Song of the Moment: Sirens

[liebzz]

Don't mess with No Code!

I like Sirens quite a bit, but I'm not ready to compare it to those album's tracks yet.

[harmless]

No Code?

[liebzz]

No Code?

Umm...yes. No Code would be my favorite album. As in, my favorite album from any band.

[harmless]

No Code?

Umm...yes. No Code would be my favorite album. As in, my favorite album from any band.

Right, but who here compared this song to anything off No Code?

[Blenheim Augustine]

No Code?

Umm...yes. No Code would be my favorite album. As in, my favorite album from any band.

Right, but who here compared this song to anything off No Code?

Wasn't ATW on No Code?

[harmless]

No Code?

Umm...yes. No Code would be my favorite album. As in, my favorite album from any band.

Right, but who here compared this song to anything off No Code?

Wasn't ATW on No Code?

Um.... not that I know of. I'll have to get back to you.

[Blenheim Augustine]

I find the live version on the video pretty clunky, but the only reason I prefer it is the strummed electric in some parts. It reminds us it's actually a rock song, and the studio version doesn't have it. But there are two guitars, as Mine says: Mike's twelve-string acoustic, and Stone's electric which is washed in reverb and is mostly punctuating the song every now and then. Both things are nice but you do have to listen pretty hard for them... I guess I feel lucky that I don't hate the piano, and it's all fairly bass-heavy which is nice as well.

The problem with the bassy piano is that Jeff plays a really simple line to avoid clogging up the low end - I'd prefer a more innovative bassline and no piano - although it is nice in parts. I can hear the guitars fine on this too but it is a busy arrangement so you need decent speakers / headphones to avoid it being the wrong kind of wall of sound.

I'm listening to simple cheap earbuds, but I hear what you're saying. If I could afford great headphones the song would sound better. And I also hear what you're saying about the low end piano forcing Jeff to rein it in a bit. I feel a more complex bassline could've added to the groove as well as the general "Pearl Jam" feel of the song. Black is made so much stronger because Jeff is allowed to play around the frets. I guess what you feel about Jeff's simpler part here will depend on whether you think the inclusion of the piano was worth it. That's a hard question to answer, but there are parts of the piano I love and parts I wish weren't there. All in all I like it, but I might prefer it if it wondered in and out more and the bass was allowed to muck around slightly over the groovy drums. I'm happy that, like ATW (which I liked but others didn't), it's the drums kind of "driving" this song. Matt would be playing it more sensitively, maybe in a Light Years way, if there were thicker guitars. But because there aren't, he doesn't.

Overall, I'd say I'm pretty happy with this arrangement - the piano is better than the stacatto 8th note hits on Unthought Known which sounded amazing the first time I heard them and then quickly became a bit old. I also don't mind Jeff playing a bit restrained and he does mess around with the rhythm a bit by switching into 8th note pulses at key points. Black is a really good comparison though - that had piano but Jeff uses a whole lot of different things including great use of octaves and chromatic passing tones.

[liebzz]

You'd rank it higher than most of No Code

Songs I prefer Sirens to: Sometimes, Smile, Off He goes, habit, Lukin, Mankind, I'm Open, Around the Bend

Songs equal to sirens: Who you are, present tense

Songs better than sirens, In My Tree, Hail Hail, Red Mosquito

ummm...this.

[harmless]

I find the live version on the video pretty clunky, but the only reason I prefer it is the strummed electric in some parts. It reminds us it's actually a rock song, and the studio version doesn't have it. But there are two guitars, as Mine says: Mike's twelve-string acoustic, and Stone's electric which is washed in reverb and is mostly punctuating the song every now and then. Both things are nice but you do have to listen pretty hard for them... I guess I feel lucky that I don't hate the piano, and it's all fairly bass-heavy which is nice as well.

The problem with the bassy piano is that Jeff plays a really simple line to avoid clogging up the low end - I'd prefer a more innovative bassline and no piano - although it is nice in parts. I can hear the guitars fine on this too but it is a busy arrangement so you need decent speakers / headphones to avoid it being the wrong kind of wall of sound.

I'm listening to simple cheap earbuds, but I hear what you're saying. If I could afford great headphones the song would sound better. And I also hear what you're saying about the low end piano forcing Jeff to rein it in a bit. I feel a more complex bassline could've added to the groove as well as the general "Pearl Jam" feel of the song. Black is made so much stronger because Jeff is allowed to play around the frets. I guess what you feel about Jeff's simpler part here will depend on whether you think the inclusion of the piano was worth it. That's a hard question to answer, but there are parts of the piano I love and parts I wish weren't there. All in all I like it, but I might prefer it if it wondered in and out more and the bass was allowed to muck around slightly over the groovy drums. I'm happy that, like ATW (which I liked but others didn't), it's the drums kind of "driving" this song. Matt would be playing it more sensitively, maybe in a Light Years way, if there were thicker guitars. But because there aren't, he doesn't.

