your shit, man. We all have demons and hard things we can't handle by ourselves, sometimes.
So, for this fanboy, and millions around the world, for whom your TALENT and music inspires so fucking much, put yourself together and "headup".
I have a band and we are looking for a proper singer for a time now, maybe a year...
And you, dear Robb, your vocal approach, your melodies, ressonate in my head, pushing me to break my barriers and fears and step to the mic (I play of the guitars).
This is how much you inspire me.
And I'm... just one.
Imagine what you do daily to your legion of fans.
Is there anybody out there?
Yea. There is. Always.
From Portugal, with MUCH MUCH love,
Fábio Gil.
From: Jean-Baptiste Collinet
Subject: Re: CHRIS CORNELL SPOTIFY PLAYLIST
To: The General Journals
Thanks for the playlist, Robb. Great choices, many almost-unknown songs. Great.
Well, I tought about dropping a serious line about how Chris somehow "changed my life" (I know, that's so cliché, but I'm at loss for words, damnit). But I was too down last time you wrote about him.
Not only did Chris, as a human being, kinda "redirected" me on a safer, healthier path… even if we never met (if there's heaven or hell, we may meet sometime. Let's be a hopeless optimistic-pessimist!)
His music... Boy, it's just gut-tearing to think about the loss of the man who opened my mind and my ears enough to stop my technical frenzy and stage thirst for a huge while, and made me start listening instead of merely hearing.
I even put aside performing for years, and I just started again maybe a few months ago. Not as a Swedish Melodeath drummer and guitarist, but as a viola da gamba soloist. Talk about a ride. It doesn't look like it, but both worlds share much more than one may think. Not sure I would have made it so far without Chris.
Chris had this ability to quickly grok and understand the world and music in an unbelievably holistic way. If that's not inspiring, I don't know what is...
I could go on and on, rambling. Enough. Chris has still much to "teach" us, even if he's not "there".
He made me wonder if we're not the dead, wrongly thinking we're alive. How can we dare think we're right? What if the ones we think of as dead/fallen are the ones alive? Anyone has an answer to this?
Jean-Baptiste Collinet
@Rich Hoit
I both love and hate this.
I love the passion, the honesty, and the wish to not shy away from the raw and heartfelt feelings towards a fantastic front man, singer, musician, friend and man. So much respect for that.
I hate the fact that it had to be written so soon 😢
Bravo, Machine Head, a great piece and a great sentiment.
And thank you, Chris Cornell.
@Ashley Merritt
You're strong as fuck Robb because you actually wrote how you feel honestly like this, helping anyone struggling with mental illness.. it helps to know that you're not the only one and the way you feel frankly is exactly the way I do. What a trip. Being open and around good folk means everything, there's always an up after a down. Always.
@Theresa Alaimo
Very proud of you, Robb Flynn, Machine Head, for this tribute to Chris. A
s a journalist for my magazine, Black Planet, in New Mexico, I ran for over 15 years, I too am grieving for Chris Cornell, that beautiful man with an amazing voice.
During the Voivod Tour they played at a club a few blocks from my work space apartment and the promoter asked if I could steam the crab legs for Soundgarden at my place. Delivering a plate of steaming hot crab legs to the beautiful Chris and looking into his eyes, made my legs steam as well. I believe I said, "Your Majesty, I present you with steaming hot crab legs" and bowed. I was such a dork, but I was so overwhelmed by his aura.
I was also at the Foundations Forum where I saw Soundgarden and met you and other great guys. I interviewed you and we all became friends and hung out with Pantera, Biohazard, Exodus, STP, Lemmy, Pearl Jam, Iron Maiden and up and coming new bands for a weekend. I still have my Scorpions beer mug they handed out from their helicopter flight, it was a great experience.
Anytime you are feeling sad or depressed Robb, try to remember that you are a talented musician, a beautiful man and maybe not every woman in the world wants to fuck you, but be your friend and will listen if you need to talk.
I might not ever know if you read this, Robb Flynn, but at least it's out there. We all love you and need you to stick around. We've lost too many, Dimebag, Peter Steele, Wayne Static, Scott Weiland, Layne Staley, Lemmy, just to name a few and when we barely catch our breath, then we lose another. We can't lose you too, our hearts are already broken.
