Chris Cornell, who was born on July 20, 1964, had one of the most recognizable amazing voices in rock music. He showed the range of his talents in his solo work as well as his work in the bands Soundgarden and Audioslave. While the below performance with Yusaf / Cat Stevens may seem like an unusual pairing, together they create a sweet live version of Stevens’s “Wild World.”
Yusaf Islam, whose performance name used to be Cat Stevens and now also goes as “Yusaf / Cat Stevens,” released “Wild World” on his 1970 album Tea for Tillerman. The song about a lover leaving is one of both sadness and hope. The singer addresses a departing lover: “And it’s breakin’ my heart you’re leavin’ / Baby, I’m grievin’ / But if you wanna leave, take good care.”
But it is not an angry broken-hearted song. The singer wishes the former lover well (“I never wanna see you sad, girl”), while warning that you can’t get by with just a smile in the “wild world.”
Yusaf / Cat Stevens wrote “Wild World” about the end of a relationship with a woman. He has explained, “I was sending out a warning signal that even though things may look great…you have a lot of fancy clothes and whatever else you want out of life. But don’t forget there’s dangers, too. My message was to her, but also probably to myself, because I was now entering into a new phase of success.” In more recent years, he has noted that he always thought the original version of the song was “too commercial,” and even re-recorded “Wild World” in another version.
In this live performance from The Pantages Theater in Los Angeles, Chris Cornell lends his voice to capture both the joy and mournfulness of the song. Check out this October 6, 2016 performance, less than a year before Cornell’s tragic death on May 18, 2017.
Earlier in 2021, a Chris Cornell retrospective album of cover songs No One Sings Like You Anymore was released.
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