Red Mosquito

96583UP wrote:

harmless wrote: As for the music: I happen to think that it's generally been following a downward trajectory almost simultaneously with these increasingly crass corporate decisions.

agreement

Leatherhead wrote:

96583UP wrote:

harmless wrote: As for the music: I happen to think that it's generally been following a downward trajectory almost simultaneously with these increasingly crass corporate decisions.

agreement

So has the trajectory of both the quality of the music and said "crass corporate decisions" gone up from Backspacer to Lightning Bolt? I tend to stay away from the business side of music, so I don't know about that, but I do know LB is quite a bit better than BS, and I haven't heard about many "crass corporate decisions" lately.

McParadigm wrote:I think they just think of Pearl Jam as a celebration of old accomplishments, now, and that colors the way they make decisions...on every single level.

harmless wrote:

stip wrote:

harmless wrote:

stip wrote:

harmless wrote:

stip wrote:

harmless wrote:Stip, you and I both admit to being somewhere on the Socialist spectrum politically. One of the big things, I guess, is that while we agree that some of Pearl Jam's music is still very enjoyable, we probably ultimately disagree on how much they've abandoned their prior anti-capitalist values. These were values that they were not overt about in the first few years of their career, granted. But when we (or I, anyway) once so proudly sang "It's evolution, baby!" it was at least in part due to the progression they'd taken in their stances. In their middle period, their desire to hold to their ethics and values in more than rhetoric was reflected in their artistic aesthetic, which you say is boring. I say it was intelligent and unassuming. I say that all the bombast and crowd-pleasing they did in their early career was thought of as early-career posturing for a reason. It was pretty dumb. I guess I'm lucky to think that the music from Vitalogy to Riot Act was the best they ever did, and maybe I would find it easier to adjust to the rest if that wasn't my feeling. If I genuinely thought that Pearl Jam's current music is artistically stronger than then. But I don't.

pearl jam's evolution on this (if we can claim to know what they're thinking) has largely paralleled my own, but that's just coincidental. The old pearl jam anti-corporate/capitalist objection was often aesthetic. Not always (the ticketmaster stuff was great), but usually. They were on a major label, and sold their albums through corporate record stores, relied on major corporations to promote them. The anti corporate/capitalist ethos (which was always more targeted against greed than capitalism per se) was largely just talk. It was image. Even in the fabled middle period. And I was really into the image stuff.

You're mostly appealing to Pearl Jam's early years here, because you know I can't disagree. But there was no genuine anti-Capitalism early on (and sorry, but to me Capitalism is greed, that's where we disagree). But there was in the middle years, and as I've said, the art followed that aesthetic, by becoming more unassuming and ambiguous (you say 'joyless and obtuse') and less likely to be bought by corporations wishing to make money off it or allow Pearl Jam to form alliances with such corporations.

excepting Yield, right? And although it was not conceptualized in those terms, Vitalogy is probably the record that most directly addressed the intersection of capitalism and art. Beyond that there is not really any anit-capitalist sentiment on any of those albums, with the exception of Green Disease and Soon Forget, and these are hardly the songs we associate with pearl jam. The withdrawl in the music and the enterprise was a personal statement, not a political one (as Southp said, I think)

And of course the major label band pearl jam, playing its music all over corporate radio, appearing on corporate television, using ticketmaster for all their tours but one, selling their albums at corporate stores, had no product that corporations were making money off of during this period.


. As I've said before, I really couldn't give a shit if the music hadn't followed a general trajectory of becoming more palatable for a general audience *precisely because* such changes allow the music to be used in this way. And yes, I really do think that is (one of) the reason(s) for all the changes. You might say "Well that's just the way they have to sell music", and I'd say OK, but it is still why I'm not as interested as I once was.

stip wrote:But today I care a lot less about it. I like it, and I would prefer if pearl jam was, say, Ani Difranco. But today ideas interest me insofar as they are attached to vehicles that can actually challenge the status quo or make life tangibly better for people. Nothing about their changing practices undermines that commitment (they're still very active in the causes they support, etc). The rest is just window dressing, and if the spending less money on the window dressing positions you to do more good for people (which is a serious argument you can make) than I'd prefer that.