@Matt McDonald
"And I think I'm strong, but I'm not. I'm not as strong as I project, and I'm not sure if I'm stronger than depression. Because I sink into it sometimes. And it's black. I hope I am. I need to be for my kids. For my wife... for myself."
God damn that shit hit me. So personal, so profound, and so relatable. Counseling, medication, therapy... none of that is a guarantee. Whether it's a bout of sadness or full on throes of suicidal depression, sometimes the hardest part for overcoming it is simply reaching out. Be it pride, shame, guilt... find a way to overcome, find something that helps you out of the funk.
Music can be so powerful, so thank you for still being here to share your deeply personal thoughts and feelings, and for continuing to make music. You never know how much it could help even just one person, I think that's reason enough to continue. Thank you!
@Jennifer May
It can be really hard to admit, you worry that you'll be labeled as an attention seeker or told that you just need to cowboy up and try harder to be happy. Medication is still really stigmatized and expensive, and talk therapy can seem intimidating. I'm very, very lucky and grateful that my mama works in mental health so I've had someone to help me navigate the system.
RIP Chris, we lost one of the greatest today.
@Phil Stein
No matter how much one tries to capture the range of emotions evoked by Chris Cornell's vocals, the description falls short of what he could do and what he could convey. Let alone the beauty, poignancy and power that he could generate.
It was like hearing a 5 course gourmet dinner from appetizer through dessert - it was varied and more than that delicious vocally. Thanks for the great description and memorial For Chris Robb. It's so on point and fitting. Perfectly stated!!!
@Mark Garcia
It's the asshole in me but I will never grieve for someone who takes their own life. I can appreciate all the words from fans and I may not have been a fan of sound garden some of the songs were worth listening to. This band as well as the grunge "sound" never resonated with me so maybe that's why as well.
@Jimmy James
Brute honesty again from mr Flynn. Bravo this is why we love you and machine head. Depression does fucking suck and you don't shy away from talking about it. RIP Chris Cornell! Man I was actually a big soundgarden fan back in the 90s before discovering metal.
@Siri LH
Thank you for your honesty and reflections! Highly interesting to read. I can relate to the sadness and the mind fuck.
Soundgarden was the band that sparked my love for heavy music. I've been depressed myself and always felt comfort in listening to Chris Cornell's voice. It resonated with my mind. The darkness felt lighter when I put on a Soundgarden album. I was comforted, like someone got my mood. Whenever I've felt lost, I've put on some Soundgarden and found myself again.
Soundgarden feels like the essence of my being and I will always be deeply grateful for their music, and for Cornell's voice, lyrics and mood.
I've seen them live once and I smiled the whole show through.
Eternal love for Chris Cornell and Soundgarden <3 My heart goes out to his loved ones.
@Austin Kokel
I saw them on Lollapalooza '96, and I'm glad to hear you say what I felt at that show. I was only 15, but I had Badmotorfinger and Superunknown and I absolutely loved both and was right up front. The band was definitely in a funk, and the bassist was an asshole, spitting on and insulting the crowd (and bot in the fun Ramones way I experienced an hour earlier). I try to explain their set to people now, and I can't. I'm glad to hear my 20+ year old sentiments echoed.
That said, I always wondered about him after that day, but I never saw this coming either, not this far down the road.
Thanks for your honesty and insight, Robb. We love you. We love Machine Fucking Head. Be strong.
@J Ake Hess
You've expressed so many feelings and thoughts rattling around in my head today that I just couldn't find words to put to. Cornell will always be uniquely amazing and in a class by himself. I was listening to his cover of Prince's Nothing Compares 2 You just last night and letting myself become entranced by his unique sound and incredible voice.
Today I am sad, angry, and a bit enthralled with my own mortality. Nobody is immune and sometimes the struggle is too much for even the people with everything to live for. I can't imagine what his family is feeling today. Beyond tragic…
@Steffan Chirazi
No-one can be sure why he is dead, and when it is appropriate, we will know.
But depression is a very, very real thing.
It is a part of life, but for some, it carries deadly lows and utterly crushing weight along with a gravitational pull into darkness that many of us cannot fathom.
I sometimes fight the rabbit hole.
