This is an album that seems to divide the RMs. Some see it as an exercise shooting for mainstream relevance post-Riot Act as they wish for a band that would have continued down the path of more artier and experimental rock, while others hate the production, and yet others love the album not so much as a return to form but as its own moment in time. I fall in the latter category and with the 2017 mix now available, the sound issues are at least mostly dealt with. The songs and the band clearly jump away from the sort of murky feel of Riot Act. The band is undeniably on a mission here, jumping out with 5 blistering rockers before we can even catch our breath. The band is beating back against where we were then in the second term of President Bush, but really these same themes could be extrapolated more universally, with characters stressing at the kitchen table over their finances or trying to find a way to spin the loss of a loved one to military conflict, or again trying to escape reality by getting in a car and getting out of dodge. This is the most Mike McCready focused album probably since Vs. and he is given a lot of space, especially early on and in the album closer Inside Job, and for this record, it really adds color to the protest. This is both a thrilling adventure and breath of fresh air - the band at its most clear headed since Yield.
Pearl Jam - No Code
Pearl Jam - Vitalogy
Pearl Jam - Binaural
Pearl Jam - Yield
Pearl Jam - Vs.
Pearl Jam - Ten
Pearl Jam
Stone Gossard - Bayleaf
Neil Young - Mirrorball
Pearl Jam - Lost Dogs
Brad - Interiors
Temple of the Dog
Pearl Jam - Riot Act
Mad Season - Above
Wellwater Conspiracy - The Scroll and Its Combinations
Brad - Shame
Brad Vs. Satchel
Wellwater Conspiracy - Brotherhood of Electric
Wellwater Conspiracy - Declaration of Conformity
Wellwater Conspiracy
Brad - Welcome to Discovery Park
Three Fish
Green River - Rehab Doll
Green River - Dry As a Bone
Mother Love Bone - Apple
Mother Love Bone - Shine
Green River - Come On Down
Hater
Hater - The 2nd
Three Fish - The Quiet Table
Bad Radio Demos
Green River - 1984 Demos
The Rockfords
Deranged Diction - Life Support / No Art, No Cowboys, No Rules
Eddie Vedder and the Walmer High School Choir - The Molo Sessions
The Rockfords - The Waiting EP
Interested to see where this goes from here. Feel like you’ve come to a crossroads in their career.
liebzz wrote:Agreed. It only gets more interesting from here, if not with some things I am probably going to let out in discussing Into the Wild, the Backspacer/Lightning Bolt thing, some really amazing side projects, etc.
Soon Earthling will be ranked as well, probably for the first time ever.
liebzz wrote:
Anders wrote:Think the ranking of s/t is more than fair, but feel like the review didn’t explain why it is rated last of the Pearl Jam albums.
It’s not. So far, Lost Dogs and Riot Act are rated below it.
It sounded like it would be rathed higher, the way you wrote about it, but yes, very unprecise sentence from me.
No worries. I sat there fighting with myself and almost placed it above Ten and Vs. but I just couldn’t do it. I have a lot of love for the Self-Titled and always have. Agreed it needs to be played loud.
I am hoping this gets timed so I listen to Earthling naturally in sequence.
Depending on your point of view, this could be Eddie’s first solo album (I mean if you want to stamp your feet about it being a soundtrack that’s your choice). Here, Eddie finds inspiration behind the story of Chris McCandless and his tragic journey to connect with the world off the grid entirely, a Zarathustra-like withdrawal from the world and ended in him never getting back. Eddie’s muse allows him to connect with a simultaneous sense of vulnerability, and an awe at the wide open spaces in this world, especially in the way the music is laid out - sparse and open, and in what feels like a mode of receiving the world rather than his day job pushing against the injustice of the world (particularly on the self-titled album). In that sense, this a beautiful album inextricably tied to the movie’s stunning visual and open scenes.
And while this album is a triumph for Eddie Vedder, the habits learned from this exercise would be what Eddie Vedder chases for much of the next 15 years. The fact that this music and album is so good that Eddie gets away with songs half-cooked, and succeeds on moments that come in a flash, well that may be why Backspacer’s quick blast or some of the more stream of consciousness and frankly rush jobs of items like Lightning Bolt, No More, Can’t Deny Me, etc end up being the mode they are. Not only does Eddie not have the time to “tinker” anymore as he’s noted, but why would he need to when he can bang out a collection of songs as good as Into the Wild? Frankly, he probably hasn’t since, and it was only when they really worked at it in Gigaton that Pearl Jam recovered from this mindset. Let’s hope that sticks. It shouldn’t take away from this album necessarily, but without us ever noticing, the writing on the wall was quickly scribbled here, even if that scribble was momentary stroke of genius.
