Song of the Moment: Sirens

[stip]

Sorry for the personal tone, but I have expressed my negative opinion towards the band's choices several times in our topics and I don't want to repeat myself.
My boyfriend who lives in London called me late last night after seeing Soundgarden in Brixton. He told me among others that ''Matt Cameron was great in his natural position with this great band and he had to see it by his own eyes to confirm that PJ is the most boring and overrated band of the 90s. We laughed. I hadn't heard Sirens yet, and I wasn't very optimistic because I happen not to like much of PJ the last seven years. After watching the video, and having Soundgarden in my mind, I thought how would Kim Thayil react to Sirens . After watching it again, I put some Black Flag on to ease the pain.

I mean this as respectfully as possible..but who cares what Kim Thayil thinks about Sirens? Two different bands who have NEVER played the same style. Ever. It only matters what Matt thinks of the material and I suspect he isn't disliking it or he wouldn't be working the two bands.

maybe he really loves it?

[VinylGuy]

Sorry for the personal tone, but I have expressed my negative opinion towards the band's choices several times in our topics and I don't want to repeat myself.
My boyfriend who lives in London called me late last night after seeing Soundgarden in Brixton. He told me among others that ''Matt Cameron was great in his natural position with this great band and he had to see it by his own eyes to confirm that PJ is the most boring and overrated band of the 90s. We laughed. I hadn't heard Sirens yet, and I wasn't very optimistic because I happen not to like much of PJ the last seven years. After watching the video, and having Soundgarden in my mind, I thought how would Kim Thayil react to Sirens . After watching it again, I put some Black Flag on to ease the pain.

I mean this as respectfully as possible..but who cares what Kim Thayil thinks about Sirens? Two different bands who have NEVER played the same style. Ever. It only matters what Matt thinks of the material and I suspect he isn't disliking it or he wouldn't be working the two bands.

maybe he really loves it?

just talked to him, he says its ok but he prefers Just Breathe a lot more.

[harmless]

Sorry for the personal tone, but I have expressed my negative opinion towards the band's choices several times in our topics and I don't want to repeat myself.
My boyfriend who lives in London called me late last night after seeing Soundgarden in Brixton. He told me among others that ''Matt Cameron was great in his natural position with this great band and he had to see it by his own eyes to confirm that PJ is the most boring and overrated band of the 90s. We laughed. I hadn't heard Sirens yet, and I wasn't very optimistic because I happen not to like much of PJ the last seven years. After watching the video, and having Soundgarden in my mind, I thought how would Kim Thayil react to Sirens . After watching it again, I put some Black Flag on to ease the pain.

I mean this as respectfully as possible..but who cares what Kim Thayil thinks about Sirens? Two different bands who have NEVER played the same style. Ever. It only matters what Matt thinks of the material and I suspect he isn't disliking it or he wouldn't be working the two bands.

maybe he really loves it?

There's no way that cool guy loves something other cool people hate...

[stip]

I can't wait to dump to this song.

It hasn't improved at all. I think there'll be people looking back at this moment and saying "Yup...that was the final nail in the coffin for me"

Yep. I txt'ed my friend last night. My Tenclub membership expires this month, 2011 was supposed to be the last year because I wanted to take a family member to the next Chicago show, didn't happen so I grudgingly renewed again, went to Wrigley and had a great time (despite things out of the band's control), said I would keep it going if I LOVED Lightning Bolt the album...every song other than MYM has been dreadful which compares to Backspacer where I only dug (at best) about half the album and thought it was awful in general.

I still may attend a Pearl Jam show, when it's convenient for me, but after nearly 13 years, I'm done paying money to Tenclub. I'd rather pay a scalper $164 for each ticket than pay $40 x4 (number of years between Chicago shows) in fan club dues and $168 for a pair of tickets when I may want 1 or 3 or 4....I'll probably get a better seat, too (though my Wrigley seats were pretty awesome all things considering). So then I'm left with a lottery I may not win (I'm actually in favor of this policy change, I'm just saying), stickers, and a vinyl 45 I can't play of songs I don't want that I can get digitally anyway, and an unresponsive and sarcastic/abusive staff.

This, and the fact that I'm finally seeing Neutral Milk Hotel live next month, suggests to me that this is kind of the end of an era (of sorts) for me...

I sincerely believe that those who aren't enjoying the song need to put it aside and that someday this song is going to mean something to them. All depends on your place in life and what it means to you today. I'm 40. I have great kids. A great wife. A great job. But I have watched life change drastically to more than a few people around me. This line is hitting me with a tonne of bricks. "It's a fragile thing, this life we lead." So this song is my here and now.

