Soundgarden, Superunknown

Yeah what Soundslave said ^... The latest Beinhorn interview where he touches on that is posted further back in this thread. There's also a thread from some years ago on this forum where he talks about specific production techniques of the album, but again, states that Chris had like a dozen tunes demoed that were all nothing notewrothy sounding, until Beinhorn said "there's no album here worth doing" and convinced Chris to get weird and write new songs that were just from his gut, not "for Soundgarden." And the 1st new demo was like 4 amazing Superunknown songs right off the bat

 

Miss Chris badly. Had such tremendous talent
What a horrible loss. Saw him in Shiner Texas back in Audioslave days. Special night for sure
I just wish he would have gotten help sooner...

 

Completely terrible, and surprising... Seems he was a beautiful human being toward everyone he ever knew as well.
I was lucky enough to catch Audioslave twice, once on his solo tour for Carry On with Pete Thorn, and 3 times since SG got back together. I WISH I had the chance to catch any of the Temple Of The Dog reunion gigs... Can't always git watcha want...

 

Got to see Soundgarden in 1990 with Faith No More and Voivod (another Die Kreuzen worshipping band). Band had me hooked after this performance.

Other time I saw Soundgarden was Summer of 1996 at Lollapalooza. They had an extra guitarist that night, Bubba Dupree. Bubba was in the band Void in the 80’s and he also appears on Soundgarden albums providing some guitar, the invisible third guitarist for Soundgarden. Perhaps if they didn’t break up months later he would have become a full fledged member?

 

Holy CRIPES that's a killer lineup! Real Thing era, Nothingface era + Loud Love.... Must've been an insanely fun show

 

had to pull the old vinyl of Down on the Upside tonight. Forgot about a tune called Tighter and Tighter. If that song isn't a dead ringer for Robin Trower i dont know what is. amazing song by Chris and company. Wow...

 

Love that tune (and whole album.) Talk about another awesome sounding record. Good call on the Trower similarity! Gotta love Robin... I can't believe he's still touring these days too!
Dewar was such an underrated singer btw. One of my favorites from that era

 

James Dewar was a phenomenal singer. One of the best. He deserved better. I LOVE Robin Trower, but Dewar did not get the recognition he deserved with Trower.

 

PREACH!

 

One of the best

 

Chris has been gone 3 years now....still not over it.

 

2 years

 

Yeah, my bad....feels longer...

 

Seeing this and the other two SG threads has me wanting to spin their music. I’m thinking last years RSD vinyl of A-Sides to kick off the weekend.

 

Now that ya mention it, I just realized SG has had some consistently great RSD releases. A-Sides, the King Animal demos & SOMMS!

 

What a sad day tomorrow will be for many of us
I remember like it was yesterday
I remember waking and seeing a text from my son law that Chris had died overnight
My first words at 5 am were No No No!
I didn’t want to believe it and was hoping and praying that it was a false report. But as minutes passed by it was all over the news waves and my heart sank to deep sadness
RIP my good music buddy
Wail that beautiful voice thru the heavens ...and I will spin some special SG

 

Right there with ya man, remember waking up and sitting down to watch the news around 5am and saw only the two words "Chris Cornell" scroll across the bottom of the screen and immediately yelled No! God No!! , because somehow I knew. I have been remembering Chris the past couple of years spinning my Higher Truth and also listening to live versions of those songs in my car. I think it's a masterpiece and unfortunately his swan song. The stuff he is saying on that album is revealing and deeply meaningful.

 

Higher Truth is one of the best things he did, and got me excited for future releases. It rivals EM as his best solo work. Murderer of Blue Skies.....what a tune. There's 4-5 classics on that record, and even the bonus tracks are good (especially Wrong Side).

I had a work retreat at the MGM just a few weeks after he passed - the plate was still off the door, scuffs on the walls....and the managing partner in my firm had the exact room, just two floors up...so if Chris's room was 1537, his was 1737. It was eerie to be in the same hotel in essentially the same room just weeks after it happened. When I got there, the first thing I did was go up to the floor where it happened....I don't know why, but I did.

Superunknown was one of the great albums of my teen years....for years my friend and I always joked that the Black Hole Sun video followed us wherever we went during the summer of '94. You look back at the musical landscape as a whole back then....what a time. One of the few reasons I wish I was in my 20s or 30s then....the shows you could have gone to, probably almost weekly.

 

Thank you for posting this info about Higher Truth. Just made a purchase.
this helps...

 

Bought the 2014 EU press last weekend.
Sounds much better than I expected. In fact I would be very happy with just that one. Has deep analog sound.
I had bought the 2019 reissue from Sound of Vinyl (orange and red) and I was very disappointed.
Now awaiting the 2004 German press which should arrive early next week.

 

So you finally got it
Probably I've mentioned in some thread that I saw a comparison on Youtube and it was stated that 2014 reissue was indeed compressed in comparison to 2004 '320'. Guitars were also EQ'ed to be more present, but midrange became muddier because of that (guitars were blended with vocals soundwise). Still, Valeron (review guy) concluded that if you're not lucky with 320, then 2014 reissue is the way to go.

 

I think the compression of the 2014 gives it a good initial impact but the muddiness and unnaturally harsh vocals are clearly not how the producer Beinhorn intended the album to sound. He was going for strong clarity and instrument separation. I'm not even convinced that the 2004 delivers all that the tapes are capable of but certainly it is the best so far.

 

Here's Beato on "Spoonman" including the inspiration thereof, if you don't already know.

 

I so love this.

 

I agree, there hasn't been a perfect mix/master combo released to date (Yes I know all mix & mastering engineers will say there isn't such a thing, you always end up having to settle on some degree of gives & takes.) But to my ear if you could take the separation/clarity of the guitars on the original cd and place them into the 320 it would be the best of both worlds!