This is why Bono's posturing doesn't bother me. He can act like a diva if he's actually doing good for people. That's much more impressive to me than someone who acts humble and does less.

harmless wrote: See, I care a lot more about it today than I used to. Rich people's posturing pisses me off now more than ever. So again, that might be another difference between us. You've grown with Pearl Jam into their "Well, we're grown ups now, we can do what we like" phase, and I've grown into a more anti-corporate socialist adult than I ever was when I listened to early Pearl Jam. During the middle period, I was under the impression that my favourite band of all time was growing with me. They were... but then they stopped. But such is life.

I am far more militantly anti-corporate today than I have ever been, and my thinking of that has radicalized precisely during the period that pearl jam became independent, made the target deal, etc. etc. So in theory I should be appalled by this. However, what people see as the corporate sell out moment

Spoiler: show

list incoming

A: anything new,

B: uninteresting because the fundamental difference is aesthetic. You can't posture as easily once you have to take responsibility for your business. It is easy to make uncompromising statements when you have a system in place to do the compromising for you.

C: Does not interfere in participating in the social and political causes that actually DO have a chance of pushing back against the things they hate.

So basically what changed, when we're honest, is that there is less posturing than there was before. I liked the posturing, so that's too bad. But lets call it what it is.

No, sorry. You can't reduce PJ's old standpoints and values down to two songs and you can't reduce every value PJ said they had down to 'posturing'.

Pearl Jam's philosophy/worldview/standpoint as I understood it was about (wait for it) agency, authenticity, and solidarity. Being able to build meaningful relationships, shared experiences, and lives in a world that made this really difficult. There are personal components to this, political components to this, social components to this. What it was NOT was an anti-capitalist ideology. There were elements of that for sure. They are good lefties. But while their project was emancipatory, it was only political in the broadest terms. Issues about women's rights, the environment, war, the economy were just some of the theaters in which this message might play. But they were not the only ones, and were rarely the principle ones. They were publicly oriented applications of a personal philosophy. Pearl Jam was not Rage Against the Machine. The actions that really counted, in terms of their politics, was not in the music (although they were certainly supported by it). It was in the political causes supported, and the actions TAKEN.

That's why I was reducing the anti-corporate stuff to posturing. It was just rhetoric independent of action (and often technically contradicted by the actions). Ticketmaster was real, but it was 18 months out of a 10 year window. Vote for Change was real. Nader in 2000 was real. The causes endorsed, the benefits played, the money given, that is the stuff that matters. Hell, the speeches matter too, insofar as it is conscious raising. But pearl jam still does all of those kinds of things. Target deals and licensing a song to a TV show doesn't change that. Wanting to write a song that people outside of your insular fan base might give a shit about doesn't change that. That's why I don't see hypocrisy here.


Beyond that, you can be perfectly capable of adopting and believing that corporations as an institution are harmful and dangerous, and that steps need to be taken to limit their power, while still making use of them because they govern the world we live in. You don't need to be an ascetic living in a cave to think that greed is bad. Warren Buffet can be one of the richest people in the world and think too much inequality is a bad thing, and not donating all his money to charity does not make him a hypocrite. If he opposed laws that created a progressive tax code he would be.

harmless wrote:
You can't decide that 'when we're honest', an independent band has to whore themselves out left right and centre just to survive. Plenty don't.

you're right. Plenty of people have done this better than Pearl Jam. And that's too bad. But it's not a betrayal of principles because they basically never did this and honestly only seemed that interested in it twice, and both times they feel like they got burned. In 1996 they boycotted Ticketmaster, and in 2000 they supported Ralph Nader. And in both cases I think they learned that you can be proud of the stand you've taken, but there are real costs, and the benefits (outside of feeling good about yourself, which to be fair is no small thing) may not really outweigh them. After that Pearl Jam has fought their fights and supported their causes, but they lost interest in trying to invent institutions that can supplant the ones they don't like. But that was also never really their fight. It was not, at their core, who they were. Pearl Jam is about solidarity, not vision.

harmless wrote: You make a good point that you can't posture and spout crap about being anti-capitalist when you're no longer able to rely on a label doing the capitalist stuff behind the scenes, but people are / I am allowed to be upset that essentially, Pearl Jam were totally dishonest about their opinions and positions for like 15 years.

