by James Zalucky
So I was checking my inbox this morning and found an email from the Soundgarden fan-club site. The email announced the artwork had been released for Soundgarden's new retrospective compilation, Telephantasm. The artwork is pretty interesting, so I figured I'd share some of it here.
Telephantasm comes out in the US on September 28th.
As you may have noticed, Soundgarden has put out a new single called Black Rain, an unreleased track from the Badmotorfinger sessions. If you haven't listened to it yet, I highly recommend going to the Soundgarden website and let it remind you of what real rock music sounds like. If it comes from the Badmotorfinger era, its pretty easy to just assume that it's awesome.
You should go to the front page of the site and play around with the artwork by zooming in and out, its much better seen from the full panoramic view. The artwork kind of resembles the Northern Lights, with a burnt out landscape down below…and a wolf just kind of just chilling there. Telephantasm will be released in a few different forms: Single CD, Deluxe 2 CD and DVD, and a Super Deluxe Version limited to 5000 copies (with splatter colored vinyl records and other goodies). Apparently the single-disc version will also be released via the video game, Guitar Hero: Warriors of Rock, with Black Rain appearing in the game and the other tracks available for download as part of the purchase.
I still go to the music store and buy the thing the day it comes out, but you can pre-order your copy of Telephantasm here.
Anyway, here is the track list for the Single-CD Version:
1. Hunted Down
2. Hands All Over
3. Outshined
4. Rusty Cage
5. Birth Ritual
6. Black Hole Sun
7. Spoonman
8. My Wave
9. Fell On Black Days
10. Burden In My Hand
11. Blow Up The Outside World
12. Black Rain (previously unreleased)
As for the 2-CD and DVD collection (i.e the one you should get):
Disc One:
1. All Your Lies
2. Hunted Down
3. Fopp
4. Beyond The Wheel
5. Flower (BBC session)
6. Hands All Over
7. Big Dumb Sex
8. Get On The Snake (live)
9. Room A Thousand Years Wide (single version)
10. Rusty Cage
11. Outshined
12. Slaves & Bulldozers
CD – Disc Two:
1. Jesus Christ Pose (live)
2. Birth Ritual
3. My Wave
4. Superunknown
5. Spoonman
6. Black Hole Sun
7. Fell On Black Days (video version)
8. Burden In My Hand
9. Dusty
10. Pretty Noose (live on "SNL")
11. Blow Up The Outside World (MTV "Live 'N' Loud")
12. Black Rain (previously unreleased)
DVD – The Music Videos:
1. Flower
2. Hands All Over
3. Loud Love
4. Jesus Christ Pose (original version)
5. Outshined
6. Rusty Cage
7. My Wave
8. Spoonman
9. The Day I Tried To Live (uncensored)
10. Black Hole Sun
11. Fell On Black Days
12. Pretty Noose (uncensored)
13. Burden In My Hand
14. Blow Up The Outside World (uncensored)
Bonus Videos:
1. Spoonman (mash-up version)
02. The Day I Tried To Live (European version)
03. Superunknown
04. Pretty Noose (international version)
05. Pretty Noose (alternate ending)
06. Blow Up The Outside World (censored)
I'm actually very surprised at the track-list they came up with. I'm perplexed that Nothing to Say is nowhere on these collections, even though its a pretty important song from their early years. The single CD version is a little top-heavy on the Superunknown material, and yet it does not have The Day I Tried to Live. However, best-of collections are usually meant just a sample of an Artist's work, used to encourage new fans to delve deeper into the actual catalog. Being an enormous Soundgarden fan (Badmotorfinger might be my favorite album of all time) probably gives me an unfair bias that makes me want certain personal favorites included (Holy Water, 4th of July, Mood for Trouble). Oh well, I have all their records anyway, so I'm not the one missing out. The music video DVD makes up for some of the missing items, and I'm glad they made a point to include Birth Ritual on the single CD edition. And seeing as its being thrown in with the new Guitar Hero game, the release should spur some new interest in the band among younger listeners, and that's certainly a plus.
