Soundgarden - Down Under On The Upside

One of the advantages of living in Australia in the 1990s was that we were often privy to material that remained unreleased elsewhere. This material was released in a number of forms:

- Bonus tracks included to encouraged people to buy exorbitantly priced local CDs rather than cheaper imports.

- Tour EPs, such as the Nirvana's  legendary "Hormoaning" - not to be confused with Sonic Youth's  "Whores moaning" , which came out a few years later! As far as I know, "Hormoaning" was only released in Australia and Japan, and although all the tracks later came out on "Incesticide", I felt like I had something special in my hot little hands for 18 months or so!

- Bonus EP versions of previously released CDs that had taken a while to take off, or that were having a second life. This was of course a thinly veiled attempt to fleece more money from suckers (like me) who had already bought the original CD when it came out!

- Tour bonus EP versions of previously released CDs, with a similar motivation as described above.

One of my favourites of the latter, for both the content and the name, was Soundgarden's 1996 Australian tour version of Down on the Upside, retitled Down Under on the Upside (ho ho ho!). This featured a collection of b-sides that at least served to save some of us musical obsessives from having to track down the individual singles, and also compiled the songs onto a single source.

Opening track Jerry Garcia's Finger (b-side of Pretty Noose) is an interesting instrumental soundscape. Karaoke (b-side of Burden in My Hand) starts with a maelstrom of sound, before easing into a laid back slow tempo tune, before the maelstrom returns for the ending. Classic Soundgarden, and IMO better than at least half the tracks on Down on the Upside. Bleed Together (b-side of Burden in My Hand in some countries, later released on A-Sides, and as a single in it's own right) is an up-tempo rocker.

Next comes the demo version of one of my fave Soundgarden songs, Birth Ritual (b-side of My Wave), the song the band contributed to the Singles soundtrack. I am a complete sucker for songs that diverge from the standard rock 4/4 timing (of which Soundgarden had a few of these - Room a thousand years wide, Spoonman), so this 7/4 gem is right up my alley! And the riff - dum da-da-da-da-dum da-da-da-da-dum DA DA! I always wondered why the band didn't put this on an album, but I suspect they felt it was a bit too similar to Jesus Christ Pose.

Next up is the video version of Fell On Black Days (b-side of Fell On Black Days), arguably better than the album version. The last track is the Moby remix of Dusty (b-side of Blow Up the Outside World).



Soundgarden - 1996 - Down Under On The Upside (Australia & New Zealand Tour Edition)

1. Jerry Garcia's Finger
2. Karaoke
3. Bleed Together
4. Birth Ritual (original demo)
5. Fell On Black Days
6. Dusty (Moby remix)

FLAC
MP3