Nearly two years after the breakup of Soundgarden, the band's former singer, Chris

Cornell, has completed more than half of the tracks for his solo debut.

Cornell, the muscular-voiced frontman for the defunct Seattle hard-rock/metal band, has

been in a Los Angeles studio for the past six weeks, working on the still-untitled album,

for which he has already recorded seven songs, according to his manager, Jim Guerniot.

"It's a loose vibe, where Chris is producing it himself and just letting it go where it feels

right," said Guerniot, who also manages Offspring and heads Time Bomb/Deconstruction Records. Guerniot was formerly

an executive at A&M Records and is credited with helping to sign Soundgarden and

nurture their career at that label.

Among the musicians assisting Cornell on the album are guitarist Alain Johannes and

bassist Natasha Shneider of L.A. rock band Eleven. Johannes and Shneider backed

Cornell on his first solo venture, "Sunshower," which appeared on the Great

Expectations soundtrack.

Ex-Soundgarden drummer Matt Cameron -- who joined Pearl Jam's live lineup this

summer to fill in for PJ's regular drummer, Jack Irons (who, interestingly, had previously

played with Eleven) -- dropped by the studio while PJ were in Los Angeles recently and

recorded a track for Cornell's album, according to Guerniot.

Also helping out on the sessions is in-demand L.A. drummer Josh Freese, who, in

addition to his work with hardcore punk act the Vandals, is rumored to be the new

drummer for Guns n' Roses.

"He said he's having a really great time," Guerniot said of Cornell's mood during the

sessions, "the most fun he's had in a while. He seems very excited."

Soundgarden, who broke up in April 1997, released a greatest-hits album,

A-Sides, in November. The collection spanned the group's output from "Nothing

to Say," taken off its debut 1987 Sub Pop EP, Screaming Life, to "Blow Up the

Outside World," from its final studio album, 1996's Down on the Upside.

As a companion to the greatest-hits album, a B-sides collection from the now-defunct

group is tentatively scheduled for release in 1999, according to Soundgarden's

ex-manager, Susan Silver. "[Guitarist] Kim [Thayil] is primarily working on it," Silver said

of the untitled collection. "It will make the perfect balance with the previous album, but it

will have a lot of obscure, previously released stuff. It'll be songs that were released on

2,000-run singles in Japan, [that] type of stuff."

Soundgarden's breakup surprised fans when it came two months after an

announcement that the band would be taking the summer of 1997 off from touring. The

tour layoff -- which would have been the band's first since 1988 -- had been reported as

being an opportunity to work on new material, although rumors of a possible break had

already begun to surface.

The last date of Soundgarden's 1996-97 tour, a Feb. 9, 1997, show at the Blaisdell

Arena in Honolulu, was their last live gig.

Soundgarden's albums have sold more than 20 million copies.