Soundgarden - Superunknown

Soundgarden’s breakthrough to the mainstream via the top of the charts was a long-deserved cashing in of all the hard work they’d put in. As Soundgarden was widely credited as one of the formative forces of the Seattle sound that was everywhere in 1994, this album was released with super high expectations - and it more than delivered. It hit right in the midst of the Grunge and alt-rock frenzy in the US, finally putting Soundgarden in the charts after they watched their neighbors Pearl Jam and Nirvana dominate the airwaves in the previous couple of years.

Chris Cornell had one of the most iconic voices in rock history. His versatility - going from a throat-shredding scream to a haunting melodic tone in a heartbeat - is one of a kind. There aren’t many rock singers who have so much unique timbre in both their scream and their “standard” singing voice - but no matter which style you hear, you know instantly you’re listening to Chris Cornell. I actually discovered Cornell first through Audioslave, who was releasing albums as I grew up, but when I traced his history back to Soundgarden I instantly fell in love. As a completely talentless singer, I’ve very rarely had the “guitar hero” moment when I hear a singer and imagine myself in front of a stadium performing their songs, but Chris Cornell had that effect on me.

If you’ve never heard his cover of “Nothing Compares 2 U,” you should. The live version is my favorite - even 20 years after the band’s peak, when he recorded this in 2015, he still had it. It was released after his death on the perfectly titled compilation No One Sings Like You Anymore (after a lyric from “Black Hole Sun”), and it gives me the goosies.

Superunknown is a little more musically challenging than some of the other mega grunge acts - but only relatively speaking. This is still grunge (plus a little metal), and it’s just as guitar-driven and dark and gloomy as you’d expect from the genre. But this album hints at stretching the form into something a bit larger, a little bit more poetic and spooky rather than just in-your-face pissed off gloom. It was trying to move both towards and away from the popular mainstream - although the popular music scene ate this up. And for good reason.

From the roundup Jamwise #46 - Best Albums of 1994.