I have been a huge PJ fan since the beginning, so I take the good with the bad and accept that I'm not going to love everything. So I'm not in that same station of fandom, where I feel the need to reconsider my affinity for the band. That said. Come back to this song. Someday its going to make sense.

I'm 31 years old. Bottom line is, no matter how much "meaning" I might/could derive from the lyrics, the music is such insipid adult contemporary shit that I can't stand it. Maybe it's unfair of me to pigeonhole Pearl Jam this way, as not everything I listen to is "rawk" (I really like Eddie's solo albums, for instance! Not that everything I listen to is related to Pearl Jam) but I don't care - this is not the type of music I want to hear when I fire up a Pearl Jam CD or attend their concerts. They've essentially entered the same zone for me that Weezer did when they released the Green album. I went and saw them live when they did their "memories" tour playing Blue/Pinkerton front-to-back each night and an "other greatest hits" portion after...the Green and later songs were completely lost on me (other than "Pork and Beans", a sarcastic return-to-form done to appease the record company) but they made other people happy. That's great, I don't begrudge them that (the band or the fans), but on the same note it's time for me to move on.

It may be, and that's fine. But with this song in particular there was the decision to write a song in a genre that most of us have been trained since the start of our fandom to look down on. It really does take a few listens to get past that wall to even begin to evaluate the song as a song.

And maybe Sirens does suck. But you can't really make that call until you hear Sirens without hearing every other 80s power ballad you don't care for. Because you're not hearing the song.

[Chris_H_2]

Harmless, I'm not sure if you were aware, but we instituted a pay-per-post policy retroactive to July 11th . . .

[stip]

Is it safe to say that Pearl Jam has entered "Dad-rock" territory?

Is that an insult though? Or a bad thing? Just curious of your meaning for it before I actually comment!

oh, it's meant to be an insult and anyone who says otherwise is full of shit

[McParadigm]

prediction: worst page in this thread since 93 at least. right here.

and it'll get fewer than 5k reads a year to boot.

[IlluminEddie]

I do understand that people have an are entitled to different views/rankings. I simply think the "AMOUNT" of preference for Riot Act (HERE) over other albums is due (in many cases) to a herd mentality and nothing more. t.

you don't need to go all conspiracy theory on this. We can just say that the people who come to RM have crappier taste in pearl jam than the larger fanbase, but that it is AUTHENTIC crappier taste.

Oh it's no conspiracy at all - the herd mentality is pretty obvious. RM: "We are SOOOooo into PJ here at RM, that the top rated albums aren't for us, nah, we going to tout the opposite.... because we're the bestest of all bestest fans ever!"

In fact, I would bet that ALL of the entire 333 Riot Act albums purchased each year from 2009-2012 were purchased by people here in this very forum.

[Chris_H_2]

Is it safe to say that Pearl Jam has entered "Dad-rock" territory?

Is that an insult though? Or a bad thing? Just curious of your meaning for it before I actually comment!

oh, it's meant to be an insult and anyone who says otherwise is full of shit

Jeff Tweedy loses his shit when people describe Wilco as "dad-rock."

[McParadigm]

Is it safe to say that Pearl Jam has entered "Dad-rock" territory?

Is that an insult though? Or a bad thing? Just curious of your meaning for it before I actually comment!

oh, it's meant to be an insult and anyone who says otherwise is full of shit

Jeff Tweedy loses his shit when people describe Wilco as "dad-rock."

It doesn't matter what Jeff Tweedy thinks. It only matters what Matt thinks. We've covered this.

[stip]

Ha! I am rocking the shit out of message boarding on an iPhone today.

I just thought that stip and dime should know.

you've always been the gold star for me

[Heathen]

thank you stip

[stip]

To me, this data really hammers home which album is the worst in the collection.

Which brings us back to the part where you're retardedly equaling sales with quality. Finally.

To pretend the two are unrelated is retarded.

Do you think The Who's worst selling album was the best? How about Pink Floyd's worst seller? Now, if you went to a random set of people and looked only at those who declared themselves as "fans" (nothing more, nothing less - no need for a fan club membership or spending hours of their day at a real cool website, they just said they are fans of Pink Floyd on a random survey they were given)... do you think that The Who or Pink Floyd's "fans" would rate their worst selling album as the best in terms of quality in aggregate? Do you think the worst sellers may end up at the bottom? I do - why - because I'm practical.

