(Credits: Far Out / Press / Nirvana)
Something crackled in the air within the heights of Washington in the 1980s. The mainstream world was in the midst of its pop heyday, but underground, the grunge movement, including Nirvana and Soundgarden, was just gearing up.
In those early stages of genesis, it was an insular enough scene that everyone knew everyone, and the music reflected a close-knit community, and no one could have expected, at least at that point, the heights that grunge would go on to reach a worldwide scale, sweeping its unsuspecting stars up in all the mania that came along with it.
Yet for bands who so strongly became able to stand on their own two feet, it was their shared moments of development which brought them closest together, namely within the confines of the studio. Producer Jack Endino knows more than a thing or two about that, having become part of the furniture of the label Sub Pop and sat alongside all these bands as their future paths took flight.
For obvious reasons, having produced the debut efforts of both bands, he could see the obvious similarities between Soundgarden and Nirvana. But there also emerged distinct areas of difference, particularly when it came to their experience of getting on stage. One rocketed to the big leagues without having treaded many of the boards at all, while the other had spent years honing their craft.
This was why Endino could “absolutely” see the surefire potential of Soundgarden from the second they set foot through the door. “Nirvana, when they came to me, nobody knew who they were,” he once explained to Ultimate Guitar. “And then when they went to do Bleach, they got the OK from Sub Pop, we did the ‘Love Buzz’ single in the summer of ’88 after doing the demo in January, and then we got the OK to do the full album in December. But I don’t think they played more than a few dozen shows, if that.”
By comparison, Soundgarden were a far more well-oiled machine by the time they came to the recording studio. “Now, Soundgarden, by the time we were doing Screaming Life, they had already been playing for, I don’t know, two or three years and had played a lot of shows. Very well-received shows, very successful live shows. They had already proven themselves to be an outstanding band when we went into the studio,” Endino added.
That difference in performing experience may seem inconsequential when you consider the paths that both bands went on to rock stardom, particularly in the case of Nirvana. But when you burrow deeper, it does account for a lot: many of Kurt Cobain’s struggles stemmed from the fact that he couldn’t stand the spotlight, and his ferocious flight to the top seemed all too quick but also all too soon, at the same time.
However, this obviously didn’t mean that Soundgarden’s frontman, Chris Cornell, also didn’t battle his own demons when it came to the life of fame and fortune. Endino was quick to point out that “He was very hard on himself, on his singing, because he was still sort of learning how to use his voice. He was still learning how to not scream. So, he had to learn how to sing, and he had to learn how to sing in tune, and he was very hard on himself if he wasn’t nailing it.”
Through the swirling heights of Seattle, something most definitely was brewing in the air. It was stardom, sex, drugs, rock and roll – for most, that would be an intoxicating high. It was for both Soundgarden and Nirvana too, but for the two men at the front of it, it ultimately wreaked a tragic toll that no one could have predicted.
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