UNPOPULAR PEARL JAM OPINIONS

[digster]

Love. Reign O'er Me is one of the band's best recordings from the last decade, and the Vh1 Rock Honors performance with The Real Me is one of their greatest performances.

I'll support these

I also think Come Back is pretty strong

I think I'd like Come Back more if it wasn't so "now here's where we try playing soul!" I think part of it is that Ed's voice, as good as it is, is definitely not a chameleon. It sticks out like a sore thumb in most genre lifts.

[Jorge]

Burt is trying to save RM here, guys. Give him some support.

Thank you. This thread is concentrated evil and it must be stopped.

I like thing.
Everybody likes thing.
oh.
I dont like thing.
I like thing.
I like thing too.

That's every thread, though. You must destroy RM.

[BurtReynolds]

Backspacer and Lightning Bolt are better than any post vitalogy record.

At least Stip knows how to properly play the LoathedVermin role here.

[bodysnatcher]

I don't think my tastes could differ any more than stip's

Except the In Hiding opinion. I really don't like that song.

[stip]

Love. Reign O'er Me is one of the band's best recordings from the last decade, and the Vh1 Rock Honors performance with The Real Me is one of their greatest performances.

I'll support these

I also think Come Back is pretty strong

I think I'd like Come Back more if it wasn't so "now here's where we try playing soul!" I think part of it is that Ed's voice, as good as it is, is definitely not a chameleon. It sticks out like a sore thumb in most genre lifts.

I think he could pull it off if the production on that song wasn't so abrasive.

[PryTo]

Backspacer and Lightning Bolt are better than any post vitalogy record.

Stip'd!

[BurtReynolds]

Burt is trying to save RM here, guys. Give him some support.

Thank you. This thread is concentrated evil and it must be stopped.

I like thing.
Everybody likes thing.
oh.
I dont like thing.
I like thing.
I like thing too.

That's every thread, though. You must destroy RM.

"To save RM, he must destroy it... and team up with a cop dog."

Someone get Whitey on the phone, I've got a screenplay I'd like him to direct.

[spike]

yeah, in hiding also sucks. probably more than dissident.

[Strat]

God I love that who performance. So much.

[Kevin Davis]

I think I'd like Come Back more if it wasn't so "now here's where we try playing soul!" I think part of it is that Ed's voice, as good as it is, is definitely not a chameleon. It sticks out like a sore thumb in most genre lifts.

I know what you're getting at, and obviously if it doesn't work for you it doesn't work for you, but in general I think this is the kind of charge that is too often brought against artists who without warning try an unfamiliar genre on for size in a deliberately unoriginal manner. It happens to Elvis Costello all the time -- he records a song (or a whole record) in the style of someone he admires, and within several weeks most major publications and roughly 60% of his fans have accused him of being a phony, as if his inability to actually physically become whoever he is imitating -- or at least his inability to temporarily make the world forget that he generally writes rock songs and not whatever else -- somehow insults the integrity of the genre. This strikes me as a relatively cheap line of criticism. On its merits, "Come Back" is a better-than-decent song with a sharp melody that evidences a strong understanding of and, in my opinion, sincere reverence for the style of composition from which it draws, its ultimate sin being the inappropriate power ballad-esque sense of drama it takes on towards the end, which hits its low with that unfortunate falsetto passage that accounts for the song's coda. The weakness of the song stems from the fact that the band made some poor decisions arranging it, not from the fact that Eddie sounds like Eddie on it instead of Otis Redding. I mean, is there something Ed could do to be more "chameleon-like" that would redeem this song for you, or do you just see this sort of genre exercise as a no-win situation for this band?

[McParadigm]

God I love that who performance. So much.

I'm always amazed when it cuts to the crowd and people aren't being knocked backward by the force of it, like Sauron's on security or something.

[Kevin Davis]

I like Dissident too, the bridge especially.

It is one of my favorite songs from the first three records.

[ridleybradout]

I think I'd like Come Back more if it wasn't so "now here's where we try playing soul!" I think part of it is that Ed's voice, as good as it is, is definitely not a chameleon. It sticks out like a sore thumb in most genre lifts.

