The title said it all: Ultramega OK. Not great, not perfect—just okay. That wry joke, dreamed up by guitarist Kim Thayil, sat on the cover of Soundgarden's first full-length album, released on October 31, 1988. The Seattle band had already made two EPs for the tiny Sub Pop label; now they were stepping up to SST Records, a label that had become a force in American independent music. But the record that should have announced their arrival became a lesson in how the right producer can make or break a band's sound.
Songs the producer did not understand
The songs were there. Ultramega OK mixed psychedelic rock, hard rock, heavy metal, and hardcore into something that felt both massive and strange. Chris Cornell's voice could soar or scrape, and the rhythm section of bassist Hiro Yamamoto and drummer Matt Cameron kept everything tight. But the man behind the board, Drew Canulette, never understood what Soundgarden were trying to do. Cornell later said the producer didn't know the sound the band needed and had no idea what was happening in Seattle's underground scene.
The label had suggested Canulette because it meant better financial terms, but the result was a record that didn't sound like the band. Cornell called the collaboration a big mistake in a 1995 interview, saying the album's production slowed the group's development. He believed the material could have made Ultramega OK one of the best records in Soundgarden's history. Instead, it became a source of frustration—a record whose strong material was let down by the way it sounded.
He believed the material could have made Ultramega OK one of the best records in Soundgarden's history.
Endino's remix and the long delay
That frustration simmered for years. Jack Endino, the veteran Seattle producer who had worked on the band's first EP, started remixing the album around the same time as the original release. He finished a rough mix of 'Flower,' but the project stalled: the band wanted to move forward, and a reissue meant paying for new pressings and distribution. The remix project was revived in 2014 by Endino and guitarist Kim Thayil, and the new remix was completed in 2017.
The remix revealed just how much had been buried. Take 'Flower,' the album's only single. Thayil remembered that he first played his guitar by blowing air across the strings, a technique audible in the song's intro, with the sound moving in rhythm with the drums. It was a small, strange detail that made Soundgarden different. The 2017 reissue, fully remixed and remastered by Endino from the original tapes, finally let those details breathe.
Ultramega OK also had a mischievous streak. Three of its songs were jokes or parodies. '665' and '667' mocked the idea of satanic rock: if the number 666 was so powerful, the band figured, the numbers next to it must be just as strong. The closing track, 'One Minute of Silence,' was a cover of John Lennon's 'Two Minutes Silence' from Unfinished Music No.2: Life with the Lions, but without Yoko Ono's part. Cornell said the musicians tried very hard to stay silent, but Kim could not keep quiet for a whole minute. It was the kind of humor that made Soundgarden feel like a band, not a product.
The album's legacy is complicated. It earned Soundgarden a Grammy nomination for Best Metal Performance in 1990, and the video for 'Flower' got regular play on MTV's '120 Minutes.' But Cornell admitted the production hurt the record's critical reception. When Sub Pop released the remixed version in 2017, it finally sounded the way the band had intended. The reissue climbed to number 8 on the Billboard Vinyl Albums chart and number 9 on the Tastemaker Albums chart—a sign of renewed interest in the album.