Chris Cornell: Ranking Every Album From Worst To Best
10. Louder Than Love
If you like wall-to-wall screeching, wailing guitars with the occasional blast of vocal theatrics ringing through the melee, then Louder Than Love is the Soundgarden album for you.
Though there are some fast and furious moments on this album, by and large it's a slow grinder, wringing every possible reference to Black Sabbath they possibly can out of the melodies. Songs like the sluggish, rambling "Power Trip" set them firmly in the mold of stoner metal that bridges the gap between Deep Purple and Queens of the Stone Age.
How much you appreciate Louder Than Love is probably dependent on how much you can tolerate a band frequently diverting into ironic silliness, as they do with the punk-flavored "Full On Kevin's Mom" and the purposely insipid machismo of "Big Dumb Sex."
Overall, it's a muscular, efficient, heavy, and seemingly unfiltered. The word "raw" might be overused when describing this type of music, but Louder Than Love is unapologetically raw.