What is Each Album's Major Flaw?: Yield

[bodysnatcher]

Yield's biggest flaw is giving us a song title that weirdo PJ fans have adopted as their cringeworthy group name

[Jorge]

Yield's biggest flaw is giving us a song title that weirdo PJ fans have adopted as their cringeworthy group name

Red Mosquito was in No Code tho

[stip]

Man, I love the lyrics on wishlist. They are some of my favorites by him.

[bodysnatcher]

Man, I love the lyrics on wishlist. They are some of my favorites by him.

One of the few (if not only) songs in their catalogue that actually uses the fade out properly

[PryTo]

I forgot to add that I love No Way, even though it's very similar to Smile (which I also ).

[stip]

Similar in what way? That's not a comparison that has occurred to me before.

[Birds in Hell]

Similar in what way? That's not a comparison that has occurred to me before.

They're both by Pearl Jam and...no, that's about it.

[stip]

Isn't smile only 4 of the 5 guys? Or am I making that up?

[bodysnatcher]

Isn't smile only 4 of the 5 guys? Or am I making that up?

I thought it was Stone and Jeff switching instruments? Not sure though

[stip]

that part I remembered. Is mike there? Probably. Just forget I said anything. I'm sorry.

[PryTo]

Similar in what way? That's not a comparison that has occurred to me before.

Just listen to 'em. The opening of the these two songs is nearly identical. The pacing, the beat, the main riff, the lyrics that say one thing but mean another (or do they?). I'd say they're a lot closer than No Way and say Spin the Black Circle or Daughter. Again, I like No Way and Smile a lot.

[stip]

Okay, I can hear that.

[Bammer]

Hard to pinpoint many flaws here outside the fact that Red Dot will forever keep me from the Yield stat tracker trophy.

[darthvedder81]

None. Even the detours (Push Me Pull Me, Red Dot, Hummus) work. The production is warm, the bass rich, the guitar tones perfect. Mike & Stone are both perfect counterparts here coming in with fills and riffs that sound simultaneously off the cuff and carefully crafted. This is Eddie's strongest record vocally as well. Perfect balance of heavy/soft and light/dark and it's paced flawlessly.

[darthvedder81]

P.S. No Way sounds so damn good on the record. It's just such a slow building groove with great Stone wah-tones layered all over. They've never been able to pull it off live probably because it's impossible to do so.

[stip]

Hummus is kinda dumb, but it's a hidden track so I don't care. It was annoying in the early era of mix CDs though. It shelved All Those Yesterdays for years

[darthvedder81]

Yield is a good album, but not a great one. For most bands, this would be a high water mark, but for PJ it was a step backwards, their first. Whereas the previous three albums had, in some regards, topped each other (or at least spoke to one another), this was the first album where PJ seemed to be out of new ideas. In some ways it’s the more logical follow-up to Ten. But given that it was sandwiched between two of the group’s more experimental, boundary-pushing albums, it’s a head scratcher.

The production is pretty big and commercial. Not to the extremes of Ten, but a tasteful variation on that style. Lots of echo, big choruses, and songs that went down easy on the first listen. It’s a much more satisfying blueprint of the kind of records they make today. The two big rockers (Brain of J, DTE) were lesser versions of the type of thing the band did so easily on Vitalogy. The two chest-beating anthems (Faithfull, In Hiding) were lesser versions of the Ten era. The two quasi-experimental numbers (Pilate, Push Me, Pull Me) harkened to the weirder moments of No Code/Vitalogy, but should have been left on the cutting-room floor. Wishlist was a meandering track that collapsed under the weight of Vedder’s worst lyrics to date. Low Light was pleasant but forgettable. All Those Yesterdays and MFC are the two songs that sounded somewhat fresh but they weren’t centerpiece material. Which leaves us with the album’s fatal flaw: Given to Fly.

When your leadoff single is a blatant Zeppelin ripoff, folks, you’ve run out of ideas. I know people like this song, and it’s an okay live number (and better be because they play it at basically every show), but it’s the sound of a band that’s run out of creative gas. And ultimately that’s the fatal flaw of the album. There’s really nothing new here. It’s the sound of a band retreating. After three albums that doggedly pushed in new directions, even when that meant alienating fans, PJ blinked.

Lots of echo? Where? This to me is Pearl Jam at their most garage/living room rock.

[McParadigm]

Given to Fly should have been a stand alone single. It was stellar in the moment and tiresome in the long run.

In Hiding has charms, but so thoroughly outlives them that meh.

I rarely listen to Brain of J.

Goddamn I love Pilate and Low Light

[Kevin Davis]

My feelings on Yield are pretty much the exact opposite of PryTo's post.

[dimejinky99]

I love most of Yield, but red dot ruins the flow, and In Hiding is hugely overrated.