Overall, I'd say I'm pretty happy with this arrangement - the piano is better than the stacatto 8th note hits on Unthought Known which sounded amazing the first time I heard them and then quickly became a bit old. I also don't mind Jeff playing a bit restrained and he does mess around with the rhythm a bit by switching into 8th note pulses at key points. Black is a really good comparison though - that had piano but Jeff uses a whole lot of different things including great use of octaves and chromatic passing tones.

[stip]

I try to be a stip apologist whenever I can, but that list is not helping things.

Yield with no 4's

one can only hope there's many fives on there

Yield is 5s and 3s

what all did you give 5s to ? GTF and DTE ?

wishlist and brain of J are 4.5s as well.

[Dr. Van Nostrand]

I find the live version on the video pretty clunky, but the only reason I prefer it is the strummed electric in some parts. It reminds us it's actually a rock song, and the studio version doesn't have it. But there are two guitars, as Mine says: Mike's twelve-string acoustic, and Stone's electric which is washed in reverb and is mostly punctuating the song every now and then. Both things are nice but you do have to listen pretty hard for them... I guess I feel lucky that I don't hate the piano, and it's all fairly bass-heavy which is nice as well.

The problem with the bassy piano is that Jeff plays a really simple line to avoid clogging up the low end - I'd prefer a more innovative bassline and no piano - although it is nice in parts. I can hear the guitars fine on this too but it is a busy arrangement so you need decent speakers / headphones to avoid it being the wrong kind of wall of sound.

I'm listening to simple cheap earbuds, but I hear what you're saying. If I could afford great headphones the song would sound better. And I also hear what you're saying about the low end piano forcing Jeff to rein it in a bit. I feel a more complex bassline could've added to the groove as well as the general "Pearl Jam" feel of the song. Black is made so much stronger because Jeff is allowed to play around the frets. I guess what you feel about Jeff's simpler part here will depend on whether you think the inclusion of the piano was worth it. That's a hard question to answer, but there are parts of the piano I love and parts I wish weren't there. All in all I like it, but I might prefer it if it wondered in and out more and the bass was allowed to muck around slightly over the groovy drums. I'm happy that, like ATW (which I liked but others didn't), it's the drums kind of "driving" this song. Matt would be playing it more sensitively, maybe in a Light Years way, if there were thicker guitars. But because there aren't, he doesn't.

Overall, I'd say I'm pretty happy with this arrangement - the piano is better than the stacatto 8th note hits on Unthought Known which sounded amazing the first time I heard them and then quickly became a bit old. I also don't mind Jeff playing a bit restrained and he does mess around with the rhythm a bit by switching into 8th note pulses at key points. Black is a really good comparison though - that had piano but Jeff uses a whole lot of different things including great use of octaves and chromatic passing tones.

thats awesome

[Dr. Van Nostrand]

I try to be a stip apologist whenever I can, but that list is not helping things.

Yield with no 4's

one can only hope there's many fives on there

Yield is 5s and 3s

what all did you give 5s to ? GTF and DTE ?

wishlist and brain of J are 4.5s as well.

i really need to listen to wishlist more and see if i like it more then im thinking i do. i am pretty fond of it live with the mirror ball

[Tuolumne]

Still pretty much an average beginning for a second single at radio. It's got about half the plays and half the audience size that Mind Your Manners had within the same time frame...typical follow-up figures. Just Breathe was doing better by this point, but that was an exception. Otherwise it's business as usual. The only real point worth noting is that it's already at #10 on Triple A. That's typically a very slow moving chart. A fast climbing song might typically reach as high as #25 or so, after two weeks.

Mind Your Manners is still #11 at Active rock and #7 at Mainstream after 12 weeks. It's losing numbers by the day, but will definitely match or best WWS before falling off.

Mind Your Manners is also a pretty good example of why Billboard chart history is often misleading about past successes. In looking at Pearl Jam's Alt-radio statistics on their website, you'd see the following information:

Mind Your Manners
Peak: 12
Weeks: 11

Amongst the Waves
Peak: 17
Weeks: 13

While you can see that Manners did better than Waves, it doesn't look like all that extreme a difference. Manners spent a total of seven weeks in the 12-14 range, however, while Waves peaked at 17 fairly early on and then floated around the bottom of the chart for a long while without much impact. As a result, Manners managed nearly 10,000 plays and an average audience size of 3.6 million at Alt-radio alone. Amongst the Waves, by comparison, received less than 4,000 spins and had an average audience size of about one million.

What do you think about how Sirens 5:40 length effects the numbers? Hard to get more plays when the song is twice as long as Just Breathe. If it gets close to the same plays as just breathe, it would fill twice the amount of radio airtime, right?

[harmless]

I try to be a stip apologist whenever I can, but that list is not helping things.

Yield with no 4's

one can only hope there's many fives on there

Yield is 5s and 3s

what all did you give 5s to ? GTF and DTE ?

wishlist and brain of J are 4.5s as well.

i really need to listen to wishlist more and see if i like it more then im thinking i do. i am pretty fond of it live with the mirror ball

Wishlist is great. It's also great that on record it leaves you wanting more; that's an artful fadeout, because then you get to hear the rest if you see them live or watch SVT.