Not dishonest. Again, they were not Rage Against the Machine. This was not a band of Marxists writing songs like Ashes in the Fall. In fact, the best we can point to in terms of the music is green disease and soon forget. One song that says greedy people suck and another that says greedy people will die lonely. Oh, and undone says corporations are bad. Nothing about what they've done since then contradicts those trenchant insights. Let me know what else i'm missing. Beyond that we have what? Some drunken concert rants? Infallible was dedicated to Wall Street at Brooklyn II. That's still there.

Lyrically pearl jam still writes about the same themes
Politically pearl jam still supports the same causes
Their music was and is still largely marketed and distributed through corporations. Now they do it themselves. So interestingly enough fewer corporations are involved, but their involvement is more obvious (not more prevalent) than it was before.

harmless wrote: Lastly, the personal is political; I don't (or I didn't) believe that PJ's refusal to play for massive crowds was *just* them being scared to be famous. To put it down to *just* that now is blatant revisionism, in my opinion. Back then, it was all part of a package that said "I never slept in Satan's Bed." I will not comply with the media's expectations of me.

The personal is political insofar as people's private lives and choices might be subject to public concern. So when we're talking about race, gender, class, domestic abuse, reproductive rights, disability rights sure, the personal is political. And authenticity can stand in opposition to commodification and so there are larger political issues there. But telling me that pearl jam's choices about how to write and market their music was explicitly anti-capitalist is a tough sell.

I know what 'the personal is political' means. The sense in which I'm using it is that your moral and ethical decisions are guided by your politics.

I saw the recent interview with Jeff, where he talked about why they'd given so many of their songs to Major League Baseball (and therefore Fox News) and he said well, although I'd barely call it news, baseball is just so cool, and we all agreed that it would be really cool. So that was interesting. By itself, it means nothing, or very little. But I just don't relate to the vast majority of the decisions they've made since S/T, and they've just got increasingly more peripheral to the music itself. Honestly, when they left Sony, I was kind of under the impression it was because, to continue on a trajectory, they were done with trying to play the major label corporate game. To want to loose yourself from a major label is a political act; or rather, it could be, and often is. So when I said 'the personal is political', what I meant was that every decision they made looked to be in line with their ethics, for a good many years. The occasional video does not undo this theory. Bands make music videos on a shoestring budget. It's part of the artform and, yes, marketing your music. At this point, I'd rather PJ *were* on a major label, because record labels are built for marketing music. Yes, we can argue their ethics, but so what? Without a major label, a band that wants to be a major label band (and earn major label money!) has to do some bizarrely peripheral things to maintain their position. And that's what PJ have done. And that's fine. But let's be honest and say that not every band in PJ's position have made the peripheral decisions they have. Heck, some bands even "downsize" at this point, because they find that they can't maintain the lifestyle and crowd size they once did *without* sacrificing their integrity and values, and without being attached to a major label. So they quit, or downsize. Your use of the phrase 'overtly anti-capitalist' is interesting, but it's a red herring. Because nobody is arguing this band is, or was ever, Black Flag (or any given political band you could name). But they were unusual in terms of major label bands. Now they seem like they have to jump on every corporate deal on offer just so that they can stay afloat... which may well be true, but I do not have to think it's anything but crass. It's certainly not the only option they could be taking. Maybe I just don't like every corporate move PJ makes to be waved in my face. That might be superficial, but as a fan, I think it's a valid concern. At least by being signed to a major label, they would be able to tell me about the music, and only the music. As for the music: I happen to think that it's generally been following a downward trajectory almost simultaneously with these increasingly crass corporate decisions. You don't, which is also fine. But you'll hopefully understand that if you do, you will feel that the personal (Pearl Jam's artistic decisions) are inherently tied to the political (their values and their desires as a business). I do not see many wide-appeal contemporary pop(ular) bands being anti-corporate, and that is because they would not reach the many demographics they hope to reach if they were. So they sacrifice their values for the 'greater good' of becoming, or being, or staying, popular. People like Madonna don't preach (no pun intended) anti-capitalist politics because it would look embarrassing. People like Nicki Minaj don't either, but they do preach feminism, because those values are easy to preach from a pedestal. Thing is, there is a point where capitalism simply clashes with the politics of identity, and is not compatible. But that's by the by.