I see it, I feel it, I flirt with its edges, but then I bury my head in the dog or hug the cat or take deep breathes and get outside and find a piece of mental architecture to grab hard, fast and haul myself out.
I am very lucky. I am slightly brushed with depression and anxiety, but fortunately I am always able to find the light. Fortunately I still retain enough of my natural mental antibodies to find the path out quickly and efficiently.
There is no doubt that age makes that path harder to find sometimes, as a consequence of both the physical being and some of the inevitabilities which come with your 50s (such as more people in your circle dying).
Others are not so lucky. It isn't because they 'don't want to' or 'aren't trying hard enough' or 'don't love their familes' or anything remotely like that. It isn't ever for the lack of trying. It is because depression (and anxiety) are a crushing, debilitating disease which this country, this planet, seems largely unable to recognize.
We push people to the outer regions of anxiety and depression with no care that there are some who fall headfirst into a rabbit hole tornado and only through regular (and possibly unrecognized miracles) find themselves hurled into the escape bunker as opposed to the abyss.
Yeah. Imagine that. A tornado that escalates within minutes from a slight, chilly breeze, a tornado that offers no pattern as to when it will appear. And imagine that the only help which can come your way is a bunker miraculously opening up beneath your feet and drawing you to a womb of safety until the tornado passes…
...Often, people with clinical depression will self-medicate. Not because they 'like to fucking party' but because there is no other way out. It's 'easier' to take a swig, take a pill, take a hit. It keeps the darkness in the distance and the tornado (when it pops up) is smashed into smithereens by the 'medicine’.
Let me, by the way, be VERY clear. I am NOT saying he was doing ANY of that. He had his dances back in the old days, ones he has been very open about. But I thought he had left that behind. I honestly don't know but feel he had for some time.
Whatever eh?
Because we judge anyway.
Yet we judge.
We judge in all senses and all ways. Why do they do that?
Why do they behave that way?
Who do they think they are?
Why can't they just cheer up...?
Why are they being such an asshole?
Yeah, cheer up will ya? You're handsome or pretty or rich or famous or successful or ALL of those things. Come on.
All you gotta do is think about how much worse so many other people have it.
Who do you think you are? There are people with 'real' problems out there…
I heard the same shit about Cobain and Staley.
Listen, does anyone really believe that they wanted to go? That they didn't with every sinew wish in their more lucid moments that they could find a way out?
Of course not. Pain is one thing, emotional pain is a whole other ball of wax, but add that to a chemical equation in your DNA that can (without warning) turn your colours to black and white, your peripheral vision to a short, narrow tunnel and which leaves your light feeling cold-negative and it is clear to see that this disease is both monstrous and potentially crippling.
The thing with tornados is that when you're in one, they don't afford you the 'luxury' of contemplation. Especially when it is your own chemicals, your own imbalances through no fault of your own, which rise from nowhere to envelope you in that tornado; I never heard of anyone caught in one who was able to see straight, let alone reason with themselves.
Fortunately some find their way out. They discover a regular path out of the fog, and they can stick to it. That is not to judge people who cannot; every situation is different.
But some simply can't. They try and try and try again. Maybe they achieve success in escaping dark moments, and maybe they eradicate self-medication and triggers from their lives with the help of great local support. However there are never guarantees.
Again, I don't know why he died. I spent a little time with him here and there, enough to know that for years, there was a dark moodiness which expressed itself via his generally quiet way and rich lyrics.
Later on he certainly spruced himself up, chucked in the deeper self-medications, and seemed a lot more comfortable with life than when he wrote the semi-self-ridiculing "Jesus Christ Pose" but what did I know?
Apparently not much at all…
...If you see a friend struggling, if you sense or feel a friend or family member is drifting near a rabbit hole, please, check-in with them. However you have to, either directly or just create an excuse to see them, to talk to them.
We are so emotionally guarded that we perhaps see it as 'intruding' or 'sticking our noses in'. Know your friends. Know your family. Be kind whenever you can with them, have a laugh or crack a shit joke. But touch base.
Do it today.
Much love to everyone who suffers and is either marginalized, trivialized or simply ignored. Much love to those getting assistance in their ongoing battle.
Subscribe to The General Journals:
http://thegeneraljournals.hosted.phplist.com/lists/?p=subscribe
