Riot Act: Official Album Thread

[Hypnos]

If there's such thing as a PJ double album,
I think this is it. Side A with traditional PJ
and Side B with a more eclectic aproach.

Side A
Love Boat Captain
Save You
Ghost
Otherside
Thumbing My Way
Undone
I Am Mine
Down
Arc

Side B
Can't Keep
Get Right
Cropduster
Green Disease (This is such a Split Enz tribute)
Bu$hleaguer
Help Help
You Are
1/2 Full
All Or None

[coptheriotact]

If there's such thing as a PJ double album,
I think this is it. Side A with traditional PJ
and Side B with a more eclectic aproach.

Side A
Love Boat Captain
Save You
Ghost
Otherside
Thumbing My Way
Undone
I Am Mine
Down
Arc

Side B
Can't Keep
Get Right
Cropduster
Green Disease (This is such a Split Enz tribute)
Bu$hleaguer
Help Help
You Are
1/2 Full
All Or None

Wow both albums are excellent

[Ms Harmless]

Love Boat Captain is so severely underrated; the way it keeps changing key as it crescendos is so unique and exciting

[VinylGuy]

Matt C plays so fucking good on this album.

I feel everytime there is a discussion about Dave A or Matt C we forget how fucking amazing Cameron is on this album ( i personally think his best album with the band is Binaural, but he is also great on Avocado and Gigaton)

But damn, he is doing all sort of great interesting stuff on all songs here....one of my favs is Cropduster.

[oneway23]

Matt C plays so fucking good on this album.

I feel everytime there is a discussion about Dave A or Matt C we forget how fucking amazing Cameron is on this album ( i personally think his best album with the band is Binaural, but he is also great on Avocado and Gigaton)

But damn, he is doing all sort of great interesting stuff on all songs here....one of my favs is Cropduster.

Was listening to RA yesterday and his high-hat work on Ghost is a personal highlight of the record for me...Excellent

[Ms Harmless]

yeah this is my fave Matt album; if he approaches this kind of inventiveness on Dark Matter it'll be a nice little companion piece

[VinylGuy]

Ghost is such a great song...the guitars there my god. It took me a while to understand how good the song was.

[VinylGuy]

yeah this is my fave Matt album; if he approaches this kind of inventiveness on Dark Matter it'll be a nice little companion piece

Yeah, he is all over Dark Matter so im expecting the new album to be in this list

[Jaeti]

Ghost is such a great song...the guitars there my god. It took me a while to understand how good the song was.

Yeah, took me years.

[epilogue]

This is still probably their best album

[Jaeti]

In reconsidering where all the albums actually stand with me these days, I've realized it's possible that I like this one more than Yield and Binaural. Until very recently, that's not a thought I'd ever entertained.

[tragabigzanda]

pearl jam sucks now

[Jaeti]

Just gave this one a listen. Over the years I've come to really like Ghost and You Are, and much more recently I've come to enjoy Get Right a bit (officially bumped it to three stars in its thread).

It's a real journey. It might cover the most sonic/stylistic territory of any of their albums, surpassing No Code in that regard, which has always been my touchstone for "all over the place Pearl Jam." Sure, having 15 tracks helps in that regard. But if you're looking for something different at just about every turn, they make good use of the fact that it's crammed with so much stuff.

[WaitingForBluey]

I love this album so much! In my opinion, this would have been much more fitting as PJ's self-titled album. It's the last album by the Pearl Jam we listened to growing up. Avocado basically marks the beginning of an entirely new band, the PJ 2.0 era I suppose. But as an eclectic mix of all the different flavors of PJ 1.0, this freaking album IS PEARL JAM.

Which PJ album is more stock full of underrated gems in the catalog? Easy answer: Riot Act

Can't Keep, Cropduster, You Are, Get Right, Green Disease, Help Help, 1/2 Full, All or None... shit, even LBC hits the spot these days!

[liebzz]

Now that I set a thought in motion on another thread about Half Full tying all the themes of this album together in its cathartic final release (the “world” echo), I’d like to think of a way this could have closed the album. A retracking if you will.

Edit: a shot at this, though it’s hard to not place All or None at the end because it is such a beautiful song it’s hard to imagine following it:

Arc
Can’t Keep
Save You
Green Disease
Down
Undone
I Am Mine
Thumbing My Way
Love Boat Captain
Cropduster
Ghost
Get Right
All or None
Other Side
You Are
Help Help
Bu$hleaguer
Half Full

[ABNorman]

I've always defaulted to popping Riot Act at or near the bottom of my album ranking, but I realised I haven't actually listened to the thing for years, so I did that today.

- I really enjoyed the sound of the acoustic guitars in the songs that have 'em.
- I don't enjoy the sound of the heavier songs. Ed sounds tired and vulnerable across the album, and that works for the slower numbers, but it makes things like Save You underwhelming. The guitar tone on Cropduster, Ghost and Get Right just doesn't sound pleasing to my ears, and doesn't differentiate them enough.
- Cropduster hit more than it's ever done since the first few listens.
- Thumbing My Way sounds lovely, but is a snooze fest.
- 1/2 Full is still a poor man's Rival
- All or None is still the best song on the album
- I know they're NOT entirely similar, but a lot of songs blend into one even immediately after I've listened to the album: Cropduster, Ghost, Get Right, Green Disease are all just fuzzy noise (both in tone and memory)

I love: All or None
I really like: Can't Keep, You Are
I kinda like: Save You, LBC, Cropduster, I Am Mine, Help Help, 1/2 Full
I don't like: Ghost, Thumbing My Way, Arc
I kinda hate: Get Right, Green Disease

So not as bad as I remember, but it's really hurt by there being no real 5 star songs peppered into the long sludge of a listen.

[Ms Harmless]

absolutely love this album, wall to wall bangers, I hit play and enjoy

[tragabigzanda]

pearl jam sucks now

[Ms Harmless]

absolutely love this album, wall to wall bangers, I hit play and enjoy

Honestly one of just three albums (Vs, Vitalogy, and this) of theirs where I don’t skip any songs. Even the ones I don’t like work well enough in the flow that I just roll with it

I don't know which my other no skips albums are, I'm sure Vs. is one of them; Gigaton too, funnily enough

[DeeDee]

It's been a while since I listened to Riot Act.

3,5 stars, it's a very special record.