stip wrote:Pearl Jam always played for massive crowds. No Code and Vitalogy both were records that seemed designed, at least on the surface, to be more difficult for casual fans. By the time Yield comes around we have television commercials promoting the album and a lead single featuring one of the most anthematic songs they ever wrote (followed by a schmaltzy ballad and then a song with a video). Then we have two other difficult records that sell poorly, that the band seemed to be (and perhaps still are) at least somewhat unhappy with, and a diminished audience (and with it diminished cultural cache and a smaller soapbox) that they weren't happy with--especially since they were both at a point in their lives when being a famous musician no longer seemed like a horrible thing. Wanting to have people hear your music, and wanting to be able to draw more attention to the issues you care about hardly seem like something worth stoning a band over.

When I say 'crowds' I mean 'demographics'. I don't care how many people are sitting in the theatre or auditorium watching a band. That's a simple consequence of having that many fans you've reached out to over the years. But I'm not a huge fan of this need to pull everyone else into the fold who, so far, have not been interested in, or invested in, Pearl Jam's style of music. It's not just 'wanting to have people hear your music' because, news flash, people already were! Us: the fans. So again, you're not tying the personal with the political here, which makes perfect sense, because neither are Pearl Jam.

So again, you cannot just reduce this down to saying that Pearl Jam only ever preached an 'explicitly' anti-corporate shtick in two songs. What about all the stuff that inadvertently suggested an anti-corporate standpoint, and what about the songs that preached any other kinds of politics that the fans (probably naively) took as another shade of an anti-corporate stance? You have to seriously revise history to say that those expectations were not raised and entertained by Pearl Jam themselves in myriad ways.

McParadigm wrote:Honestly, if I had to put money (ha ha) down, my bet would be that it's just not that exciting to be Pearl Jam any longer.

I don't mean to say that I think it's unpleasant, or boring, or whatever. I just mean that it's now a firmly established and archetypal entity, with very clear audience expectations based on those existing designs. That's simply not sound ground for inspired creative expression, especially when you've got such empathetic sentiments regarding people who are emotionally bonded to the music you've already made.

I'd say it's no accident that the band leans so heavily on side-projects and solo albums, these days. It's also no accident that the one person who must know his solo work is going to be most impactful on the band's overall image has relied on non-threatening options like movie soundtrack work and gimmicked recordings for his output. They no longer perceive Pearl Jam to be a genuine creative outlet (for those conversations where similarities between Yield and the last two records have popped up, here's your key difference...Yield very much has a feeling of "this is my car, and I can drive it wherever the fuck I have the urge to go," where Backspacer has a feeling of "How can I make my car look a little bit different today?"). By definition, not perceiving it as a creative outlet has to mean that they must perceive it as something else.

When a band stops being a source of artistic pressure, it just becomes a legacy. It becomes security and comfort and nostalgia, even for the people who are up there standing on stage and making all that noise. It becomes about celebrating what you've already achieved....and, yeah, that makes for a really touching band/fan relationship. But it rarely makes for great records.

It's probably kind of a hard place to be in, and I suppose that that should be credited as the source of at least some of the behavioral changes of late. Pushing 50 is an ugly place to be when you're in a rock and roll band and you're feeling itchy. Neil Young circumvented his "aging entity" trap by behaving like an absolute dick. Bruce Springsteen ditched his band, and then rediscovered them later on. He seemed to get a little extra traction out of that for a while, but he's still in a bit of that same sport Pearl Jam is. Bob Dylan just does whatever Bob Dylan wants to do right now, and I don't know how much he cares if it works for other people. Ironically, that willful disinterest in the outside world's opinion has actually become a part of his nostalgic safety blanket. As for others...Tom Waits disappears, waiting until the planets align and the hair on his arms won't stop standing on end. David Bowie....well, I mean, for Bowie, artistic oddity is as much a part of his security blanket as dickbag interviews are for Oasis. Good for him, I guess. But the point is, none of these things are options for Pearl Jam now because Pearl Jam is a construct, and not a singular artistic drive. They can't be the guy who doesn't give a shit what you think, or who dumps his band, or whatever. They can't be anything else as long as they're Pearl Jam.

