Black Hole Sun (track)
by Soundgarden
Year: 1994
From the album Superunknown (track #7)
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Black Hole Sun appears on the following album(s) by Soundgarden:
- Superunknown (track #7) (this album) (1994)
- A-Sides (track #11) (compilation) (1997)
- Telephantasm (track #6) (compilation) (2010)
- Live On I-5 (track #16) (2011)
- Live From The Artists Den (track #26) (2019)
- Superunknown: The Singles (track #9) (compilation) (2014)
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Black Hole Sun ratings
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Showing latest 3 ratings for this track. | Show all 425 ratings for this track.
| Rating | Date updated | Member | Track ratings | Avg. track rating |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ! | 09/08/2026 02:38 | Beot_Tea | 45 | 84/100 |
| ! | 06/29/2026 11:17 | Siromynian | 20,078 | 71/100 |
| ! | 06/23/2026 22:57 | sunnydhamm | 18,628 | 57/100 |
Rating metrics:
Outliers can be removed when calculating a mean average to dampen the effects of ratings outside the normal distribution. This figure is provided as the trimmed mean. A high standard deviation can be legitimate, but can sometimes indicate 'gaming' is occurring. Consider a simplified example* of an item receiving ratings of 100, 50, & 0. The mean average rating would be 50. However, ratings of 55, 50 & 45 could also result in the same average. The second average might be more trusted because there is more consensus around a particular rating (a lower deviation).
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This track is rated in the top 1% of all tracks on BestEverAlbums.com. This track has a Bayesian average rating of 90.3/100, a mean average of 89.7/100, and a trimmed mean (excluding outliers) of 90.7/100. The standard deviation for this track is 12.6.
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soundguardian 05/12/2013 09:55 | #75884
It's to a point that the track is almost cliche, for the fact that a standard rock listener automatically associates Soundgarden with the "Black Hole Sun" single. Based on the band's impressive output, one would expect Soundgarden would be noted for more than simply one, albeit quite quirky and memorable, single from its most famous album. It charted for weeks, holds various titles on ranking websites and magazines (like Q, Kerrang!, and Guitar World), and eventually claimed a Grammy for Best Hard Rock Performance.
It's just quite odd. It has apocryphal lyrics, a super strange apocalyptic-related music video, drop-D tuning, and background mysterious-sounding effects during the verses that tend to be disorienting. The best parts of the song are the interchange of "Black Hole Sun, Black Hole (SUN)" from channel to channel on a stereo pair (during the latter half of the song) and that perfect solo midway through the piece, with one guitar component continuously riffing down in a consistent sequence of descending frequencies while the other breaks down in a spectacular fashion of impromptu-esque notes. It's a solo that will most likely outlive most in the minds of rock lovers.
As for the meaning of the song, well... according to Cornell, there is none, at least not a deterministic underlying meaning. This makes it all the more open to interpretation, but it's still a curiosity how various random words spattered onto a composition connected Soundgarden with a very devoted fanbase. One thing is certain - the beauty of the melody greatly contrasts with the darker themes explored therein.
Romanelli TOP 100 COMMENTER 04/03/2012 16:37 | #39370
Perfect song. Nothing else to say about it.
NoeSSS 06/11/2016 01:30 | #168436
Has some of the best lyrics I have heard in my life.
And the nicest solo in years, fits correctly in it's year 1994, best year in the nineties.
AAL2014 TOP 100 COMMENTER 07/15/2022 02:19 | #287428
Most of the things I wanted to touch on have been mentioned in some form in other comments, but for a mainstream band’s biggest hit and legacy song to be in an odd tuning, have the solo section be in 9/8, and have such iconically esoteric lyrics is exactly why Soundgarden is one of my favorite bands.
Soundgarden's best song on the album.
