Dark Matter (song)

[spike]

Ear fatigue is the new mouthfeel.

[stip]

Great discussion points all, and really glad to see other people weighing on this with some measure of care.

Trolling behavior aside, these technical choices undercut the relatively strong composition in a couple big ways:

1. It detracts significantly from the core strength of the band, e.g. their ability to deliver a sense of organic power and emotion in their playing.

2. Whether it's characterized as "ear fatigue" or "pain," they both serve to disincentivize repeated listens.

And I'm all for a very "produced" sound, when it's done well. There's just not one thing about this mix/master that I would call flattering or compelling.

This is where you lose me. I can hear the produced critique. It does sound very much like a band recorded a song, rather than a band in a room. But I don't hear how that undercuts the emotion, or even make the song feel less organic (it does feel less 'live, I suppose, but that seems like it's something similar). It still sounds authentic and collaborative to me. I don't hear the songs stripped of emotion in a way that happens sometimes on, say, Lightning Bolt, where I can push past that by filling in some gaps and scuffing some surfaces in my head.

I think this is truer for singers than it is for instrumentalists. It’s really difficult for any kind of production to completely stamp the humanity out of a singer’s voice — even in songs like “Sample and Hold” by Neil Young and “Kid A” by Radiohead, where the voices are essentially manipulated to sound like robots, the human emotion comes through clear as day (these are much different production choices than what is happening on “Dark Matter,” but the same premise is true — it’s hard for production to truly dehumanize a voice).

Musical instruments aren’t as resilient. One note from Eddie Vedder’s voice has a lot more inherent, discernible uniqueness in it than one snare hit from Matt Cameron, despite the fact that Matt very much has a style of his own. But when you start applying layers of artifice to a drum track, the loss of individuality comes quicker than it does with a voice. Keith Richards has one of the most identifiable guitar tones in rock music, and there are parts on the new Stones record where that individuality is really, really sanded down; he sounds like could be anyone on some of those songs. So yeah, “Dark Matter” definitely sounds like a band of humans; I would not hear it and assume it was a singer singing over machines. But does it sound like uniquely like these five musicians? I think you could argue that it doesn’t necessarily — it definitely sounds like Eddie and some other people, and I guess you could argue that on some level you can hear “five guys in a room.” I’m just not sure I hear these five guys in a room. In my opinion, that’s a loss.

part of the problem is that I'm not sure I could readily identify matt's style. That's on me as a listener and not being a particularly discerning listener of drums. But your point is well taken. It's not a fairly typical sounding Pearl Jam track to my ears, musically, outside of the Eddie glue (and the points Jeff comes through).

Having said that, Ryan Lendt (who has a youtube guitar channel) was this week's guest on the State of Love and Trust podcast, and was teaching Jason (one of the hosts) how to play Dark Matter on guitar. And there were elements of the song that he felt had Stone's signature all over them. Definitely not things I picked up on, but I'm not a guitar player.

[VinylGuy]

Listened a few times yesterday on my flight back; and damn Matt C is wonderful

Really exited about his performance in the album

[tragabigzanda]

pearl jam sucks now

[tree_]

I just gave it another listen for the first time in about 25 days and I'm going to have to take it up from 2 stars to 3.6. I think I may have an unfair, biased distaste for Ed's voice and when I move past that, it sounds much better. I idolized Ed as a child, and I might have Ed issues because of my father issues, and since I've stopped talking to my dad I've hated Ed, which is unfair to him. Maybe his voice isn't so bad after all. I can come back around, I think.

[Ello Sailor]

Ed is Tree's dad

[oftheearth]

Listened a few times yesterday on my flight back; and damn Matt C is wonderful

Really exited about his performance in the album

Matt has some incredible drum parts throughout but especially towards the end/outtro of the song. If this is just a taste of what's to come on this record we are in for a treat. Eddie did speak on his level of playing on the album.

[tree_]

Ed is Tree's dad

where do you think "they say knowledge is a tree, it's growing up just like me" came from?

[VinylGuy]

Listened a few times yesterday on my flight back; and damn Matt C is wonderful

Really exited about his performance in the album

Matt has some incredible drum parts throughout but especially towards the end/outtro of the song. If this is just a taste of what's to come on this record we are in for a treat. Eddie did speak on his level of playing on the album.

Yeah, Jeff too. Really exited for what’s to come.

[Kevin Davis]

Having said that, Ryan Lendt (who has a youtube guitar channel) was this week's guest on the State of Love and Trust podcast, and was teaching Jason (one of the hosts) how to play Dark Matter on guitar. And there were elements of the song that he felt had Stone's signature all over them.

I agree! I actually think I mentioned this in one of my initial comments on the song -- the riff leading into the chorus (right before Eddie starts singing "denounce the demagogues") sounds very Stoney, specifically very Ten-era Stoney, which isn't something we've seen for a while, though for some reason I feel like I have heard some chatter that the music for this song might actually be Matt's. I wouldn't find that hard to believe either; there is some Wellwater Conspiracy in the DNA of this song for sure (Matt and Stone have many common musical ancestors, so this isn't super surprising). A lot of that is in the composition, though, not so much the feel of the playing.

In fairness, the individual musicians in PJ don't all have that same "feel" that someone like Keith Richards does, where you can tell it's them just by hearing them strum around for a few bars. (Honestly the most instantly recognizable instrumentalist in PJ is probably Eddie, just because he is consistently and endearingly rudimentary in a way that has barely changed since 1995.) But, as a collective, they definitely have a sound -- someone mentioned "Ghost" earlier in this thread, and that's a great example. When they all drop in right at the beginning of that song, you can tell -- that's it, that's Pearl Jam. That's what these five guys playing together sounds like. There's some flexibility in that baseline sound for PJ -- more so than for a group like, say, Neil Young and Crazy Horse, or Sonic Youth -- but it definitely exists. And while that flexibility is a strength on its own, I actually think it works somewhat to their disadvantage against homogenizing production values like these, precisely because that baseline sound isn't as anchored by a consistent sonic trademark.

I like this song a lot, but some of the warmth and immediacy of it feeling like a Pearl Jam record is missing, which is a shame. In the end it's just one song, and the album is just one album. I can deal. But it does take some dealing.

[dad]

Ear fatigue is the new mouthfeel.

is this like eating bowls of your favorite cereal for every meal for a week?

[Strat]

I had a bowl of honey nut cheerios for the first time in maybe 15 years and i almost died and went to heaven

[Strat]

someone asked Dave A what he thought of the new single and said "it has whiff of soundgarden to it!" to which dave replied "yea, it has a whiff of something "

[Jorge]

Lol

[Ms Harmless]

haha

[Noaheb]

Trag do you like the BOB remix of Ten or the original better and why?

[Ms Harmless]

Trag do you like the BOB remix of Ten or the original better and why?

<insert "that's bait" meme>

[tragabigzanda]

pearl jam sucks now

[LetMeSleep]

Trag do you like the BOB remix of Ten or the original better and why?

Definitely the original

Absolutely.

[stip]

Trag do you like the BOB remix of Ten or the original better and why?

Definitely the original

Absolutely.

The one exception is Alive. The RVM remix is the definitive version