Red Mosquito

I think it's fine if there's a "solo" song on a PJ album; The End was a solid listen to Backspacer, after all. I think the main thing that matters is if the song is good. If it's a quality song, it'll earn it's spot.

I also can't see this being a Mike song; Ed's playing the main stuff on it, he's playing guitar period; I can't think of any song he plays on that he didn't write. It seems pretty close to what Ed's been writing acoustically.

Lament wrote:

harmless wrote:The first "It should've been an Ed solo song" was Elderly Woman. We can also add Indifference, probably.

While I don't really agree with your sentiment, I see where it's coming from. Shouldn't Oceans be the first then, though? And Indifference just doesn't fit the bill for me. Everything Ed has ever done solo has been strummy-type stuff. There's way too much atmosphere provided by the band in that song to not say it absolutely has "PEARL JAM" written all over it. If it were on the record in the same manner he performs it with Ben Harper I'd agree, but there's too much Jeff and Mike bring to it on the record to see it as an "Ed solo" track.

Even this Future Days song is dripping with atmosphere, it's just not an atmosphere that many people are liking. A better argument would be instrumentation, that Elderly Woman and Indifference aren't great examples because they're too full-sounding. But 'Hard Sun' and a few other tracks from ITW were full-band numbers as well, and still, Ed solo songs. So I'm not sure where the criticism comes from exactly. Elderly Woman has a starkly different atmosphere and tone to Leash. It's as different as Just Breathe is to Got Some.

Yeah, but Hard Sun was built from the ground up by Eddie on instruments, besides Corin Tucker's vocal. You can't get more 'solo' than that (I guess other than actually writing the song). It's probably not the same thing here.

digster wrote:I think it's fine if there's a "solo" song on a PJ album; The End was a solid listen to Backspacer, after all. I think the main thing that matters is if the song is good. If it's a quality song, it'll earn it's spot.

I also can't see this being a Mike song; Ed's playing the main stuff on it, he's playing guitar period; I can't think of any song he plays on that he didn't write. It seems pretty close to what Ed's been writing acoustically.

It's obviously an Ed song.

harmless wrote:Even this Future Days song is dripping with atmosphere, it's just not an atmosphere that many people are liking. A better argument would be instrumentation, that Elderly Woman and Indifference aren't great examples because they're too full-sounding. But 'Hard Sun' and a few other tracks from ITW were full-band numbers as well, and still, Ed solo songs. So I'm not sure where the criticism comes from exactly. Elderly Woman has a starkly different atmosphere and tone to Leash. It's as different as Just Breathe is to Got Some.

Sorry, I should have been more clear about Indifference vs. the other songs. Oceans, Elderly Woman, Off He Goes, Thumbing My Way, and all the other songs that people would put in the "Should've been an Ed solo song" category are songs who's most distinctive and driving characteristics are the vocal melody & a strummy, dude by the campfire chord progression. Even though a lot of those other songs have other members on them, they're songs that would still sound somewhat similar if it were just one guy playing them on guitar. To me the Ed solo (or with Ben Harper) Indifference sounds completely different to the band version.

I'll give you Hard Sun, but if we're saying certain Pearl Jam songs "Should have been an Ed solo song," I would call Hard Sun a "Pearl Jam should've covered it instead" song. As much as I love Ed's cover of it, I think a full band cover would blow it out of the water.

But like I said, I don't put much stock in the "Should've been an Ed solo song" argument. The only reason I would ever think that is when I think "This isn't very good, I'd rather it not be on a Pearl Jam record. I wish he'd put it somewhere else." But that's an entirely different reason than most people are using the assessment (or maybe it's not).

Why does he hardly play Thumbing My Way live anymore if he can play this stuff? The organ in that song is so lovely, I'm hoping this one gets the same treatment.

Listening to this one with headphones makes me like it a little more. Jeff's bass and Matt's vocal harmonies sound really nice.

harmless wrote:Why does he hardly play Thumbing My Way live anymore if he can play this stuff? The organ in that song is so lovely, I'm hoping this one gets the same treatment.

Because it almost always stops a show dead in its tracks. Setlist killer.

evenslow wrote:

harmless wrote:Why does he hardly play Thumbing My Way live anymore if he can play this stuff? The organ in that song is so lovely, I'm hoping this one gets the same treatment.

Because it almost always stops a show dead in its tracks. Setlist killer.

Very possibly, but I guess you could say the same thing about any of these acoustic songs, so given that fact, he might as well play good ones.

digster wrote:I also can't see this being a Mike song; Ed's playing the main stuff on it, he's playing guitar period; I can't think of any song he plays on that he didn't write.

Come Back is the one example that springs readily to mind, but he also plays parts here and there in Present Tense.

Lament wrote:

harmless wrote:Even this Future Days song is dripping with atmosphere, it's just not an atmosphere that many people are liking. A better argument would be instrumentation, that Elderly Woman and Indifference aren't great examples because they're too full-sounding. But 'Hard Sun' and a few other tracks from ITW were full-band numbers as well, and still, Ed solo songs. So I'm not sure where the criticism comes from exactly. Elderly Woman has a starkly different atmosphere and tone to Leash. It's as different as Just Breathe is to Got Some.