[McParadigm]

What do you think about how Sirens 5:40 length effects the numbers? Hard to get more plays when the song is twice as long as Just Breathe. If it gets close to the same plays as just breathe, it would fill twice the amount of radio airtime, right?

It's a factor, but it's more of an asterisk than a key decider. Long songs can and often do pull very equal numbers to shorter ones at rock and adult radio...the two places this song is aimed. All it really means is that it will tend to "feel" like it's getting more plays than it really is.

[Dr. Van Nostrand]

I try to be a stip apologist whenever I can, but that list is not helping things.

Yield with no 4's

one can only hope there's many fives on there

Yield is 5s and 3s

what all did you give 5s to ? GTF and DTE ?

wishlist and brain of J are 4.5s as well.

i really need to listen to wishlist more and see if i like it more then im thinking i do. i am pretty fond of it live with the mirror ball

Wishlist is great. It's also great that on record it leaves you wanting more; that's an artful fadeout, because then you get to hear the rest if you see them live or watch SVT.

i do like the fade out on that one

[evenslow]

What do you think about how Sirens 5:40 length effects the numbers? Hard to get more plays when the song is twice as long as Just Breathe. If it gets close to the same plays as just breathe, it would fill twice the amount of radio airtime, right?

It's a factor, but it's more of an asterisk than a key decider. Long songs can and often do pull very equal numbers to shorter ones at rock and adult radio...the two places this song is aimed. All it really means is that it will tend to "feel" like it's getting more plays than it really is.

Also, is there a new context to view these numbers in? For instance, JB was 4 years ago and listening habits have no doubt changed. Do we factor in things like YouTube, Last.fm, Spotify, etc. more than we would have then? If so, is there a way to quantify that?

[Mike]

What do you think about how Sirens 5:40 length effects the numbers? Hard to get more plays when the song is twice as long as Just Breathe. If it gets close to the same plays as just breathe, it would fill twice the amount of radio airtime, right?

It's a factor, but it's more of an asterisk than a key decider. Long songs can and often do pull very equal numbers to shorter ones at rock and adult radio...the two places this song is aimed. All it really means is that it will tend to "feel" like it's getting more plays than it really is.

Also, is there a new context to view these numbers in? For instance, JB was 4 years ago and listening habits have no doubt changed. Do we factor in things like YouTube, Last.fm, Spotify, etc. more than we would have then? If so, is there a way to quantify that?

Last.fm is interesting to watch. A real hit-song reaches around 25k-50k listeners a week. (Arctic Monkeys' Do I Wanna Know 53k Katy Perry's Roar 40k, Lady Gaga's Applause 37k, Miley Cyrus' Wrecking Ball 35k, Robin Thicke's Blurred Lines 24k) Sirens was listened to by 4.5k people this week.

[evenslow]

What do you think about how Sirens 5:40 length effects the numbers? Hard to get more plays when the song is twice as long as Just Breathe. If it gets close to the same plays as just breathe, it would fill twice the amount of radio airtime, right?

It's a factor, but it's more of an asterisk than a key decider. Long songs can and often do pull very equal numbers to shorter ones at rock and adult radio...the two places this song is aimed. All it really means is that it will tend to "feel" like it's getting more plays than it really is.

Also, is there a new context to view these numbers in? For instance, JB was 4 years ago and listening habits have no doubt changed. Do we factor in things like YouTube, Last.fm, Spotify, etc. more than we would have then? If so, is there a way to quantify that?

Last.fm is interesting to watch. A real hit-song reaches around 25k-50k listeners a week. (Arctic Monkeys' Do I Wanna Know 53k Katy Perry's Roar 40k, Lady Gaga's Applause 37k, Miley Cyrus' Wrecking Ball 35k, Robin Thicke's Blurred Lines 24k) Sirens was listened to by 4.5k people this week.

Interesting. But Last.fm also caters to a relatively younger audience, so that has to be factored in as well. But I'm not surprised by that number.

[McParadigm]

What do you think about how Sirens 5:40 length effects the numbers? Hard to get more plays when the song is twice as long as Just Breathe. If it gets close to the same plays as just breathe, it would fill twice the amount of radio airtime, right?

It's a factor, but it's more of an asterisk than a key decider. Long songs can and often do pull very equal numbers to shorter ones at rock and adult radio...the two places this song is aimed. All it really means is that it will tend to "feel" like it's getting more plays than it really is.

Also, is there a new context to view these numbers in? For instance, JB was 4 years ago and listening habits have no doubt changed. Do we factor in things like YouTube, Last.fm, Spotify, etc. more than we would have then? If so, is there a way to quantify that?

I noted way back when Manners came out (and Mike's comment above goes into this) that radio isn't so much a determiner of success anymore as it is the most effective barometer for determining how a song is doing in general. Streaming and download media data still correlates very consistently with radio listening patterns, so knowing how a song is doing at radio can help to understand how it is being received in general outside the fanbase.

Case in point...Mike mentions last.fm. The Fixer and Just Breathe, both genuine radio hits last time out, are the 14th and 5th most listened to Pearl Jam songs by last.fm users for the last six months, respectively. Radio success was indicative of their impact on casual listeners.