FEATURE:
Won't You Come, and Wash Away the Rain?
Soundgarden’s Superunknown at Thirty
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IT will be an emotional day…
PHOTO CREDIT: Paul Harries
when 8th March arrives. It is a time to celebrate thirty years since the release of Soundgarden’s Superunknown. No doubt one of the best albums of the 1990s, it is also sad that the band’s lead, Chris Cornell, is no longer with us (he died by suicide in 2017). His voice and lyrics are so crucial to the success and brilliance of the album. So poetic and intelligent as a songwriter, his awesome vocal power and range makes each of the fifteen tracks so compelling. Even though the album is seventy minutes and is quite sprawling, there seems to be no waste or bloat on Soundgarden’s fourth studio album. In fact, the international version of the album have sixteen tracks – ending on She Likes Surprises rather than Like Suicide. Less than a month before Grunge godfather Kurt Cobain died (5th April, 1994), we got an album that seemed to predict something terrible. Black Hole Sun, the best-known track from Superunknown, has that feeling of needing something to wash away pain and darkness. Produced with Michael Beinhorn, Soundgarden released a timeless album. One that seemed to capture a mood perfectly in 1994. In perhaps music’s greatest-ever year, Superunknown stands alongside the greatest albums from the year. I will end with some reviews of Superunknown. Prior to that, there are features about the album that are worth bringing in. Whilst many have seen the 1994 album as harrowing, alienating and tortured, there is so much richness and range on the album. Rather than seeing it as an insight into Chris Cornell’s psyche at the time, I feel it is a testament to the remarkable talent of this man. Words that can resonate with many people but also offer hope and depth. It is hard to explain. I feel many paint Superunknown as bleak. That is not how I see it.
In 2022, Kerrang! discussed how Superunknown was a breakthrough for Soundgarden. A legacy that has lasted all of this time, there is no doubt that this album – released on 8th March, 1994 – is a masterpiece. Even stronger than the remarkable Badmotorfinger of 1991:
“Soundgarden were the first of the big grunge acts to sprout and yet the last to bloom. At least commercially. Long before Nirvana and Pearl Jam struck gold with Nevermind and Ten respectively, Soundgarden had impressed with their staggering musical intelligence – fusing punk, metal and rock with an array of bewildering time signatures and dynamics. And that was to say nothing of Chris’ voice: both sky-scraping and inimitable.
By 1991 they were drowning in critical acclaim following classic third album Badmotorfinger, but they weren’t smashing charts. Moreover, when Soundgarden toured that album supporting Guns N’ Roses, they soon found the rock world to be a divided nation. When Kerrang! interviewed them in Australia on their headline tour ahead of Superunknown’s release, they were ecstatic simply to be playing to their own fans.
“We went to Europe with Guns N’ Roses playing in front of 60,000 people who didn’t give a shit about us,” Chris reflected.
At the time of recording Superunknown in 1993, Soundgarden were a band searching for individuation: not just to distinguish themselves from every other band, but also from what they had done previously. First, they changed the way they worked.
“Someone would bring in a demo of a song they wrote, and as opposed to really concentrating on why we liked it and what it was about the original idea, we’d just sort of Soundgarden-ise it,” Chris told K! about their old method. “That can make an album sound a little more sterile.”
Their new material would be different and their musical remit would have to expand to accommodate it. Twenty tracks in total were made at Seattle’s legendary Bad Animals studio with producer Michael Beinhorn, before whittling that number down to 15.
Chris Cornell delivered big moments aplenty, including the classic singles The Day I Tried To Live and Fell On Black Days, plus frenetic opener Let Me Drown. But one of his songs would, of course, go on to eclipse the rest, at least in terms of mainstream attention. Even in the present day, the disenchanted psychedelia of Black Hole Sun remains extraordinary. Chris told Rolling Stone he saw it as a “surreal, esoteric word painting”.
Indeed, the whole album painted with an unrestricted palette. Keyboards, alternative tunings, viola, cello, spoons and, in the case of My Wave, even a nod to surf-rock were all introduced. It is, in the words of guitarist Kim Thayil speaking for a Spotify commentary on the 20th anniversary reissue, a “perfect headphones album”.
