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When the band broke up, my first thought was “I’ll never get to see Matt Cameron play drums again” and, well, we know how that turned out. But there’s a difference between playing on that stuff and playing Soundgarden music. I snuck through Seattle alleys and darkened under-curfew streets to see Kim Thayil play live with Jello Biafra during the WTO riots. I flew to San Francisco to see Chris Cornell’s first solo gig at the Fillmore. I will believe it when I see it, but there is part of me that is just OVER THE MOON.

The shot above is from the 6/20/96 gig at the Showbox, right before they left for Lollapalooza. At 4pm on a Friday, tickets went on sale at the Blockbuster above Queen Anne. I got in line at 3pm the day of this show. The problem with Soundgarden, of course, is that the audience is full of Pantera wannabes. I have photos from Lolla 96 at the Gorge where the pit looks like Scylla and Charybdis were inside of it. I worry about it being emotionally void. But I also know that I will go once just to find out for sure.

I will also remind you of the site that set the standard for what a band website COULD be: The Unofficial Soundgarden Homepage, where I had to go to dig out that photograph. And you would have to have been a member of SOMMS to understand the headline of this post. For that reason, I will not explain further.