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Cover of Superunknown by Soundgarden — Cover: Superunknown

Song · Soundgarden

“The Day I Tried To Live” by Soundgarden

From the album Superunknown (1994)

“The Day I Tried To Live” by Soundgarden appears on 22 radio countdowns from 12 stations between 1994 and 2025. It was first released in 1994 on the album Superunknown. Its best result is #20 on the KISW 25 Greatest Rock Songs from 1994. In the combined RockLists rankings it is the #165 alternative song of 1995 and #2,356 alternative song of all time.

22countdowns

12stations

#20best position

0#1 finishes

0top 10 finishes

1994–2025years charted

Watch

Soundgarden - The Day I Tried To Live (Official Music Video)

Video from YouTube (SoundgardenVEVO). Pressing play loads YouTube's player. Watch on YouTube

"The Day I Tried to Live" went out in April 1994 as the second single from Superunknown, Soundgarden's fourth album, and it's Chris Cornell's song start to finish, words and music. It lurches and churns in true Soundgarden fashion: guitars in an odd tuning of two Es and four Bs, a dissonant fog hanging over everything, and a meter that keeps tripping, one bar of 7/4 followed by two of 4/4 for much of the ride. Kim Thayil has written off those odd time signatures as pure accident, since the band rarely counted a song out until it was finished.

Cornell said it was about trying to break out of his own closed-off, reclusive habits. Michael Beinhorn produced it with the band, and Brendan O'Brien mixed.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.

RockLists rankings

Alternative & Modern Rock

Indie & Adult Alternative

Classic Rock

#3,354 of all time

Hard Rock & Metal

All Rock Formats

Year-end countdowns

Year	#	Station	Countdown	of
1994	20	KISW Seattle-Tacoma, WA	KISW 25 Greatest Rock Songs from 1994	25
1995	88	KROQ Los Angeles, CA	KROQ Top 106.7 Songs of 1995	107
1995	50	WDRE Philadelphia Philadelphia, PA	WDRE Top 103.9 Songs of 1995	104

All-time and decade countdowns

Year	#	Station	Countdown	of
1994	667	KISW	KISW Top 1000 of All Time (1994)	1000
1995	501	KISW	KISW Top 1000 of All Time (1995)	1000
1996	496	KISW	KISW Top 1000 of All Time (1996)	1000
1998	490	KISW	KISW Top 1000 of All Time (1998)	1000
1999	517	Q101	Q101 Top 1,011 Songs of All-Time (December 1999)	1017
1999	196	107.7 The End	The End Top 1077 Songs of All-Time (December 1999)	1077
1999	540	KISW	KISW Top 1000 of All Time (1999)	998
2002	149	KISW	KISW Top 999 of All Time (2002)	999
2002	486	Fred (XM 44)	Fred XM Top 2002 Songs of All-Time (July 2002)	2002
2004	296	107.7 The End	The End Original Alternative 500 (May 2004)	500
2004	81	WBCN	WBCN Grunge Top 104 (2004)	104
2005	398	99X	99X Freedom of Choice 1000 (2005)	1000
2020	394	105.9 The X	105.9 The X July 420 (2020)	420
2021	533	90.9 The Bridge	90.9 The Bridge Top 909 Songs of the '90s	908
2021	370	105.9 The X	105.9 The X July 420 (2021)	420
2022	371	105.9 The X	105.9 The X July 420 (2022)	420
2022	477	KEXP	KEXP Top Songs of the Last 50 Years (1972-2022)	491
2023	329	105.9 The X	105.9 The X July 420 (2023)	420
2025	318	99.1 PLR	99.1 PLR Top 400 of the Last 40 Years (2025)	400

Also listed as: The Day I Tried to Live.

Charting alongside it in 1995

Best songs of 1995 →

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