“Why the fuck didn’t I think of that?”: the one riff Kim Thayil from Soundgarden wished he had written
As grunge guitarists go, there’s few that can match the illustrious heights of Kim Thayil, making his way as the soul of Soundgarden to the pinnacle of rock godliness. Like many of their cronies in the genre, however, the road to rapture was not always plain-sailing for Thayil and his bandmates and, in many senses, they relied on these counterparts when it finally came time to lift themselves off the ground.
As much as it seems retrospectively that peak grunge outfits like Nirvana and Soundgarden were always at the top of their game as rock pioneers, it took years of hard graft for each of those bands to fine tune their sound for commercial audience appeal. This was particularly true as their visions for alternative rock were formed in arguably one of the most inopportune moments – when it came to the beginnings of Soundgarden specifically, the synth surf of the new wave was in full force, and the tide were decidedly out on their murkier sound.
However, a new decade brought darker clouds on to the rock scene, and subsequently the ideal chance for grunge to take grip. Alongside Soundgarden on the rise were the likes of Nirvana, Pearl Jam, and The Smashing Pumpkins, who all played their respective roles in shaping the others into behemoths. But in Thayil’s view, there was another band who proved a guiding inspiration when it came to sliding up and down the six string.
When previously discussing his favourite albums from the genre, he singled out a perhaps more unsuspecting outfit as leading the way. He explained: “Alice in Chains came from a different scene, but then started playing with us and Pearl Jam, and they played some shows with Nirvana on Facelift.” With respect to the band’s 1990 breakout effort, there was one song in particular that Thayil felt epitomised the entire record, and that he wished he could have nabbed for himself.
The guitarist continued: I think of a song like ‘It Ain’t Like That’ and I love the groove. When I would play with them onstage, they’d ask me what song I want to do, and that was the one. I love that riff and that song. I wish I’d written it, and that’s why I love that album — just because of that song.”
“It’s easy to fall in love with something when you think, ‘Why the fuck didn’t I think of that?’,” he enthused, before conceding that: “The whole record has great stuff on it.” Indeed, with the storming power of hits like ‘We Die Young’ and ‘Man in the Box’ on Facelift, it’s easy to see why Alice in Chains were bolted from obscurity into the upper echelons of rock dominance, reaching out a helping hand to future exports like Soundgarden who would finally reap the rewards of mainstream success with the release of Superunknown in 1994.
It’s only natural that from such a seminal time, there are particular tunes that Thayil singles out as being the most significant in his ascension to fame. ‘It Ain’t Like That’ by Alice in Chains may have been the one that got away, but it undeniably powered him to a new level of rock creativity that he wouldn’t be considered a guitar great without.
