Soundgarden Album: “A-Sides”

Before bands like Creed, Nickelback, Puddle of Mudd, Staind, etc. were mudding up the airwaves, there was a band from Seattle (no, I'm not talking about Nirvana) who kept their integrity from their indie days even when they won Grammys and had monster hits. This band was Soundgarden, and "A-Sides", a collection of mostly Soundgarden hits, is a nice collection that fans new to the band can use as a nice introduction. Though it is mostly compiled with the singles from later albums, we get songs from the Sub Pop days like "Flower" and "Loud Love". It would have been nice to see some more songs from the Sub Pop releases, but this is ok as we get well known songs (and fan favorites) "Jesus Christ Pose", "Rusty Cage", "Day I Tried to Live", and "Ty Cobb", and we get the monster hits "Outshined", "Black Hole Sun", and "Spoonman". We also get an unreleased track (from the "Down on the Upside" sessions) called "Bleed Together" which is a nice little track but ends too quickly. Being a big fan of Soundgarden no greatest hits package would be perfect, especially without songs like "My Wave", "Like Suicide", "Never the Machine Forever", and "Searching With My Good Eye Closed", all of which would have rounded this package out very nicely, but this is still a nice little collection (at least A&M Records isn't churning out pointless duplicate compilations every other year like Columbia does with Alice in Chains' catalog). All in all, this is a nice little collection that serves well as an introduction to one of the defining bands of the 90's.

This greatest hits collection shows the listener the ENTIRE side of Soundgarden. They should not really be classified as a METAL band - If you listen to this disk ENTIRELY, you will know why. It takes you through ALL the most popular songs from the SCREEMING FOR LIFE ep through DOWN ON THE UPSIDE. (Along with an unrealeased track BLEED TOGETHER) Examples of why Soundgarden is one of the more crafty bands in the hard rock era can be heard throughout: The Sabbath-type riffs, with a touch of punk in NOTHING TO SAY....The rawness and brutality of FLOWER....The polished, change in tempo of RUSTY CAGE....The hard-rockin, politically charged HANDS ALL OVER....The smoothness and psychadelica of BLACK HOLE SUN and BLOW UP THE OUTSIDE WORLD...The hardcore punk sound of TY COBB....The list goes on and on...

Soundgarden is one of the only bands to experiment with all these styles and make them work. A sad thing they are no more. BUT - Do yourself a favor, and get everyone of Soundgardens CDs...There is ALOT more great music from Cornell & Co on their other releases..You dont KNOW what your missing. The only reason I purchased this was for the unreleased BLEED TOGETHER - and it was worth EVERY dime.

This 17-song collection is a near-perfect showcase of some of the incredible rock tunes Soundgarden were able to come up with over the last few years. This CD highlights stuff from their indie days (the rocking 'Nothing To Say', 'Loud Love', 'Hands All Over', to name a few) all the way up to their excellent finale Down On The Upside ('Pretty Noose', 'Burden In My Hand', Blow Up The Outside World', and for some strange reason, 'Ty Cobb'). Most of their biggest and best hits ('Black Hole Sun', 'Outshined', 'Jesus Christ Pose', 'Pretty Noose' among them) are here, the only omission really being 'My Wave'. The material had to be balanced though, so there wouldn't be 3 from Badmotorfinger, but 7 or 8 from Superunknown. There are 3 or 4 songs from each of their LP's, which is good, because they perfectly capture the spirit of each respective album. As a Greatest Hits package, you can't go wrong with A-Sides, but if you have all of their albums, the only previously unreleased song is the 'Burden In My Hand' B-side 'Bleed Together', so you might not want to fork out more cash. If you're just a casual fan who never really bothered to buy any of their CD's, then A-Sides is all you need to get your Soundgarden fix.

If you are a fan of Soundgarden you will love this album. Basically it is a collection of the great and inspiring songs they have put out. Not only does it showcase the early talent of the band, but also the last hits they put out together. Don't get me wrong i love audioslave but they will never stand up to the classic SOUNDGARDEN!!!!!!!!!!!!

ive got nothing to say except that it dosent get better than this,.

negative reviewers

your posers..you know nothing about grunge except smells like teen spirit