Red Mosquito

Ten (1991) - I probably haven’t listened to this album in full in at least a decade. But when it came out, and for the decade-plus that followed, this album meant as much or more to me than any other. So many classic songs, even if I don’t crave hearing them anymore. “Release” is possibly my favorite song of all time, and about 4-5 others on this album are rock icons. And deservedly so.

Vs. (1993) - I have the same relationship with Vs. as I do with Ten. This is one of my most loved albums of all time. I go back to this more often than Ten, and it has aged better probably. This probably is my favorite era for Ed’s vocals, and Dave A.’s drumming on Vs. is my favorite of any PJ album.

Vitalogy (1994) - This was one of the first albums I truly recognized as a comprehensive piece of art. I was 14 years old, and everything about Vitalogy amazed me. The album sounded incredible on my discman. The album artwork was beautiful, and dark, and weird, and cool as fucking hell. I’ve never had a more thorough experience than when I was obsessing with Vitalogy in the year or so that followed its release. It’s still a great experience now.

Merkinball (1995) - Two amazing songs. “I Got Id” and “Long Road” are both PJ classics, and the sound of this release is perfect. I still love these songs.

No Code (1996) - Wonderfully different than what came before. The change to Jack Irons made No Code sound like a radically different Pearl Jam, but they still sounded awesome. An interesting variety of songwriting was complimented by a wildly creative and interesting album art presentation. No Code changed the trajectory of the band, any direction forward seemed possible. This album still sounds great, and I’ve listened to it more frequently than the earlier records over the last few years.

Yield (1998)- This was the first album I was old enough to skip school and drive. I was a junior in high school, skipped my second through fourth period classes to drive to Best Buy, buy the album (which came with a vinyl version of the “Given to Fly” single), and then drove around listening to the entire thing at max volume. It was a glorious experience. Yield sounds fucking great, it‘s full of fantastic songs, and the band with Jack drumming is at pique performance. Having this album accompanied by a VHS copy of Single Video Theory was possibly the absolute height of my Pearl Jam devotion and love. It doesn’t get much better than that.

Binaural (2000) - “Sleight of Hand”. Best song PJ has ever recorded. This album came out when I was in college and smoking tons of weed, partying all the time, and spending lots of time with girls. Even though I was having a blast being 20, I still loved darker, moody music. Radiohead’s “Kid A” was dominating my mind, and Binaural was and is a challenging album. The addition of Matt Cameron changed PJ’s sound again. The recording process produced some really interesting sounding songs with great depth. I’ve always loved many of the songs, but I also struggled with other tracks for years. I desired the original track list for a really long time. Like more than a decade. At times I still feel that could’ve been the clear best album PJ ever made. That said, I’ve grown to love Binaural for what it is, and over the last few years, this has been my favorite PJ album.

Riot Act (2002) - It was a new time in my life. I was 22, working and traveling full time, and a year away from marriage. I remember driving what hundreds of miles on dark and rainy nights, listening to Riot Act and wondering about a completely unknown future. Riot Act was long and varied, and uncertain. I related to that. But I also remember it being the most uneven PJ album. I really disliked some of the songs for the first time (some of which I’ve grown to appreciate) but there were also seven or eight songs that I thought were great. This is still basically how I feel about it. I place it in the “Love” category because this was the last album I have had a truly intimate relationship with over the years. These first seven Pearl Jam albums defined my youth and early adulthood. No group of albums by any band has meant more to me in my life.

Avocado (2006) - When this album came out, I was married, had two young daughters, and was a puffy-chested 26 year old, thinking I had everything figured out. I was crazy excited for the first new album in four years - which seemed like a forever wait back then. I was so disappointed when I heard “World Wide Suicide”. It was the first single that I hated out of the blocks. I thought it sounded like the generic shitty rock that was mostly on the radio at that time, and I still do. The B-side was “Unemployable“, which reminded me of ”Cropduster” (from Riot Act) and made me optimistic about the new album because I really liked that song. On release, I had a mostly positive reaction, but I could tell that this was a decided step down from previous albums. I thought the tour that followed was great. Ed sounded really strong. These new songs sounded a lot better live than they did on the album. The band seemed energized and ready to make great music. There were rumors that they had a significant amount of material already recorded or in the works, and another album didn’t seem like a distant idea. It seemed like a pretty good time to be a PJ fan. I got a tattoo.