Pearl Jam - No Code
Pearl Jam - Vitalogy
Pearl Jam - Binaural
Pearl Jam - Yield
Pearl Jam - Vs.
Pearl Jam - Ten
Pearl Jam
Stone Gossard - Bayleaf
Neil Young - Mirrorball
Pearl Jam - Lost Dogs
Eddie Vedder - Into the Wild
Brad - Interiors
Temple of the Dog
Pearl Jam - Riot Act
Mad Season - Above
Wellwater Conspiracy - The Scroll and Its Combinations
Brad - Shame
Brad Vs. Satchel
Wellwater Conspiracy - Brotherhood of Electric
Wellwater Conspiracy - Declaration of Conformity
Wellwater Conspiracy
Brad - Welcome to Discovery Park
Three Fish
Green River - Rehab Doll
Green River - Dry As a Bone
Mother Love Bone - Apple
Mother Love Bone - Shine
Green River - Come On Down
Hater
Hater - The 2nd
Three Fish - The Quiet Table
Bad Radio Demos
Green River - 1984 Demos
The Rockfords
Deranged Diction - Life Support / No Art, No Cowboys, No Rules
Eddie Vedder and the Walmer High School Choir - The Molo Sessions
The Rockfords - The Waiting EP
Man, Into The Wild is something else yeah. I remember going to work and listening to Hard Sun, learning it was a single for a fucking solo eddie vedder album. I was over the moon.
I think you nailed it with the idea of Eddie doing this all by himself and quick, and that notion he has about Guided By Voices or Pollard with quick songs...That was the point behind Backspacer for sure, to "cut all the fat", like he said around that time.
Here, the songs are so fucking good they stand by themselves. I have only seen the movie once, and every time i listen to Far Behind not once i think its about that guy.
Now it’s finally Jeff’s turn to give us his solo debut. Armed with a ton of great ideas, the execution isn’t always perfect, but as in any Jeff album, the wish that these ideas get worked up by the band is ever present. That’s not to say there aren’t great songs here though: Give Me a Reason, Bulldozer, the Three Fish-like Say Goodbye, The Forest (the instrumental track of this making its way into Immagine en Carnice), Life of a Salesman, and Hi-Line are all awesome songs that Jeff works up well. His voice might have sounded bad on Sweet Lew, but here it’s perfectly serviceable and fits the songs he is singing. The sketches of Relapse and Only Could in the Sky show he’s capable of a lot as a songwriter and the latter one I wish was fleshed out a bit more. This wasn’t released to huge fanfare, but it is worth checking out and lends promise to what will become a stronger catalogue in releases to come.
Jeff Ament in his best Smokey the Bear impression: don’t go messin’ with matches!!
Pearl Jam - No Code
Pearl Jam - Vitalogy
Pearl Jam - Binaural
Pearl Jam - Yield
Pearl Jam - Vs.
Pearl Jam - Ten
Pearl Jam
Stone Gossard - Bayleaf
Neil Young - Mirrorball
Pearl Jam - Lost Dogs
Eddie Vedder - Into the Wild
Brad - Interiors
Temple of the Dog
Pearl Jam - Riot Act
Mad Season - Above
Wellwater Conspiracy - The Scroll and Its Combinations
Brad - Shame
Brad Vs. Satchel
Wellwater Conspiracy - Brotherhood of Electric
Wellwater Conspiracy - Declaration of Conformity
Wellwater Conspiracy
Brad - Welcome to Discovery Park
Three Fish
Green River - Rehab Doll
Jeff Ament - Tone
Green River - Dry As a Bone
Mother Love Bone - Apple
Mother Love Bone - Shine
Green River - Come On Down
Hater
Hater - The 2nd
Three Fish - The Quiet Table
Bad Radio Demos
Green River - 1984 Demos
The Rockfords
Deranged Diction - Life Support / No Art, No Cowboys, No Rules
Eddie Vedder and the Walmer High School Choir - The Molo Sessions
The Rockfords - The Waiting EP
The one thing Into the Wild has that so few of its descendants have is some really, really nice melodies -- "No Ceiling" and "Rise" especially are among the most effortlessly lovely tunes Eddie has ever penned, and they're rare cases of feeling like he's tapping into a musical space that Pearl Jam wasn't meant for, and is actually better off for it. It reminds me a bit of Paul McCartney's first solo album, actually -- kind of a one-man-band junk shop of surprisingly varied musical fragments, milking the low stakes for everything they're worth. Obviously ITW is more focused thematically, but...not dissimilar vibes aesthetically.
