Seattle grunge legends Soundgarden have released a new single titled Been Away Too Long, which is the first to be taken from their long-anticipated new album titled King Animal. The single follows on from snippets of songs we’ve heard previously, and before that a non-album track recorded for The Avengers film.

Singer Chris Cornell has said of the new album, “It’s kind of hard to describe, it’s sort of picking up where we left off. There’s a lot of different feels on the album. We’re a band where every single member contributes music, so that makes it very diverse. It’s a very rich album with a lot of different moods to it.”

King Animal will reportedly also feature unreleased material that predates Soundgarden’s 1988 debut Ultramega OK. If this is indeed the case, it certainly adds credence to the claims by Soundgarden guitarist Kim Thayil that King Animal reaffirms the band’s popular sound. “It re-establishes that we still rock, we’re still heavy, and we’re still a little weird,” Thayil told Rolling Stone, according to Blabbermouth.

The new album is due out in Australia from 11th November, this one being the band’s first studio release since 1996’s Down on the Upside.

Listen: Soundgarden – Been Away Too Long

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y0A71tITqe0

‘King Animal’ Tracklisting

1. Been Away Too Long

2. Non-State Actor

3. By Crooked Steps

4. A Thousand Days Before

5. Blood On The Valley Floor

6. Bones of Birds

7. Taree

8. Attrition

9. Black Saturday

10. Halfway There

11. Worse Dreams

12. Eyelid’s Mouth

13. Rowing