Soundgarden 2011

On July 22, 2011, I experienced Soundgarden live at the Los Angeles Forum. Buying a General Admission ticket on Stub Hub for $108 on April 27, I saw Steve Miller Band the night before at the OC Fair. Not wanting to drive all the way back to San Diego, I was already close to the show when I woke up. Here is my story.

I've been a Soundgarden fan since high school. I remember hearing their music with bands like Pearl Jam and Alice in Chains, but I don't recall who introduced me to them. We just all liked them. They were considered the amazing trifecta from Seattle (although Eddie Vedder is from San Diego). Not only are all three bands extremely talented, but their sound was unique (aka the grunge founders).

When I woke in Los Angeles, I could hardly wait to play electric guitar in the park! Plugging into my battery powered amplifier (Roland's Micro Cube), I played Fly Away (Kravitz), My Wave, Vertigo, Are You Gonna Go My Way? and a few other songs. It was tons of fun in the sun! I ended up visiting two other parks, but simply wrote poetry in one and changed clothes and pre-partied in the other.

Driving to the concert, I turned off my speakers about 1.5 miles away. The Forum isn't in the best part of town (Inglewood) and I didn't want anyone seeing or hearing me park on the street because they could steal my stereo, amplifiers and speakers. I found a decent spot and parked a half mile away from the arena and walked there.

It took a few minutes to get inside the venue because there were several lines and I had to get frisked. They also issued me a bracelet for the general admission section. Eventually, I got to the floor and squeezed as close as I could to the front. It just so happened I was directly in the middle, too. I had missed the opening band (Mars Volta), but I was there at the perfect time. Soundgarden was about to come on stage!

I was really impressed how the three of the four original members of Soundgarden (Chris Cornell, Kim Thayil and Matt Cameron) performed so excellently. Ben Shepherd (replacing founding bassist Hiro Yamamoto in 1989) played bass quite well, too. In fact, it was awe inspiring and mouth dropping. Like Alice in Chains, these guys know how to usher in a dark and dissonant sound. Without checking, I know many of their songs are written in minor keys. They also occasionally borrow a note from another key while using all sorts of effects.

I didn't hear one bad note from the band or from Chris Cornell. They performed around 20 songs, including Searching With My Good Eye Closed, My Wave, Spoonman (although I didn't see any spoons), Black Hole Sun, 4th of July, Blow Up the Outside World, Outshined, Rusty Cage, The Day I Tried to Live, Pretty Noose, Slaves and Bulldozers, Let Me Drown, Fell On Black Days, Burden in My Hand, Jesus Christ Pose, Mailman, Head Down, Superunknown. Chris Cornell, sporting long hair and a beard, mentioned how they were in the process of writing new material for an upcoming album. I was hoping to hear Hands All Over, Birth Ritual and Seasons, but they didn't play them.

Blow Up the Outside World was somehow new to me. I really liked it in concert and I've been listening to it on my mp3 player again and again since the show. The vocal effect is cool and the laid back drums nicely accompany the effect-laden electric guitar. I love how Chris Cornell sings about being invincible.

Ever count the beats in Outshined? I just did and it sure isn't in 4/4 timing. Listen and see and you'll count 7 beats because it's in 7/8 time. Not to mention, Soundgarden uses two different time signatures in The Day I Tried to Live.

Chris Cornell's disarming, blood curdling scream in Slaves and Bulldozers is out of this world. He really knows how to hit the highs. Somehow, he's also able to produce a nice warm tone with his voice, along with vibrato. Cornell is truly gifted and has really honed his instrument.

The late Layne Staley and Alice in Chains collaborated with Chris Cornell on Right Turn and Brother. He collaborated with Eddie Vedder when he sang Hunger Strike with Temple of the Dog. More recently, Cornell recorded Promise with Slash. All of the songs I just mentioned are epic and certainly worth a listen.

One of Soundgarden's strengths is the ability to repeat a hook or phrase in a way where it takes over. The melody and repetitive sound becomes the focus. This was true in many Nirvana and Alice in Chains songs, too.

In addition to using repetition very effectively, many of Cornell's lyrics are simple phrases almost anyone can relate to. His lyrics are often ambiguous and rarely tell the entire story. He takes his situation and takes a step back in order to create a song that explains it without going into too much detail. In fact, his mysterious lyrics are quite interesting and could have multiple meanings (somewhat like Scott Weiland's lyrics in Stone Temple Pilots).

Listening to Soundgarden with headphones puddles me and overrides my senses. They know how to build a sound and they also know how to create crazy (wtf?) sounds, along with epic endings to their songs. If and when I join a band, I want us to sound like this. These guys have a very high standard for excellence and obviously spend an extraordinary amount of time on their songs. Their hooks are often lengthy, making them more difficult to find than typical, little riffs.

When is the last time you heard a song with spoons in it? Spoonman is the only song that comes to my mind. Not only is it a cool song with a unique instrument, it made me pick up the spoons! Plus, playing along with Soundgarden on my electric guitar has caused me to create some unique sounds of my own. Due to their dedication to musicianship, Soundgarden is an inspirational band!

The intro to Fell On Black Days sounds like a laser gun firing! It's difficult to find and play it exactly like they do. Cornell and Kim play electric guitars and they blend sounds very well together, like in the intro to Day I Tried to Live.

