Soundgarden
Down On The Upside

I am in a period full of nostalgia. I wander disconsolately through my living room and occasionally fish out those discs that I haven't listened to in at least a year. Let's examine this "Down On The Upside." What does it tell me? What does it convey to me? Why is it often considered a dud by the public and critics?

Obviously, it is easy to notice how the macho hard rock of "Badmotorfinger" has been completely abandoned. Here, Chris’s voice doesn’t dare absurd high notes, and the other three members no longer appear too cohesive. The album is dispersive, not compact at all, also thanks to a 16-track playlist. To be honest, I'm not very interested in songs like "Rhinosaur," "Dusty," "Overfloater," "Switch Opens." Then, the unreasonable experimentalism of "Applebite" slightly gets on my nerves. And these tracks already make up a third of the album.

Yet, down there in the upside down, masterpieces emerge that significantly elevate the level of the album. The singles are powerful, there are two or three episodes tending towards punk, oriental influences, slow blues pieces.

"Tighter & Tighter" I elect as the best of the album and one of the peaks of their career. "Never The Machine Forever" is the only song written by Kim Thayil, and it is something devastating. I remember my first listen, when the right term was "unprecedented." And then I adore one of their most overlooked pieces, "Boot Camp". I can't understand the reason. Probably there isn’t one, but if one day I figure it out, I'll add a comment below.

Clearly, the masterpiece that is "Superunknown" overshadows this last (for now) episode, which struggles to continue on the path of its predecessor. In any case, "Down On The Upside" offers many points for reflection. The ego of the individual band members becomes small, sacrifices itself in favor of more refined arrangements. It is no longer about showcasing one’s own goods, always appealing anyway, but about serving a higher form of art.

For this reason, I say that this work had within it the potential to be the magnum opus of Soundgarden. The project was marred by a few broken threads in the cohesion of the quartet.

It deserves a full 4, nothing less and nothing more. As I wrote, it is an album capable simultaneously of exhausting and elevating the mind. Maybe I'm talking a bunch of nonsense, but an inner contrast is what I feel every time I put this CD in my stereo. See you soon, Chris.