Fell on Black Days is a song by the Grunge band Soundgarden, written by frontman Chris Cornell. Fell on Black Days was released as the fifth single from the band’s fourth studio album, Superunknown (1994). The song peaked at number four on the Billboard Mainstream Rock Tracks chart. The song was included on Soundgarden‘s 1997 greatest hits album, A-Sides and the 2010 compilation Telephantasm as the Superunknown version on the single disc version and the video version on the Deluxe Edition. The time signature of the song is in 6/4. Cornell said:
“On ‘Fell on Black Days‘; the drums are totally straight, even though the riff is in six, so it doesn’t feel quirky at all.”
Guitarist Kim Thayil has said that Soundgarden usually did not consider the time signature of a song until after the band had written it, and said that the use of odd meters was “a total accident.”
Fell on Black Days was released as a single in 1994 in various versions with the previously unreleased B-sides Kyle Petty, Son of Richard, Motorcycle Loop and Fell on Black Days (demo). The demo version is in fact a completely different song, featuring different lyrics (with only the chorus containing similarities to Fell on Black Days) and different music, with considerably heavier Drop DGDGBE guitar tuning. Soundgarden performed the demo version live on Pearl Jam‘s January 8, 1995, Self-Pollution satellite radio broadcast, a four and a half hour long pirate broadcast out of Seattle which was available to any radio stations that wanted to carry it. The demo version was retitled Black Days III for the Superunknown 20th Anniversary reissues and appeared on the Deluxe Super Deluxe editions.
It appeared on Billboard magazine’s Hot 100 Airplay chart, peaking at number 54 in its tenth week and remaining on the chart until its twentieth week. The song peaked at number four on the Billboard Mainstream Rock Tracks chart and number 13 on the Billboard Modern Rock Tracks chart. Outside the United States, the single was released commercially in Australia and the United Kingdom. In Canada, the song reached the top 70 on the Canadian Singles Chart and remained in the top 70 for two weeks. Fell on Black Days reached the top 50 in the Netherlands and in Ireland it was a moderate top 20 success.
In 2017, Billboard ranked the song number one on their list of the 15 greatest Soundgarden songs, and in 2021, Kerrang! ranked the song number three on their list of the 20 greatest Soundgarden songs. The song was featured twice on the TV show Supernatural in the episodes Simon Said, and Southern Comfort. The Vampire Diaries featured the song in the season 6 episode Black Hole Sun which in turn was named after Soundgarden‘s hit.
Tracklist:
- Fell on Black Days
- Kyle Petty, Son of Richard
- Fell on Black Days (video version)
Chris Cornell (July 20, 1964 – May 18, 2017).