Guitarist Kim Thayil begins playing some notes from the bent position and he slowly bends them back to their original place. He does this in songs like Blow Up the Outside World and Pretty Nose. It sounds like a falling star or a dropping bomb! This unique technique is only used by a few guitarists (e.g. Jerry Cantrell, Robby Krieger, Erik Erlandson, etc.). Kim also makes use of harmonics.

Music blog


Soundgarden - 2011 - Band and Concert Review

Soundgarden live in concert in 2011 at the LA Forum

Instead of taking time off in between recordings, Chris Cornell has been writing music and touring solo. He worked with Tom Morello in Audioslave from 2001-2007. In fact, many bands seem to continuously write albums and tour, again and again. In this era of file sharing, where bands make nothing from album sales, touring is and will become even more important. Incidentally, I also think every band should have a Rockband game.

Country legend Johnny Cash covered Rusty Cage in 1996. His cover is shorter and stripped down, but it's still excellent. By choosing Soundgarden and one of their songs to cover, he has immortalized this band all over again.

Soundgarden creates and blends diverse sounds in Burden in My Hand. When it starts, it sounds like an old time piano you'd hear at Farrell's Ice Cream Parlor. From there, it goes into a hook that sounds like something Jimmy page from Led Zeppelin would play.

Speaking of Led Zeppelin, Soundgarden follows Jimmy Page's path when they play electric guitar with the same vocal notes in Outshined. Beginning this technique toward the middle of the song, Kim emphasizes different words in phrases with different techniques on electric guitar. This is also a quality we hear in many of George Harrison's recordings with John Lennon and The Beatles. Using the electric guitar to either precede, play simultaneously with or follow the vocal melody is a technique and signature that began in the classic rock era. A few bands still do it very well today.

Kim Thayil is an excellent guitarist. Not only is he very fast, but he also knows how to create countless different, cool sounds. During the show, a couple of times he turned his back to the audience and faced his amplifier. Sometimes guitarists do this to create a certain sound (e.g. from feedback), but during Jesus Christ Pose, I think he was trying to hide how he played it; especially the beginning with all of the insane sounds.

As a musician who loves finding other guitarists' work, these guys make me a little upset. Not only is their music very difficult to find because there are countless difficult parts per song, but I think they finally confirm my notion that some musicians are trying to create songs that nobody will ever cover. Furthermore, it also confirms my feelings that musicians have secret ways of creating sounds and they'd like to keep it that way.

Chris Cornell's vocals were excellent and he seemed haunted on a number of their hits. It's difficult to tell with any certainty, but the lyrics in the song Black Hole Sun could be referring to the Antichrist. "Black hole son, won't you come and wash away the reign....." If guitarists have secrets, lyricists certainly do, too. In fact, I believe some write lyrics in situations where they can't be too descriptive and must be a little ambiguous, sometimes.

Ben Shepherd played a flawless bass guitar. He held it at a funny angle for most of the show. The band played the same guitars for most of the show, but they eventually changed once or twice. They played a variety of fantastic Fenders and groovy Gibsons.

Their music is very hook oriented and layered. When Chris played guitar while Kim played, they created a textured sound. I noticed Chris playing the chords on My Wave while Kim aggressively played the bent note in the pre-chorus. Matt Cameron was amazing on the drums. Instead of playing simply, he often filled in the spaces with dope rolls. It was great to hear a drummer who wasn't afraid to use his toms, cymbals and his other drums.

Soundgarden was much nicer and tamer than I thought they'd be. Since they've never smiled for a promo picture, I figured they'd break lots of things and run around the stage like crazy people. On the contrary, they didn't move much at all. They also didn't throw anything. I was pretty close, but not close enough to see Dave Grohl.

Soundgarden played an encore and at the end, Kim kept playing. He turned toward his speaker and wailed. Playing a few notes, he created a dark, humming, dissonant sound that accompanied me and the other concertgoers as we walked toward the exit and left.

Soundgarden impressed me with their infectious hooks, their lengthy songs, brilliant guitar improvisation, awesome bridges, numerous complicated parts and seriously bent notes. I've also enjoyed the crazy sounds at the ends of many of their songs. Probably impossible to duplicate, their songs are original and often eerie.

Chris Cornell's guttural sounds, screams and wails were impressive. Not only is it difficult to hit those notes, but it's even harder to do it with his intensity. He ferociously attacks those high notes and I noticed today (I watched a live YouTube video of Bremerton concert) he did it the same way back in 1992. Chris Cornell's falsetto is so smooth it doesn't sound like a weird, high head voice, but it sounds like he's simply singing super high notes.

Not to be overlooked, Matt Cameron is an essential part of Soundgarden. It would be hard to imagine the band without his amazing work. I've been impressed with his chops because he almost never plays simply. Cameron is always using his toms, snare, kick drum and cymbals. He has great meter and also uses his ride. His intensity is pretty furious as well and it can be felt as he pounds the drum heads.

I was really disappointed that Soundgarden only played Lollapalooza in Chicago last year. Somehow, I had never seen them before. Nonetheless, when I discovered they were touring and coming to Los Angeles (San Diego would have been best, but oh well), I couldn't wait to see them. The wait was well worth it because these guys are insanely talented. This was an epic show because they have a very high standard for musicianship and know how to build a chaotic sound without going too far with it.

Thanks, guys. I can't wait to hear more.