They're a bit like the Rolling Stones, but without Mick Jagger's obsessive want to be on top of every new musical trend that comes to the fore. Subtract his genre-whoring influence from the last 30 years of Stones records, and you'd have an almost AC/DC like consistency of style. Why?

Because it has to sound like that, now.

Because it's a Rolling Stones record.

So I don't think that the weird merchandizing, or the repackaging or sonic behavioral changes or occasional sign of frustration, are about a love of watching their bank accounts grow or some strange new self-satisfied core. I think they just think of Pearl Jam as a celebration of old accomplishments, now, and that colors the way they make decisions...on every single level.

Unrelated photo

96583UP wrote:

harmless wrote: As for the music: I happen to think that it's generally been following a downward trajectory almost simultaneously with these increasingly crass corporate decisions.

agreement

McParadigm wrote:Honestly, if I had to put money (ha ha) down, my bet would be that it's just not that exciting to be Pearl Jam any longer.

I don't mean to say that I think it's unpleasant, or boring, or whatever. I just mean that it's now a firmly established and archetypal entity, with very clear audience expectations based on those existing designs. That's simply not sound ground for inspired creative expression, especially when you've got such empathetic sentiments regarding people who are emotionally bonded to the music you've already made.

I'd say it's no accident that the band leans so heavily on side-projects and solo albums, these days. It's also no accident that the one person who must know his solo work is going to be most impactful on the band's overall image has relied on non-threatening options like movie soundtrack work and gimmicked recordings for his output. They no longer perceive Pearl Jam to be a genuine creative outlet (for those conversations where similarities between Yield and the last two records have popped up, here's your key difference...Yield very much has a feeling of "this is my car, and I can drive it wherever the fuck I have the urge to go," where Backspacer has a feeling of "How can I make my car look a little bit different today?"). By definition, not perceiving it as a creative outlet has to mean that they must perceive it as something else.

When a band stops being a source of artistic pressure, it just becomes a legacy. It becomes security and comfort and nostalgia, even for the people who are up there standing on stage and making all that noise. It becomes about celebrating what you've already achieved....and, yeah, that makes for a really touching band/fan relationship. But it rarely makes for great records.

It's probably kind of a hard place to be in, and I suppose that that should be credited as the source of at least some of the behavioral changes of late. Pushing 50 is an ugly place to be when you're in a rock and roll band and you're feeling itchy. Neil Young circumvented his "aging entity" trap by behaving like an absolute dick. Bruce Springsteen ditched his band, and then rediscovered them later on. He seemed to get a little extra traction out of that for a while, but he's still in a bit of that same sport Pearl Jam is. Bob Dylan just does whatever Bob Dylan wants to do right now, and I don't know how much he cares if it works for other people. Ironically, that willful disinterest in the outside world's opinion has actually become a part of his nostalgic safety blanket. As for others...Tom Waits disappears, waiting until the planets align and the hair on his arms won't stop standing on end. David Bowie....well, I mean, for Bowie, artistic oddity is as much a part of his security blanket as dickbag interviews are for Oasis. Good for him, I guess. But the point is, none of these things are options for Pearl Jam now because Pearl Jam is a construct, and not a singular artistic drive. They can't be the guy who doesn't give a shit what you think, or who dumps his band, or whatever. They can't be anything else as long as they're Pearl Jam.

They're a bit like the Rolling Stones, but without Mick Jagger's obsessive want to be on top of every new musical trend that comes to the fore. Subtract his genre-whoring influence from the last 30 years of Stones records, and you'd have an almost AC/DC like consistency of style. Why?

Because it has to sound like that, now.

Because it's a Rolling Stones record.

So I don't think that the weird merchandizing, or the repackaging or sonic behavioral changes or occasional sign of frustration, are about a love of watching their bank accounts grow or some strange new self-satisfied core. I think they just think of Pearl Jam as a celebration of old accomplishments, now, and that colors the way they make decisions...on every single level.