Each member made big contributions. Some of the most arresting riffs belong neither to Chris nor Kim but rather drummer Matt Cameron, who not only conceived of the central riff for Mailman but also played mellotron on it. Fresh Tendrils was another Matt composition (made even more atypical by including clavinet), and so was the rising guitar of Limo Wreck. “Our drummer came up with that,” gushed Kim.
Two of the album’s most unique songs came courtesy of bassist Ben Shepherd. The disembodied, twisting strains of Head Down was his creation, as was the Indian music-influenced Half. Chris even refused to sing on the latter, insisting that it would lose its character without Ben’s voice.
Kim Thayil not only served up the surging, punky Kickstand, as you would expect, he augmented songs brilliantly, adding compelling layers and riffs. Most stunning of all was his standout solo on Like Suicide.
Soundgarden didn’t shy away from the molten noise that had defined them, either. On 4th Of July – inspired by Chris’ LSD trip on an Indian reservation – they arguably delivered their heaviest moment.
When all of the above was put together in the studio, Soundgarden had recorded an album that fit their own adventurous brief and was set to confound expectations. “There has been much rumour about Superunknown… the dreaded word ‘commercial’ has been bandied about,” reported K! ahead of its release. “It’s far from commercial, but it’s not Badmotorfinger 2.”
As its legacy would attest, this was something else entirely.
Soundgarden soon unravelled after their mainstream breakthrough. They would release one more (excellent) album, 1996’s Down On The Upside, before imploding. Though it took 16 years before they would release 2012’s King Animal, even in that protracted absence, Superunknown remained omnipresent in rock’s collective conscience.
Much of it was dark, articulating themes of loss, depression and isolation with unflinching grace and a searing poetic edge. Reflecting with Rolling Stone in 2012, Chris – who had always been so allergic to nostalgia – reappraised their masterpiece.
“There’s an eeriness in there, a kind of unresolvable sadness or indescribable longing that I’ve never really tried to isolate and define and fully understand,” he said. “But it’s always there. It’s like a haunted thing.”
In light of the tragedy of his passing in 2017, it is perhaps now more haunting than ever. The loss of Chris Cornell – and, indeed, of Soundgarden – is one rock fans will mourn greatly. But such grief should also be tempered by the undiminished power of their music. ‘Alive in the Superunknown,’ Chris bellowed on the title-track’s chorus. So he was then. So he shall remain”.
Before coming to a couple of reviews, there is an interesting feature from Consequence of Sound. Marking the twentieth anniversary of Superunknown in 2014, their colleagues Matt Melis and Henry Hauser discussed the album’s place in both the band’s history and the legacy of the Grunge movement. There are some interesting exchanges and observations. I never thought about the track sequencing and, if you had to, would you cut a song from this classic?! There is no doubt everyone has their own favourite tracks from Superunknown:
“MM: What’s your favorite cut off the record?
HH: That would be “Head Down”. The track kicks off with Cornell’s soft whisper lulling us into a numb calm. Complex time signature shifts come into play once again, really showcasing Cameron’s impeccable timing. The drummer takes a 20-second victory lap as the track fades, almost like a curtain call after a Herculean effort. Fully deserved.
Is there a track you would drop?
MM: It’s bordering on sacrilege, but I never understood the hysteria over “Black Hole Sun”, even though that song blew Soundgarden up. And do you remember the video? Christ, that gave me nightmares. All those Enzyte commercial smiles and morphing, impish faces. But it plays so long and always struck me as a bizarre take on an old-timey song like “You Are My Sunshine”. It’s the only track I routinely skip over. I’m guessing you and the 19 million YouTubers who’ve watched it don’t agree.
HH: I agree in part and dissent in part. I find the melodic guitar and cold, distant harmonies to be really compelling. But for all this catchy, cosmic, psychedelic pop, it’s a self-obsessed song and goes on for way too long. Plus, it’s been playing in select coffee shops for two decades straight. Tons of overplayed songs become parodies of themselves; it’s unavoidable.
MM: Or become part of Weird Al polka medleys.
So, Soundgarden announced that they’ll be playing Superunknown in its entirety next week down in Austin as part of the iTunes Festival. Is this something to get excited about attending or streaming?