Backspacer (2009) - Avocado had been good. Not great, but good. I was ready to rock. Then we got Backspacer. There are maybe two songs that I like on this album. It’s boring, bland, uninteresting music, accompanied by dumb lyics, and crappy melodies. I just don’t like it. This was the first time I genuinely thought PJ made something crappy. I was hoping they’d make a new album quickly and put this thing to bed, but that was a silly idea.

Lightning Bolt (2013) - Four more years passed, I was going through a divorce and hoping for something deeply meaningful that I could hold onto and give me something good in a difficult time. This album didn’t provide that. My favorite song, the title track, was just as disappointing as I thought it was cool at the time. The fade-out finish erased the killer guitar solo and ruined what should’ve been the absolute best part of the song. There were only 3-4 songs I was able to get into, and the rest of Lightning Bolt was either really annoying, super boring, or just plain dumb. It seemed like PJ had crossed into a territory it would be really hard to recover from. My obsession had grown into a malaise, as I still deeply loved the older material, but thought that band, the creative Pearl Jam, had all but disappeared.

Gigaton (2020) - After the last decade and a half of disappointments and boredom, I didn’t have high hopes for this record. Then we heard “Dance of the Clairvoyants” and my mind was blown. This was absolutely unexpected and incredibly interesting in all the right ways. It was shocking and awesome to get such a pleasant surprise. And this song is the first one in at least a decade that should stand the test of time as a great PJ track. “Superblood Wolfmoon” has continued to raise my excitement and my expectations. The production on this record sounds great so far, and no band needed that more than Pearl Jam. I now can’t wait to get the full Gigaton release and digest what promises to be the first really strong PJ album in a really long time.

Thank you for sharing that PHATJ. I’ve had a similar journey with Pearl Jam.

nice post phatj

PHATJ wrote:Ten - I probably haven’t listened to this album in full in at least a decade. But when it came out, and for the decade-plus that followed, this album meant as much or more to me than any other. So many classic songs, even if I don’t crave hearing them anymore. Release is possibly my favorite song of all time, and about 4-5 others on this album are rock icons. And deservedly so.

Vs. - I have the same relationship with Vs. as I do with Ten. This is one of my most loved albums of all time. I go back to this more often than Ten, and it has aged better probably. This probably is my favorite era for Ed’s vocals, and Dave A.’s drumming on Vs. is my favorite of any PJ album.

Vitalogy - This was one of the first albums I truly recognized as a comprehensive piece of art. I was 14 years old, and everything about Vitalogy amazed me. The album sounded incredible on my discman. The album artwork was beautiful, and dark, and weird, and cool as fucking hell. I’ve never had a more thorough experience than when I was obsessing with Vitalogy in the year or so that followed its release. It’s still a great experience now.

Merkinball - Two amazing songs. I Got Id and Long Road are both PJ classics, and the sound of this release is perfect. I still love these songs.

No Code - Wonderfully different than what came before. The change to Jack Irons made No Code sound like a radically different Pearl Jam, but they still sounded awesome. An interesting variety of songwriting was complimented by a wildly creative and interesting album art presentation. No Code changed the trajectory of the band, any direction forward seemed possible. This album still sounds great, and I’ve listened to it more frequently than the earlier records over the last few years.

Yield - This was the first album I was old enough to drive for. I was in high school, skipped my second through fourth period classes to drive to Best Buy, buy the album (which came with a vinyl version of the GTF single), and drive around listening to the entire thing on max volume. It was a glorious experience. Yield sounds fucking great, is full of fantastic songs, and the band along with Jack is at pique performance. Having this album accompanied by a VHS copy of Single Video Theory was possibly the absolute height of my Pearl Jam devotion and love. It doesn’t much better than that.

Binaural - Sleight of Hand. Best song PJ has ever recorded. This album came out when I was in college and smoking tons of weed, partying all the time, and spending lots of time with girls. Even though I was having a blast being 20, I still loved darker, moody music. Binaural was and is a challenging album. The addition of Matt Cameron changed PJ’s sound again. The recording process produced some really interesting sounding sounds with great depth. I’ve always loved many of the songs, but I disliked other tracks for years too. I also wanted the original track list for a really long time. Like more than a decade. At times I still feel that could’ve been the clear best album PJ ever made. That said, I’ve grown to love Binaural for what it is, and over the last few years, this has been my favorite PJ album.