Sales are related to quality for ONE band's catalog. It doesn't work from band to band, or genre to genre... but, individually for one band from album to album it does.

Should that effect your thinking? No, but neither should the herd mentality of a website full of hipsters.

Nope, I just checked and the verdict is still that you're one of the most retarded people on this board, and that's saying something.

if this was a real RM post you would have ranked them

[IlluminEddie]

But, you can rank quality for yourself - right?

A survey would capture your rankings, and mine and others... that would probably be the best way.

As for sales, I think sales does the same thing in a sense - admittedly not quite as well. If you don't like something, you aren't going to buy it. If you do, you will. In this day and age, it's even less cut and dry because you can now download it if you don't really like it too much or are indifferent about rewarding the artist. My point is that Backspacer, which was more negatively impacted by declining national album sales and piracy, outsold Riot Act. In that sense, sales could be used for ranking albums and would apparently show Backspacer over Riot Act.

I don't think singles can be used with the same statistical accuracy. But, in general, Last Kiss was preferred by more people to Jeremy. That's what it would say. I think the issue here is most think that they are "real fans" of Pearl Jam than some who don't come to boards like this. I disagree. A fan's a fan to me. They all count.

Backspacer had the shit promoted out of it with 2 radio "hits". Much , much, much more so than Riot Act. Doesn't not mean it ranks higher than RA except for success.

So, you're saying Riot Act didn't have any hits? I agree. That could be one reason it sucks.

[McParadigm]

In fact, I would bet that ALL of the entire 333 Riot Act albums purchased each year from 2009-2012 were purchased by people here in this very forum.

Then this must be the place (naive melody)

[stip]

FFS, this conversation is still going on?

Go to the LB thread if you want to ruin something... damnit!

that thread needs a lot more of people talking about how great that song is.

[McParadigm]

Ha! I am rocking the shit out of message boarding on an iPhone today.

I just thought that stip and dime should know.

you've always been the gold star for me

Do you search engine your screen name?

[Dr. Van Nostrand]

Is it safe to say that Pearl Jam has entered "Dad-rock" territory?

Is that an insult though? Or a bad thing? Just curious of your meaning for it before I actually comment!

oh, it's meant to be an insult and anyone who says otherwise is full of shit

and its a pretty damn stupid insult as well

[Thejambi]

But, you can rank quality for yourself - right?

A survey would capture your rankings, and mine and others... that would probably be the best way.

As for sales, I think sales does the same thing in a sense - admittedly not quite as well. If you don't like something, you aren't going to buy it. If you do, you will. In this day and age, it's even less cut and dry because you can now download it if you don't really like it too much or are indifferent about rewarding the artist. My point is that Backspacer, which was more negatively impacted by declining national album sales and piracy, outsold Riot Act. In that sense, sales could be used for ranking albums and would apparently show Backspacer over Riot Act.

I don't think singles can be used with the same statistical accuracy. But, in general, Last Kiss was preferred by more people to Jeremy. That's what it would say. I think the issue here is most think that they are "real fans" of Pearl Jam than some who don't come to boards like this. I disagree. A fan's a fan to me. They all count.

Backspacer had the shit promoted out of it with 2 radio "hits". Much , much, much more so than Riot Act. Doesn't not mean it ranks higher than RA except for success.

So, you're saying Riot Act didn't have any hits? I agree. That could be one reason it sucks.

I am not a Riot Act fan . It is not a radio album. I like Backspacer better but I'd have to say the quality of the songs on RA are better.

[stip]

Really cracks me up when women bring up ed having a model wife as part of their distaste for PJ music these days...

Its....

Interesting....

shut up, strat. you're grasping at straws here, and I'm not interested in this kind of bullshit male egotism wrapped up in what you poorly try to disguise as 'interesting' - if you don't think ed's marriage (second marriage at that) to a beautiful younger woman was a thorough disappointment to someone like myself who always had a tremendous amount of respect for him as someone from my generation who was sincere in his views, only to observe him give in to every stupid and insecure stereotype that he used to rail against, then you know- not really my issue- you think it's cool? good - I don't. I think it's typical and thus disappointing behavior from what used to be an extraordinary icon of the 90s.

But... You do realize the reason Ed and Beth got a divorce was because Beth was sleeping with a construction worker working on remodeling their house?

she had the good sense to sleep with a blue collar worker, so there's no values issue/hypocrisy here.