LoathedVermin72 wrote:Writing things that mean something to them. Creating sounds they find interesting. Stretching their boundaries. Anything but deliberately attempting to recapture something from decades ago.
If their aim is to make records that sound like their early ones, they're not doing a very good job. None of their last few records share much in common musically with Ten or Vs.
I feel like they keep trying to come up with something similar to Yield more than anything else. A few anthemic ones, a few garagey ones, a few laidback ones and one kind of weird one - for the most part, pretty cruisy and accessible, nothing to rock the boat too hard. A perennial comeback album.
Birds in Hell wrote:If their aim is to make records that sound like their early ones, they're not doing a very good job. None of their last few records share much in common musically with Ten or Vs.
I feel like they keep trying to come up with something similar to Yield more than anything else. A few anthemic ones, a few garagey ones, a few laidback ones and one kind of weird one - for the most part, pretty cruisy and accessible, nothing to rock the boat too hard. A perennial comeback album.
I think you guys are misreading what he said. He was talking in more general terms about songs that stand up alongside their best in concert. That doesn't mean they're trying to write songs exactly like the hits they have. As much as everyone hates on them, the one thing you can say for them is they've very rarely tried to ape what they've already done. They could have very easily just gone into Stone's riff-book forever and tried to recapture Alive et al, but they never did, even in the later years.
He just means they're trying to write songs that stand up to that, you know, like, big, memorable, (possibly crowd pleasing) songs. You might disagree with that method, but he's not saying they're trying to write songs from Ten all over again.
evenslow wrote:I think you guys are misreading what he said. He was talking in more general terms about songs that stand up alongside their best in concert. That doesn't mean they're trying to write songs exactly like the hits they have. As much as everyone hates on them, the one thing you can say for them is they've very rarely tried to ape what they've already done. They could have very easily just gone into Stone's riff-book forever and tried to recapture Alive et al, but they never did, even in the later years.
He just means they're trying to write songs that stand up to that, you know, like, big, memorable, (possibly crowd pleasing) songs. You might disagree with that method, but he's not saying they're trying to write songs from Ten all over again.
Am I making any sense here?
Oh, that's definitely what he said. No doubt. And it's a terrible approach.
I agree with spenno in the sense that if they're trying to ape their earlier work, they're not that successful at it. Their recent stuff sounds nothing like their early records, and those earlier records, with some single song exceptions weren't making the effort to please that these newer ones are.
I think he just means they want big, accessible songs that go down easy for a listening audience. And I get the desire to have songs that feel good to play live. I just think when they approach it in such a clinical fashion ("how can we craft this chorus for maximum live playability?"), that's asking for trouble. I also don't see why they worry about it so much, as they've never come close to having a record that they couldn't pull off well in concert, no matter how "difficult" they were (besides, ironically, some songs from these newer accessible records).
evenslow wrote:I think you guys are misreading what he said. He was talking in more general terms about songs that stand up alongside their best in concert. That doesn't mean they're trying to write songs exactly like the hits they have. As much as everyone hates on them, the one thing you can say for them is they've very rarely tried to ape what they've already done. They could have very easily just gone into Stone's riff-book forever and tried to recapture Alive et al, but they never did, even in the later years.
He just means they're trying to write songs that stand up to that, you know, like, big, memorable, (possibly crowd pleasing) songs. You might disagree with that method, but he's not saying they're trying to write songs from Ten all over again.
Am I making any sense here?
Oh, that's definitely what he said. No doubt. And it's a terrible approach.
Oh I didn't mean it's a good approach. Just saying that they're not deliberately copying themselves.
It seems silly that they'd write songs for the purpose of playing them live when they play like eight shows a year. If ever there was a time not to care about that, seems like now'd be it.
Also, at this point, they're not really going to lose huge swaths of the Jamily just because they put out Binaural 2 or whatever. They need to go for it next time out.
LoathedVermin72 wrote:Jesus. Ugh. No wonder LB sucked. If they are going to approach songwriting that way, they will never make another good record.
Let's assume this isn't self-evident. What approach should they take to make a good record.
I think the question should be which approach was behind the part of their catalogue people liked, connected to etc.
I think it's more about what worked for them rather than what should be the approach to writing music in general.
evenslow wrote:Also, at this point, they're not really going to lose huge swaths of the Jamily just because they put out Binaural 2 or whatever. They need to go for it next time out.
Binaural (like everything post Ten and before s/t) happened in a context where they didn't feel like their individual influence should be equally represented on every single song at all cost. The only way of getting into an artistic space that feels remotely related to Vitalogy/No Code/Binaural/Riot Act and in part Vs and Yield would be for them to willing to go to an approach that made them detest working with each other.
I found telling that Jeff singled out Ten specifically not the 1st 3 records even though both Vs. and Vitalogy produced at least as big songs that are live staples now.
It's still a statement in a long series that tells more about them having a bigger influence on the music (as was the case with Ten) and valuing that more than the music itself compared to what was the modus operandi during the difficult (because of Vedder) years.
Jeff doesn't seem to be recognising and addressing an issue within the band's creative process. To the contrary he mentions 2 examples of what he feels are 2 successful examples of their new approach. He sounds very satisfied with what PJ currently is.
Birds in Hell wrote:
I feel like they keep trying to come up with something similar to Yield more than anything else. A few anthemic ones, a few garagey ones, a few laidback ones and one kind of weird one - for the most part, pretty cruisy and accessible, nothing to rock the boat too hard. A perennial comeback album.
Thats been their formula for every record.
Strat wrote:Including ten.
I don't think that's true's at all. Ten is a songwriting style that really stands alone in their catalogue for me, I really can't imagine them writing a song like Black or Jeremy at any other time in their career. There's nothing remotely garagey, weird or acoustic (in the vein of Low Light, Off He Goes, Yellow Moon, Thumbing My Way, etc.) on there either.
I really feel like Yield created something of a 'template Pearl Jam record' for the band in a way that none of their other albums have. Even at the time it was something of a "comeback" record after the general inwardness of the band in the mid 90s. It was last record they worked on with Brendan prior to Backspacer too, so it makes sense that they (meaning both Brendan and the band) tried to pick up where they left off after finding themselves in a broadly similar situation once again.
Birds in Hell wrote:If their aim is to make records that sound like their early ones, they're not doing a very good job. None of their last few records share much in common musically with Ten or Vs.
I feel like they keep trying to come up with something similar to Yield more than anything else. A few anthemic ones, a few garagey ones, a few laidback ones and one kind of weird one - for the most part, pretty cruisy and accessible, nothing to rock the boat too hard. A perennial comeback album.
Technically, they said they were making songs that "would stand with" songs on Ten, not that "would sound like" songs on Ten. But still, until they stop giving a shit what we (or the Pit) thinks and start writing songs that just mean something to them here and now, they're never going to have a late-career groundbreaker.
Everything's perfectly all right now. We're fine. We're all fine here, now, thank you. How are you?
I didn't mean to imply that I thought that Jeff meant that either, I agree that he's clearly talking about the crowd reaction to the songs etc.
"We were trying to write songs that we thought would be fun to play live, songs that we’d want to hear every night for 50 or 60 shows, and with Mind Your Manners and Sirens in particular I think we had songs that people liked singing along with every night."
It's a bizarrely functional approach to songwriting.