HH: I think Superunknown deserves the spotlight, but I hope this doesn’t mean they’re going to exclude material from the first three albums. That would be unfortunate.
MM: Would you want a second set that delved into the rest of their discography?
HH: Yeah, I’d be hoping for a second set. And I’d also advise them to shuffle up the order.
MM: Abandon the original sequence?
HH: I would. I think it works well in an album context, but a lot of the most visceral cuts are towards the front of the LP. In terms of playing a live set, if they stick to the original order they’re going to get through all the singles relatively early. That doesn’t make for a grand climax, which is what they ought to be going for.
What do you think?
MM: It’s like a movie you love. You know every scene, beat, and twist, and there’s an emotional and psychological payoff when you can anticipate what’s coming and it still delivers when it arrives. So, I do think there’s something to seeing the journey through from opener to closer, never being surprised but also never being bored by knowing what’s coming. So, the original sequence would be my preference”
I would urge anyone who does not own Superunknown to go and buy it. In 2014, to mark its twentieth anniversary, there were reissues. Depending on your budget, there was a two or five-disc set. Soundgarden’s magnum opus was reviewed by Pitchfork in 2014. They were hugely positive about this incredible and epic album:
“Usually, it’s a bad sign when the wild-child frontman of your favorite group cuts his hair and starts wearing shirts. But the clean-cut Cornell that emerged with Superunknown was emblematic of the album’s mission to deliver maximal effect with minimal histrionics. With its despairing worldview, gold-plated production, and CD-stuffing 71-minute running time, Superunknown is a quintessential ’90s artifact. But thanks to its still-formidable high-wire balance of hooks and heft, the album nonetheless represents, some 20 years later, the platonic ideal of what a mainstream hard rock record should be. And even if that’s an ideal to which few contemporary bands aspire (aside from, say, Queens of the Stone Age), Superunknown remains a useful model for any left-of-center artist hoping to achieve accessibility without sacrificing identity.
For Soundgarden, the push toward pop was the result of incremental evolutions rather than a spectacular leap. Where Badmotorfinger introduced flashes of psychedelia and paisley-patterned melody amid Kim Thayil’s pulverizing riffage, on Superunknown, these elements become featured attractions. The once-oblique John Lennon references gave way to unabashed homage—centerpiece power ballad “Black Hole Sun” is pretty much “Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds” turned upside down and dropped in a heap of soot and coal. That song counts as Superunknown’s most wanton act of subversion—setting its apocalyptic imagery to a tune so pretty, even Paul Anka can dig it—but if that element of surprise has been diluted by two decades of perpetual rock-radio rotation, the album boasts a wealth of less celebrated deep cuts (the queasy psych-folk of “Head Down,” the dread-ridden doom of “4th of July”) that retain a palpable sense of unease.
Even the album’s eternal fist-pump anthems—“The Day I Tried to Live”, “Fell on Black Days”, “My Wave”—are infected with misanthropy and malaise, making Superunknown the rare arena-rock album that makes just as much sense in blacked-out bedroom. (And yet, despite the junkie intimations of its title, “Spoonman” is really just about a man who plays with spoons.) That said, if you don’t hate the world now quite as much as did when you were 18, you may find yourself skipping over the leaden likes of “Mailman” and “Limo Wreck,” while developing a newfound appreciation for how bassist Ben Shepherd’s India-inspired oddity, “Half”, injects a welcome dose of absurdity into the mix.
By fortuitous coincidence, Superunknown hit stores the same day as Nine Inch Nails’ The Downward Spiral, an album boasting a similarly expansive scope and thematic framework, albeit approached from a drastically different set of influences (’80s new wave, goth, and electro as opposed to ’60s classic rock). The connection between the two albums is strong enough that the two bands toured together in 1994 and—despite some shit-talkin’ in the interim—are reuniting once again this summer for a joint-20th-anniversary jaunt. For casual Soundgarden fans who still own the record, a concert ticket may ultimately be a more efficient way of celebrating Superunknown’s birthday than by shelling out for this reissue (available in two-and five-CD box set iterations), whose bonus material mostly amounts to demos and rehearsal tapes that cast this epic album in a more normalizing light. However, you do develop a greater appreciation for the final product when you hear the ideas that got scrapped along the away or relegated to B-sides, like the dirgey embryonic arrangement of “Fell on Black Days” (a.k.a. “Black Days III”), the free-form ambient stew of “Jerry Garcia’s Finger”, and a club-friendly industrial funk mix of “Spoonman” by Steve Fisk that sounds like a test run for his beat-driven project Pigeonhed.