I know what you're getting at, and obviously if it doesn't work for you it doesn't work for you, but in general I think this is the kind of charge that is too often brought against artists who without warning try an unfamiliar genre on for size in a deliberately unoriginal manner. It happens to Elvis Costello all the time -- he records a song (or a whole record) in the style of someone he admires, and within several weeks most major publications and roughly 60% of his fans have accused him of being a phony, as if his inability to actually physically become whoever he is imitating -- or at least his inability to temporarily make the world forget that he generally writes rock songs and not whatever else -- somehow insults the integrity of the genre. This strikes me as a relatively cheap line of criticism. On its merits, "Come Back" is a better-than-decent song with a sharp melody that evidences a strong understanding of and, in my opinion, sincere reverence for the style of composition from which it draws, its ultimate sin being the inappropriate power ballad-esque sense of drama it takes on towards the end, which hits its low with that unfortunate falsetto passage that accounts for the song's coda. The weakness of the song stems from the fact that the band made some poor decisions arranging it, not from the fact that Eddie sounds like Eddie on it instead of Otis Redding. I mean, is there something Ed could do to be more "chameleon-like" that would redeem this song for you, or do you just see this sort of genre exercise as a no-win situation for this band?

As usual, KD says it best

God I love that who performance. So much.

I'm always amazed when it cuts to the crowd and people aren't being knocked backward by the force of it, like Sauron's on security or something.

I know, right? They should be all

[digster]

I think I'd like Come Back more if it wasn't so "now here's where we try playing soul!" I think part of it is that Ed's voice, as good as it is, is definitely not a chameleon. It sticks out like a sore thumb in most genre lifts.

I know what you're getting at, and obviously if it doesn't work for you it doesn't work for you, but in general I think this is the kind of charge that is too often brought against artists who without warning try an unfamiliar genre on for size in a deliberately unoriginal manner. It happens to Elvis Costello all the time -- he records a song (or a whole record) in the style of someone he admires, and within several weeks most major publications and roughly 60% of his fans have accused him of being a phony, as if his inability to actually physically become whoever he is imitating -- or at least his inability to temporarily make the world forget that he generally writes rock songs and not whatever else -- somehow insults the integrity of the genre. This strikes me as a relatively cheap line of criticism. On its merits, "Come Back" is a better-than-decent song with a sharp melody that evidences a strong understanding of and, in my opinion, sincere reverence for the style of composition from which it draws, its ultimate sin being the inappropriate power ballad-esque sense of drama it takes on towards the end, which hits its low with that unfortunate falsetto passage that accounts for the song's coda. The weakness of the song stems from the fact that the band made some poor decisions arranging it, not from the fact that Eddie sounds like Eddie on it instead of Otis Redding. I mean, is there something Ed could do to be more "chameleon-like" that would redeem this song for you, or do you just see this sort of genre exercise as a no-win situation for this band?

Elvis Costello is pretty much exactly the kind of person I had in mind who is able to do this well. My lobbing this criticism at PJ in this specific instance doesn't mean that it extends to every band or solo artist who ever attempted a genre pastiche. I was talking really only about this specific song.

My problem with it is that there is a cognitive dissonance between Ed's inability to be anyone other than, well, Ed. Just because Elvis can do it well doesn't mean Ed can. This undoubtedly is due, in part, to the fact that the song doesn't really try to be anything more original than a R&B photocopy, and it comes off less as PJ spreading their wings and more as Ed applying his patented S/T warble to some Stax karaoke. I'm not asking for Ed to be a spitting image of Otis Redding, but if he doesn't (or can't) confront any of the genre's trademarks while fronting a song that is pretty much a straight lift, it's gonna sound a bit weird.

[Kevin Davis]

I'm not asking for Ed to be a spitting image of Otis Redding, but if he doesn't (or can't) confront any of the genre's trademarks...

Which are...what exactly? I don't mean to seem hostile, i'm just curious what you'd have him do that wouldn't just make him sound further like an out-of-depth caricature.

[@SkitchP]

From 1991-1194 Pearl Jam was the best band of all time

America's Educators you guys.

[Lament]

From 1991-1194 Pearl Jam was the best band of all time

America's Educators you guys.

I can't think of a single band from 1194 who was better than Pearl Jam.

[McParadigm]

From 1991-1194 Pearl Jam was the best band of all time

America's Educators you guys.

I can't think of a single band from 1194 who was better than Pearl Jam.

The Mongols?

[numbers]

From 1991-1194 Pearl Jam was the best band of all time

I'm confused, are you starting with 1991 BC?

[stip]

1194 BC through 1991 AD. I apologize for the reversal.

I would have gone from 1194 BC to 1994 AD, but



was just too good