Unrelated photo

stip wrote:I also don't know that I'd buy the Stone's comparison either, even though we make it alot. Besides the fact that the stones can claim to be one of the real founders of modern rock music, which probably does put them in a class all by themselves, my understanding is that when they tour they pretty much tour exclusively as a nostaliga act. When pearl jam has new music they play it extensively, and the people in the audience are there to hear the new music as much as the old stuff. They sing along. They can't wait to hear it. They are excited for it.


The two bands it makes the most sense to compare pearl jam to is probably REM and U2. They are from the same era (REM and U2 are older, obviously), had similar fan bases, and followed really similar career trajectories. all those bands stopped doing anything truly new by the early 2000s. The last original move in U2's arsenal was Pop. REM's was Reveal. Pearl Jam's was probably Binaural. After that each of these bands were done exploring new facets of their music. A song or two here and there, but everything that followed was a variation on an existing theme. There were no surprises anymore. When it was done well (accelerate, all you can't leave behind) no one minded. When it was done less successfully (no line on the horizon, around the sun) people didn't like the albums very much. You might get good Pearl Jam, REM, or U2. You might get bad Pearl Jam, REM, or U2. But you weren't going to get new Pearl Jam, REM, or U2.

Pearl Jam is fine with this. U2 seems to be fine with this. REM wasn't and called it quits, and while I suppose many of us can respect the decision I don't know many REM fans who wouldn't love another album, even if it sounded familiar, as collapse into now did. The important thing, at that stage in their career, was that it was good .

Leatherhead wrote:

96583UP wrote:

harmless wrote: As for the music: I happen to think that it's generally been following a downward trajectory almost simultaneously with these increasingly crass corporate decisions.

agreement

So has the trajectory of both the quality of the music and said "crass corporate decisions" gone up from Backspacer to Lightning Bolt? I tend to stay away from the business side of music, so I don't know about that, but I do know LB is quite a bit better than BS, and I haven't heard about many "crass corporate decisions" lately.

96583UP wrote:

Leatherhead wrote:

96583UP wrote:

harmless wrote: As for the music: I happen to think that it's generally been following a downward trajectory almost simultaneously with these increasingly crass corporate decisions.

agreement

So has the trajectory of both the quality of the music and said "crass corporate decisions" gone up from Backspacer to Lightning Bolt? I tend to stay away from the business side of music, so I don't know about that, but I do know LB is quite a bit better than BS, and I haven't heard about many "crass corporate decisions" lately.

generally was placed in bold for a reason

Leatherhead wrote:

96583UP wrote:

Leatherhead wrote:

96583UP wrote:

harmless wrote: As for the music: I happen to think that it's generally been following a downward trajectory almost simultaneously with these increasingly crass corporate decisions.

agreement

So has the trajectory of both the quality of the music and said "crass corporate decisions" gone up from Backspacer to Lightning Bolt? I tend to stay away from the business side of music, so I don't know about that, but I do know LB is quite a bit better than BS, and I haven't heard about many "crass corporate decisions" lately.

generally was placed in bold for a reason

Well it's hard to generalize when you ignore 1/3 of the contents of the generalization.

stip wrote:

96583UP wrote:

harmless wrote: As for the music: I happen to think that it's generally been following a downward trajectory almost simultaneously with these increasingly crass corporate decisions.

agreement

But the increasingly crass corporate decisions also pretty closely follow changes in the music industry. That's one of the reasons I don't see a connection here. Pearl Jam could have written No Code or Binaural and they would have promoted it the same way because they feel like they HAVE to promote it that way.

Leatherhead wrote:Can somebody shed some light on these "crass corporate decisions" we're all talking about? It all seems quite overblown to me. What, PJ played some sorta-private show for a bunch of rich dudes, and got a bunch of money for it? PJ partnered with Target to release an album to big box stores while maintaining some sort of check on their carbon footprint or some shit like that? These don't seem like big deals to me, these seem like very small deals. All that matters is the music, and while it's not as good as it used to be, sure, that's pretty much expected, seems to happen to most big bands after a while.