The opening lines of “Hello, Goodbye,” which kicks off Soup, Blind Melon’s ill-fated second album, serve as Shannon Hoon’s warning to listeners of what’s to come as the record unfolds.
“I’m entering a frame bombarded by indecision, where a man like me can easily let the day get out of control, down this far in the Quarter,” he sings in mock-vaudevillian against boozy New Orleans brass. The revelry is gone as soon as the last horn fades, though, when the pummeling one-two punch of “Galaxie” and “2×4” hit. It’s clear this is not the Blind Melon of the lithe, carefree smash hit “No Rain.”
The story of Soup begins and ends in New Orleans, a city that attracts wayward artists like a beacon to its endless menu of distractions.
Published by Grammy.com on August 15, 2020
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