The isolated guitar from the Soundgarden classic ‘Black Hole Sun’
Not every grunge artist was necessarily looking to be a virtuoso. Although there might have been a few guitarists that possessed some serious chops in the Seattle scene, most of the bands coming out of the first wave of grunge were more concerned with rebelling against the traditional models of guitar heroes than perfecting their instruments. Despite acts like Pearl Jam having some phenomenal solo work from Mike McCready, Soundgarden was one of the few bands from the scene that sounded like they were pushing the genre forward.
With each subsequent album, Soundgarden always treated the studio like a songwriting workshop, making songs that were part way between alternative, hard rock, and eclectic art rock on record like Badmotorfinger. By the time Kurt Cobain passed away, they were on the verge of one of their greatest successes with Superunknown, spawning the hits ‘Spoonman’ and ‘Fell on Black Days’. Though every song has its own distinct identity, ‘Black Hole Sun’ exists out of the usual grunge fad because of its guitar part.
Compared to the rest of the album, the band played with the tape machine to create a dreary effect, making the song sound slightly out of tune if one played it on a standard-tuned guitar. With Chris Cornell leading the charge with his subtle distorted rhythm guitar, the isolated tracks make the listener feel like waking up from some strange fever dream.
However, Cornell’s strong suit was always vocal duties, and Kim Thayil’s warped interpretation of traditional slide guitar was inspired. Unlike the precise slide playing heard by Duane Allman, the slide work here is incredibly lazy, fed through a Leslie speaker. During the verses, Thayil’s chorus effect makes his lead lines sound like bells coming from the depths of the underworld, slowly weaving around Cornell’s melody until the chorus.
Once the pivotal line of the song comes in, the tone completely shifts, sounding like one of the heaviest songs of the ‘90s based on the walls of guitars hitting the speakers simultaneously. While there’s a lot of distortion on the six-strings, the mix is still full and keeps everything fairly melodic, as Cornell picks away at chords in drop-D tuning as he prays for the rain to stop.
For longtime fans, the solo is typical of Thayil, from playing flurries of notes to doing avant-garde sound experiments that make him sound like he’s trying to strangle the instrument. Then again, this kind of playing is just a drop in the bucket for the rest of the album, featuring even heavier tunes like ‘4th of July’ and more melodic tunes with strange time signatures like ‘The Day I Tried To Live’ and ‘My Wave’.
While the rest of the grunge scene was about playing music authentically as possible, Soundgarden’s melodic and heavy-playing blend felt like the perfect marriage between Black Sabbath and The Beatles. Even the rest of the scene thought so, with Dave Grohl remembering being knocked out by the sound of the record when hearing an advanced copy during Nirvana’s final recording session. The rest of the Seattle scene always made music that sounded like it was coming from underwater, but Soundgarden’s magnum opus also made for one of the most finely produced records of the ‘90s.