Sorry, I should have been more clear about Indifference vs. the other songs. Oceans, Elderly Woman, Off He Goes, Thumbing My Way, and all the other songs that people would put in the "Should've been an Ed solo song" category are songs who's most distinctive and driving characteristics are the vocal melody & a strummy, dude by the campfire chord progression. .

Oceans isn't an Ed song - Jeff wrote the bassline, which is the vocal melody, and the rest of the band filled it in. Indifference is also an Ament tune.

But I agree with this:
"Future Days isn't very good, I'd rather it not be on a Pearl Jam record. I wish he'd put it somewhere else."

One of the issues with Ed's songwriting contributions is that he often leaves very little space for two other guitars since he often plays the vocal melody on the guitar and plays open chords across six strings. It means that there's very little of the band's personality within the song as Mike and Stone are largely following the main chords or playing incidental guitar licks and Jeff is playing root notes. I think this is probably where we get the idea that these are 'solo' songs because the rest of the band is largely redundant. However, if the songs were any good I probably wouldn't care about any of this - I don't have a problem with Corduroy or Elderly Woman or Off He Goes because they are good songs.

Blenheim Augustine wrote:One of the issues with Ed's songwriting contributions is that he often leaves very little space for two other guitars since he often plays the vocal melody on the guitar and plays open chords across six strings. It means that there's very little of the band's personality within the song as Mike and Stone are largely following the main chords or playing incidental guitar licks and Jeff is playing root notes. I think this is probably where we get the idea that these are 'solo' songs because the rest of the band is largely redundant. However, if the songs were any good I probably wouldn't care about any of this - I don't have a problem with Corduroy or Elderly Woman or Off He Goes because they are good songs.

Very well put.

Lament wrote:

Blenheim Augustine wrote:One of the issues with Ed's songwriting contributions is that he often leaves very little space for two other guitars since he often plays the vocal melody on the guitar and plays open chords across six strings. It means that there's very little of the band's personality within the song as Mike and Stone are largely following the main chords or playing incidental guitar licks and Jeff is playing root notes. I think this is probably where we get the idea that these are 'solo' songs because the rest of the band is largely redundant. However, if the songs were any good I probably wouldn't care about any of this - I don't have a problem with Corduroy or Elderly Woman or Off He Goes because they are good songs.

Very well put.

Yup.

Farmer John wrote:Listening to this one with headphones makes me like it a little more. Jeff's bass and Matt's vocal harmonies sound really nice.

Maybe i need to listen with headphones, all i can hear is ed and BOB, i saw Jeff playing in the video but couldn't hear him, and i could see Matt singing but couldn't hear him

Dr. Van Nostrand wrote:

Farmer John wrote:Listening to this one with headphones makes me like it a little more. Jeff's bass and Matt's vocal harmonies sound really nice.

Maybe i need to listen with headphones, all i can hear is ed and BOB, i saw Jeff playing in the video but couldn't hear him, and i could see Matt singing but couldn't hear him

Same, and I've listened with headphones. Still, some upright bass on the album would be nice.

This is a nice sounding version

It's gotten better over the last few days. I could barely make it through the song yesterday.

Still my least favorite of the new tunes.

Still not hearing the bass everyone else is hearing, but I can see it. The song's OK, I still don't understand Brendan's piano other than jumping on board a PJ set for some love.

Me opinion:

This song is not directed to his wife or his kids. It's directed to people who feel the same way he does (mainly about religion and the world order). It's another song in the same manner as MYM. In fact, it makes me think they are related. I wouldn't be surprised if the whole album is. Lightning Bolt is tough to make much out of (lyrically - it gets jumbled towards the end), but it doesn't make me cast that theory off either.

P.S. To answer a question on why are there new posters here: I'm here, like many, because I was banned from the Pit. Then they wanted me to pay again and I thought to myself - F them. Anyway, I was here way back under another name, for some reason I can't login under that name. In fact, I started that Target, Ticketmaster, and the Ten Club thread a few years back. Anyway, I only find time to talk PJ around album releases anymore. One remaining question I have that everyone seems to be ignoring - how will the distribute this album (Target, Walmart)?

IlluminEddie wrote:Me opinion:

This song is not directed to his wife or his kids. It's directed to people who feel the same way he does (mainly about religion and the world order). It's another song in the same manner as MYM. In fact, it makes me think they are related. I wouldn't be surprised if the whole album is. Lightning Bolt is tough to make much out of (lyrically - it gets jumbled towards the end), but it doesn't make me cast that theory off either.

P.S. To answer a question on why are there new posters here: I'm here, like many, because I was banned from the Pit. Then they wanted me to pay again and I thought to myself - F them. Anyway, I was here way back under another name, for some reason I can't login under that name. In fact, I started that Target, Ticketmaster, and the Ten Club thread a few years back. Anyway, I only find time to talk PJ around album releases anymore. One remaining question I have that everyone seems to be ignoring - how will the distribute this album (Target, Walmart)?

You're talking about Future Days right?