An upcoming book about Chris Cornell promises to be the first comprehensive biography of the late rocker who fronted both Soundgarden and Audioslave in addition to Temple of the Dog. It's called Total F*cking Godhead: The Biography of Chris Cornell, and it comes out July 28 from Post Hill Press.

While there have been previous tomes about Cornell, the 384-page exploration from journalist and music critic Corbin Reiff aims to be the definitive guide on the musician. Further, the book seeks to place Cornell's work in the context of his fellow grunge scene luminaries as a crucial document for posterity.

As Reiff told Variety of the book's scope, "There weren't a lot of dots connected about Soundgarden and the history of music, and even among the Seattle bands — Pearl Jam, Nirvana, Alice in Chains even — they had seemed a little lost to history. And so my book is in a lot of ways an attempt to rewrite that record."

He continued, "[Soundgarden] were always a little too ahead of their time, or were a little askew from what was going on. And the tension with Chris is that there's the image of him as this brooding 'Fell on Black Days' dude, but you can't be as good a writer as he was and not have a good sense of humor; he loved to take the piss out of things. I wanted to make sure that when people read the book they got as full a picture of who he was."

First announced by Reiff in 2018, the upcoming biography includes info from the author's interviews with figures such as producer Jack Endino and fellow critic Dawn Anderson. However, Reiff was unable to interview either Cornell's family or the singer's Soundgarden bandmates for Total F*cking Godhead.

Cornell died in Detroit at the age of 52 on May 18, 2017, after his bodyguard found him unconscious in a hotel room. Soundgarden had performed in the city the previous evening. Investigating authorities later acknowledged that the musician died by suicideHis wife and daughters survive him.

Pre-orders for Total F*cking Godhead are available now.

Total F*cking Godhead: The Biography of Chris Cornell Book Cover

Simon & Schuster
Simon & Schuster
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