3 Classic Rock Artists From the 90s Who Went Solo

What is a band? Sometimes it’s a collection of musicians who feel they can express any side of their creativity with freedom and experimentation. Other times, though, it can feel like a single lane of a highway—a great, fast, beautiful lane. But one lane, nonetheless. Sometimes artists want to veer out of that lane to showcase some other moves.

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That’s what we wanted to explore below. To take a look at three prominent artists from the 1990s who enjoyed great success in bands but who also decided to go out on their own at various points in their lives. Indeed, these are three classic rock artists from the 1990s who went solo.

Eddie Vedder

The Southern California surfer Eddie Vedder got a few demos from a new rock band in Seattle around the turn of the 1990s—from there, classic rock history was made. That surfer wrote some lyrics, met the band in the Pacific Northwest, and together they formed Pearl Jam. The grunge group had a great deal of success, beginning with their debut LP, Ten, in 1991. But it was in 2007 when Vedder went out on his own to pursue a solo career. He didn’t leave Pearl Jam; he just veered onto a new path for a bit. Vedder had a more sensitive side than he could always express with his band of hard rockers. His first studio solo release? The 2007 soundtrack for the tragic film, Into the Wild.

Chris Cornell

Chris Cornell rose to fame in the late 1980s thanks to his Seattle-born band Soundgarden. The group, which released its first album, Ultramega OK, in 1988, was the first grunge outfit to garner a Grammy nomination. Later, in 1991, he founded the Andrew Wood tribute supergroup Temple of the Dog. But it was in the late 1990s when Cornell decided to try out a solo career, releasing his debut solo LP, Euphoria Morning, in 1999. Cornell, who joined the classic rock group Audioslave in 2002, released four more solo albums throughout his career, including the 2020 posthumous No One Sings Like You Anymore, Vol. 1, which dropped three years after his 2017 death.

Slash

Wearing his signature top hat and sunglasses, Slash became a famous celebrity musician in the 1980s thanks to the success of his classic rock band Guns N’ Roses. But no one group could ever hold Slash, who went solo in 1995 after releasing his final LP with GNR in 1993. His debut solo LP? The 1995 offering, It’s Five O’Clock Somewhere, with his band Slash’s Snakepit. Slash has been part of several projects since then, including releasing his self-titled solo LP, Slash, in 2010. More recently, he’s been a part of the epic project, Slash featuring Myles Kennedy & the Conspirators, which released its latest LP, 4, in 2022.

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