You also get a glimpse of the band’s future course with a beautifully spare acoustic treatment of “Like Suicide” that points the way to 1996’s more temperate Down on the Upside, the album that effectively triggered Soundgarden’s subsequent 13-year break-up. But then the go-for-broke, peak-conquering triumphalism of Superunknown was itself a harbinger that the writing was on the wall for this band at the time. When Cornell sings, “Alive in the superunknown” on the album’s acid-swirled title track, it’s both a valorous testament to Soundgarden’s last-gang-in-town fortitude and a telling prophecy of the uncertainty to come, with grunge’s early ’90s stranglehold on alt-rock radio soon to be loosened by the emergence of pop-punk, Britpop, electronica, and nu-metal. But amid a musical landscape now splintered into infinite subgenres, Superunknown remains the very definition of no-qualifiers-required rock—a tombstone for a once-dominant aesthetic, perhaps, but also a solid, immovable mass that endures no matter how dramatically its surroundings have changed”.
I am going to round up with a review from AllMusic. If some find Superunknown too dark or heavy a listen, there are those that can appreciate the range and depth of the album. The smarts, the anxiety, the measured moments, the anthems and surprise moments. Taking Metal and Grunge to new places, there is no doubt that Superunknown inspired so many other artists. It was a huge statement. Seen as one of the best albums ever, Chris Cornell, Kim Thayil, Ben Shepherd and Matt Cameron delivered a masterpiece on 8th March, 1994:
“Soundgarden's finest hour, Superunknown is a sprawling, 70-minute magnum opus that pushes beyond any previous boundaries. Soundgarden had always loved replicating Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath riffs, but Superunknown's debt is more to mid-period Zep's layered arrangements and sweeping epics. Their earlier punk influences are rarely detectable, replaced by surprisingly effective appropriations of pop and psychedelia. Badmotorfinger boasted more than its fair share of indelible riffs, but here the main hooks reside mostly in Chris Cornell's vocals; accordingly, he's mixed right up front, floating over the band instead of cutting through it. The rest of the production is just as crisp, with the band achieving a huge, robust sound that makes even the heaviest songs sound deceptively bright.
But the most important reason Superunknown is such a rich listen is twofold: the band's embrace of psychedelia, and their rapidly progressing mastery of songcraft. Soundgarden had always been a little mind-bending, but the full-on experiments with psychedelia give them a much wider sonic palette, paving the way for less metallic sounds and instruments, more detailed arrangements, and a bridge into pop (which made the eerie ballad "Black Hole Sun" an inescapable hit). That blossoming melodic skill is apparent on most of the record, not just the poppier songs and Cornell-penned hits; though a couple of drummer Matt Cameron's contributions are pretty undistinguished, they're easy to overlook, given the overall consistency. The focused songwriting allows the band to stretch material out for grander effect, without sinking into the pointlessly drawn-out muck that cluttered their early records. The dissonance and odd time signatures are still in force, though not as jarring or immediately obvious, which means that the album reveals more subtleties with each listen. It's obvious that Superunknown was consciously styled as a masterwork, and it fulfills every ambition”.
Even though there has been an anniversary reissue, I hope that many revisit Superunknown ahead of its thirtieth anniversary. So many classics from 1994 have anniversaries coming up. Without doubt one of the finest albums of that incredible year, I remember when it came out. Watching the video for Black Hole Sun for the first time when I was ten. Listening to the album years later – maybe in the late-1990s – and being blown away by it. Even though Chris Cornell is no longer with us, we remember him through albums like this. Such a compelling and amazing songwriter and singer. Someone who can never be replaced or forgotten. We will definitely remember the phenomenal Superunknown…
FOR decades to come.