SOUNDGARDEN | SUPERUNKNOWN
This monolith of an album captures the heaviness of the band’s early work while displaying a brand new range of territory. Chris Cornell dove into an abyss of stark and brooding lower register vocal deliveries while still cranking the attitude up to 11. It’s a heavy attack of grooves and guitar that come together in a whiplash of crunchy riffs and pummelling bass lines.
15 songs and 70 minutes in its playtime, the album seems endless. You can get lost in parts of it that seem to gallop into desolate forest areas of experimentation and diversity. Alternate tunings and odd time signatures make for a captivating experience, as the music meanders and expands. Themes of death, loss, and discovery offer philosophy layered in bleakness. The music feels like a heavy suit of armour that feels both protective and encompassing all at once.
“Spoonman” punches through with a lengthy guitar riff mimicking the drawn-out pull of the album. Lyrics wade through the dark waters of suicide, substance abuse, and depression perfectly reflecting the realism that the early 90’s was slipping into. Albums like these were quintessential in hammering the final nail into the coffin of the out-dated hair-metal that preceded it.
Superunknown symbolized a change in the tides for rock music and washed listeners in a bath of bleakness that was raw and honest. Other early 90’s acts were on the bandwagon of this sea change (NIN, Nirvana Tool, Alice In Chains) which the pushed sales of Doc Martin boots and flannel through the roof. Every rock band now wanted to be an “Alternative” band, and this album was the bridge to a new inspiration of glory. This was a template for the origin of modern rock. It was time to let the shadows creep in.
“The Day I Tried To Live” says it all in its title, that life was now about indifference, solitude, and survival and the era of opulence and neon was dead. “Fourth of July” is all dirge drop-tuned guitars that feel like a guttural stomach punch after a churning bout of nausea. “Fell On Black Days” doubled down on the darkness and boasted an undeniable vocal melody as the band cradled Cornells open cry for help.
Most ubiquitous though was the smash hit “Black Hole Sun”, which was massively overplayed everywhere in the summer of 1994. It’s video was a mishmash of queasy apocalyptic fever-dream imagery that is still difficult to watch. The song’s guitar tone quivers with a syrupy flange that further seasons the album’s flavour. The album cover’s distorted photograph of the “screaming elf” shows a black and white upside-down burning forest. Grey, black, and orange represents something scarier and colder than their previous work. It perfectly portrays the distant fires that burn within the music.
The album is a hard-rock milestone that feels endless and vast, even volcanic at times. It never finds a safe zone from anxiety as the underlying energy was built from a temple of despair. Ambitious and colossal in size, Superunknown remains the band’s best-selling and greatest work.
2.5 oz Johnny Walker Black Label
1 oz Jägermeister
1/2 oz Ameretto
3/4 oz fresh lime juice
3 dashes of orange bitters
*Place ice in a rocks glass and add all the ingredients. Stir with a spoon and top with a splash of water. Garnish with a lime wedge.