Red Mosquito

Obviously I disagree, KD, but to be clear: when I say there’s no “reason” for the songs to be kept to a uke-only production, what I’m saying is: they aren’t better for it.

There are plenty of songs in this world that would lose (or have lost) something elemental by the introduction of instrumentation beyond that in which they were birthed. These definitely aren’t it. There are also plenty of songs out there whose charms are crucially supported, highlighted, or grown by a gentle coloring. Those Mountain Goats songs are in that camp. So is much of Into the Wild (although “gentle coloring” isn’t always the operative term, there). This package is, to me, absolutely in the same space.

I 100% agree that it’s some of Ed’s most interesting writing, but even here the nature of his writing is such that there’s always a danger of fairly homogenized results. In the days when his vocal performances elevated songs and gave them personality, that wasn’t a concern. Now, to be frank, he can’t do that, and instrumentation choices are that much more crucial to turning good writing into a great recording.

He doesn’t do anything to serve his writing, and the result is an album that doesn’t do his own work justice. I don’t think it’s by accident that, even in this content desert where we gossip about Mike McCready jumping jacks and somehow can remember that Out of Sand even exists, this entire album filled with strong writing by the principle figure in the band has remained firmly in the Rockfords pile for most fans.

verb_to_trust wrote:Ed Solo to an audience that isn't Cubs executives and Ten Club members will go over great.

I doubt many people in the UK know who Eddie is, especially when you factor in it's a stadium show which will draw in a lot of casual fans. Kaiser Chiefs are way bigger than EV in the UK and I don't think they've had a hit since Ruby over a decade ago.

dusting off a bunch of decade old songs, keeping them virtually unchanged with sparse production value, and releasing them to the masses isn't a money grab?

“Ukulele album from aging Pearl Jam frontman” isn’t exactly a surefire recipe for commercial success.

it's pretty lazy and minimal effort. if he made even $100k off it, it's a coup.

most expensive part of the album was hiring the scuba diver to go down and take the photo for the album cover

spike wrote:it's pretty lazy and minimal effort. if he made even $100k off it, it's a coup.

Again, this is just the default criticism of all modern Pearl Jam-related things. I agree that the album probably incurred low overhead and, oh no, probably netted EV a profit, especially considering it was released on the band's own label. But nothing about the project was crass or gaudy; you don't have to like the album, but the idea that it exclusively existed to milk the fanbase of their money, no different from a Ten Club dog leash or shot glass or whatever, is a level of cynicism that is absurd even for RM.

And the "ten year-old songs" criticism is silly. Artists release "new" albums of songs that have been sitting around for a while all the time.

Kevin Davis wrote:

spike wrote:it's pretty lazy and minimal effort. if he made even $100k off it, it's a coup.

Again, this is just the default criticism of all modern Pearl Jam-related things. I agree that the album probably incurred low overhead and, oh no, probably netted EV a profit, especially considering it was released on the band's own label. But nothing about the project was crass or gaudy; you don't have to like the album, but the idea that it exclusively existed to milk the fanbase of their money, no different from a Ten Club dog leash or shot glass or whatever, is a level of cynicism that is absurd even for RM.

And the "ten year-old songs" criticism is silly. Artists release "new" albums of songs that have been sitting around for a while all the time.

haha, calm down and give me a plausible reason why this album exists.

spike wrote:

Kevin Davis wrote:

spike wrote:it's pretty lazy and minimal effort. if he made even $100k off it, it's a coup.

Again, this is just the default criticism of all modern Pearl Jam-related things. I agree that the album probably incurred low overhead and, oh no, probably netted EV a profit, especially considering it was released on the band's own label. But nothing about the project was crass or gaudy; you don't have to like the album, but the idea that it exclusively existed to milk the fanbase of their money, no different from a Ten Club dog leash or shot glass or whatever, is a level of cynicism that is absurd even for RM.

And the "ten year-old songs" criticism is silly. Artists release "new" albums of songs that have been sitting around for a while all the time.

haha, calm down and give me a plausible reason why this album exists.

so Ed could tour it for 8 years

spike wrote:haha, calm down and give me a plausible reason why this album exists.

Same could be said for the last two Pearl Jam outings.

I'll take Ukulele Songs over either Backspacer or Lightning Bolt. Ukulele Songs has it charms and embraces the limitations of the medium. It wasn't released with a lot of fanfare and I am sure few people outside of a PJ forum remember anything about this record or have heard a single song from it. It wasn't designed for radio play and released for purely artistic reasons imo. I think of it more as a fan club release and a damn fine one at that.

spike wrote:

Kevin Davis wrote:

spike wrote:it's pretty lazy and minimal effort. if he made even $100k off it, it's a coup.

Again, this is just the default criticism of all modern Pearl Jam-related things. I agree that the album probably incurred low overhead and, oh no, probably netted EV a profit, especially considering it was released on the band's own label. But nothing about the project was crass or gaudy; you don't have to like the album, but the idea that it exclusively existed to milk the fanbase of their money, no different from a Ten Club dog leash or shot glass or whatever, is a level of cynicism that is absurd even for RM.

And the "ten year-old songs" criticism is silly. Artists release "new" albums of songs that have been sitting around for a while all the time.

haha, calm down and give me a plausible reason why this album exists.

From the previous page:

I think the songs are almost uniformly strong -- harmonically, melodically, and stylistically unique items in EV/PJ canon, some of them among the more compositionally compelling things Eddie has written from a strictly nuts-and-bolts, chords-and-melodies perspective.

Granted, that's just (one of the reasons) why I like the album, but others have expressed their fondness for it as well; even McP, who dislikes the album, at least agreed with that part of my assessment. Whether you accept that as a "plausible reason why it exists" is up to you, though I'm not sure what kind of answer I'd give to a question like this regarding any album. I don't think the album has any kind of meaningful significance, or is any kind of major touchstone for the artist (though, as I said, I do think it explores some musical ideas that exist nowhere else in this artist's body of work), but I also don't think that an artist turning a fair profit on a low-overhead album is synonymous with that album being a "moneygrab."

yeah, the notion that Uke Songs was release to make money is absurd. It was released when he felt it was ok to release it, and it had more to do with his personal life than anything else.

I have it on vinyl, and i think i listened to it maybe two times? I dont really care about it, but its a good album.

bodysnatcher wrote:

spike wrote:

Kevin Davis wrote:

spike wrote:it's pretty lazy and minimal effort. if he made even $100k off it, it's a coup.

Again, this is just the default criticism of all modern Pearl Jam-related things. I agree that the album probably incurred low overhead and, oh no, probably netted EV a profit, especially considering it was released on the band's own label. But nothing about the project was crass or gaudy; you don't have to like the album, but the idea that it exclusively existed to milk the fanbase of their money, no different from a Ten Club dog leash or shot glass or whatever, is a level of cynicism that is absurd even for RM.

And the "ten year-old songs" criticism is silly. Artists release "new" albums of songs that have been sitting around for a while all the time.

haha, calm down and give me a plausible reason why this album exists.

so Ed could tour it for 8 years

we have a winner