Riot Act - It was a new time in my life. I was 22, working and traveling full time, and a year away from marriage. I remember driving what seemed like hundreds of dark and rainy nights, listening to Riot Act and wondering about a completely unknown future. Riot Act was long and varied, and uncertain. That related to me. But I also remember it being the most uneven PJ album. I really disliked some of the songs for the first time, but there were also seven or eight songs that I thought were great. This is still basically how I feel about it. I place it in the “Love” category because this was the last album I have had a truly intimate relationship with over the years. These first seven albums defined my youth and early adulthood. No group of albums by any band has meant more to me in my life.

Avocado - when this album came out, I was married, had two young daughters, and was a puffy-chested 26 year old, thinking I had everything figured out. I was crazy excited for the first new album in four years - which seemed like a forever wait back then. I was so disappointed when I heard WWS. It was the first single that I hated out of the blocks. I thought it sounded like the generic shitty rock that was mostly on the radio at that time, and I still do. The B-side was Unemployable, which reminded me of Cropduster and made me optimistic about the new album because I really liked that song. On release, I had a mostly positive reaction, but I could tell that this was a decided step down from previous albums. I thought the tour that followed was great. Ed sounded good. These new songs sounded a lot better live than they did on the album. The band seemed energized and ready to make great music. There were rumors that they had a significant amount of material already recorded or in the works, and another record didn’t seem like a distant idea. It seemed like a pretty good time to be a PJ fan. I got a tattoo.

Backspacer - Avocado had been good. I was ready to rock. Then we got Backspacer. There are maybe two songs I like on this album. It’s boring, bland, uninteresting music accompanied by dumb lyics and crappy melodies. I just don’t like it. This was the first time I genuinely thought PJ made something crappy. I was hoping they’d make a new album quickly and put this thing to bed, but that was a silly thought.

Lightning Bolt - Four more years passed, I was going through a divorce and hoping for something deeply meaningful that I could hold onto and give me something good in a difficult time. This album didn’t do that. My favorite song, the title track, was just as disappointing as I thought it was great at the time. The fade out ruined what should’ve been the absolute best part of the song. There were only 3-4 songs I was able to get into, and the rest was either really annoying, super boring, or just plain dumb. It seemed like PJ had crossed into a territory it would be really hard to recover from. My obsession had grown into a malaise as I still deeply loved the older material, but thought that band, the creative one, had all but disappeared.

Gigaton - After the last decade and a half of disappointments and boredom, I didn’t have high hopes for this record. Then we heard “Dance” and my mind was blown. This was absolutely unexpected and incredibly interesting in all the right ways. It was shocking and awesome to get such a pleasant surprise. And this song is the first one in at least a decade that should stand the test of time as a great PJ track. SBWM has continued to raise my excitement and my expectations. The production on this record sounds great so far, and no band needed that more than Pearl Jam. I now can’t wait to get the full Gigaton release and digest what promises to be the first really strong PJ album in a really long time.

OK but rank them tho

Anders wrote:Thank you for sharing that PHATJ. I’ve had a similar journey with Pearl Jam.

stip wrote:nice post phatj

Thanks stip

You guys are old.

theplatypus wrote:

PHATJ wrote:Ten - I probably haven’t listened to this album in full in at least a decade. But when it came out, and for the decade-plus that followed, this album meant as much or more to me than any other. So many classic songs, even if I don’t crave hearing them anymore. Release is possibly my favorite song of all time, and about 4-5 others on this album are rock icons. And deservedly so.

Vs. - I have the same relationship with Vs. as I do with Ten. This is one of my most loved albums of all time. I go back to this more often than Ten, and it has aged better probably. This probably is my favorite era for Ed’s vocals, and Dave A.’s drumming on Vs. is my favorite of any PJ album.