ITW is very special to me. The book, the film, the album.
Read the book years before the movie and it really impacted me. When I found out they were making a movie about it i was thrilled, even more when heard Sean Penn was involved (at the time still crazy but was putting out quality work), and over the moon when heard Ed would be doing the movie.
The entire story is a huge reason I live in the Mountains of Colorado.
As noted earlier, some of the habits that worked magically with Into the Wild rear their heads here but not with the same level of success. Granted, this is still a very good album, but it doesn’t nearly live up to the standards this band set over the prior two decades. The band felt inspired to cut the fat and deliver a lean and mean record. Surely, the songs that commit to this, for me, are among the most successful - a chance to take them a little less seriously is frankly an admirable goal for a band that existed with a totally different vibe live than on record where they seemed to self-conscious at points. Gonna See My Friend, Got Some, The Fixer, and yes, Supersonic accomplish this and well (sorry folks)… when it’s forced, like Johnny Guitar, it sounds a bit awkward. When they try to U2-ify themselves in Amongst the Waves and to a lesser extent the Love Boat Captain-like Unthought Known, the results are mixed - the songs are fine but they sound like Pearl Jam covering themselves. These seem like ideas they threw into the ether instead of really working them out, hence the cringey gems and rhinestones line. Just Breathe is their first and best attempt at the wedding song for our now of age Pearl Jam fans, and in addition to being directly derivative of Tulumne, it really starts to sway across the cheese line that screams the “crossover” hit it became. Which leaves me on a positive note with the best this album has to offer: Speed of Sound, which the character and tone of the song is reminiscent of Sleight of Hand - not nearly as good but they can mine that space any day, and The End, which effectively produces its intended mood (and panic when I hear it). In the end, a too short mixed bag that’s really better than I am describing, but they were and are capable of so much more than this.
Pearl Jam - No Code
Pearl Jam - Vitalogy
Pearl Jam - Binaural
Pearl Jam - Yield
Pearl Jam - Vs.
Pearl Jam - Ten
Pearl Jam
Stone Gossard - Bayleaf
Neil Young - Mirrorball
Pearl Jam - Lost Dogs
Eddie Vedder - Into the Wild
Brad - Interiors
Temple of the Dog
Pearl Jam - Riot Act
Mad Season - Above
Wellwater Conspiracy - The Scroll and Its Combinations
Brad - Shame
Pearl Jam - Backspacer
Brad Vs. Satchel
Wellwater Conspiracy - Brotherhood of Electric
Wellwater Conspiracy - Declaration of Conformity
Wellwater Conspiracy
Brad - Welcome to Discovery Park
Three Fish
Green River - Rehab Doll
Jeff Ament - Tone
Green River - Dry As a Bone
Mother Love Bone - Apple
Mother Love Bone - Shine
Green River - Come On Down
Hater
Hater - The 2nd
Three Fish - The Quiet Table
Bad Radio Demos
Green River - 1984 Demos
The Rockfords
Deranged Diction - Life Support / No Art, No Cowboys, No Rules
Eddie Vedder and the Walmer High School Choir - The Molo Sessions
The Rockfords - The Waiting EP
Another wonderful aspect of ITW is simply Ed's voice. His delivery and cadence and tailoring to each song is pitch perfect (pun intended). Hard Sun is one of the best vocal tracks he's ever committed to tape.
evenslow wrote:Another wonderful aspect of ITW is simply Ed's voice. His delivery and cadence and tailoring to each song is pitch perfect (pun intended). Hard Sun is one of the best vocal tracks he's ever committed to tape.
I once sought out and listened to the original. The cover is much better. No wonder Indio sued.
tragabigzanda wrote:I agree with KD that the melodies on ITW are strong, but I think the real strength is one of inspiration: Ed was able to tap into something special for that album, and while we might point to specific aspects — the melodies, the ramshackle drums, the right amount of breathiness from Ed — the fact is that the album is much more than the sum of its parts.
Only Society and Hard Sun really stand on their own, I think. But taken together, every song works to create a unique emotional space that exists throughout the record.
Those are the only two songs I still listen from ITW with any regularity. Long Nights is probably next in line.
Even though riot act is my favorite album, I agree with most of these rankings except s/t. I would put s/t about where riot act is. And mad season would rank above “ten” for me