Vitalogy - This was one of the first albums I truly recognized as a comprehensive piece of art. I was 14 years old, and everything about Vitalogy amazed me. The album sounded incredible on my discman. The album artwork was beautiful, and dark, and weird, and cool as fucking hell. I’ve never had a more thorough experience than when I was obsessing with Vitalogy in the year or so that followed its release. It’s still a great experience now.

Merkinball - Two amazing songs. I Got Id and Long Road are both PJ classics, and the sound of this release is perfect. I still love these songs.

No Code - Wonderfully different than what came before. The change to Jack Irons made No Code sound like a radically different Pearl Jam, but they still sounded awesome. An interesting variety of songwriting was complimented by a wildly creative and interesting album art presentation. No Code changed the trajectory of the band, any direction forward seemed possible. This album still sounds great, and I’ve listened to it more frequently than the earlier records over the last few years.

Yield - This was the first album I was old enough to drive for. I was in high school, skipped my second through fourth period classes to drive to Best Buy, buy the album (which came with a vinyl version of the GTF single), and drive around listening to the entire thing on max volume. It was a glorious experience. Yield sounds fucking great, is full of fantastic songs, and the band along with Jack is at pique performance. Having this album accompanied by a VHS copy of Single Video Theory was possibly the absolute height of my Pearl Jam devotion and love. It doesn’t much better than that.

Binaural - Sleight of Hand. Best song PJ has ever recorded. This album came out when I was in college and smoking tons of weed, partying all the time, and spending lots of time with girls. Even though I was having a blast being 20, I still loved darker, moody music. Binaural was and is a challenging album. The addition of Matt Cameron changed PJ’s sound again. The recording process produced some really interesting sounding sounds with great depth. I’ve always loved many of the songs, but I disliked other tracks for years too. I also wanted the original track list for a really long time. Like more than a decade. At times I still feel that could’ve been the clear best album PJ ever made. That said, I’ve grown to love Binaural for what it is, and over the last few years, this has been my favorite PJ album.

Riot Act - It was a new time in my life. I was 22, working and traveling full time, and a year away from marriage. I remember driving what seemed like hundreds of dark and rainy nights, listening to Riot Act and wondering about a completely unknown future. Riot Act was long and varied, and uncertain. That related to me. But I also remember it being the most uneven PJ album. I really disliked some of the songs for the first time, but there were also seven or eight songs that I thought were great. This is still basically how I feel about it. I place it in the “Love” category because this was the last album I have had a truly intimate relationship with over the years. These first seven albums defined my youth and early adulthood. No group of albums by any band has meant more to me in my life.

Avocado - when this album came out, I was married, had two young daughters, and was a puffy-chested 26 year old, thinking I had everything figured out. I was crazy excited for the first new album in four years - which seemed like a forever wait back then. I was so disappointed when I heard WWS. It was the first single that I hated out of the blocks. I thought it sounded like the generic shitty rock that was mostly on the radio at that time, and I still do. The B-side was Unemployable, which reminded me of Cropduster and made me optimistic about the new album because I really liked that song. On release, I had a mostly positive reaction, but I could tell that this was a decided step down from previous albums. I thought the tour that followed was great. Ed sounded good. These new songs sounded a lot better live than they did on the album. The band seemed energized and ready to make great music. There were rumors that they had a significant amount of material already recorded or in the works, and another record didn’t seem like a distant idea. It seemed like a pretty good time to be a PJ fan. I got a tattoo.

Backspacer - Avocado had been good. I was ready to rock. Then we got Backspacer. There are maybe two songs I like on this album. It’s boring, bland, uninteresting music accompanied by dumb lyics and crappy melodies. I just don’t like it. This was the first time I genuinely thought PJ made something crappy. I was hoping they’d make a new album quickly and put this thing to bed, but that was a silly thought.

Lightning Bolt - Four more years passed, I was going through a divorce and hoping for something deeply meaningful that I could hold onto and give me something good in a difficult time. This album didn’t do that. My favorite song, the title track, was just as disappointing as I thought it was great at the time. The fade out ruined what should’ve been the absolute best part of the song. There were only 3-4 songs I was able to get into, and the rest was either really annoying, super boring, or just plain dumb. It seemed like PJ had crossed into a territory it would be really hard to recover from. My obsession had grown into a malaise as I still deeply loved the older material, but thought that band, the creative one, had all but disappeared.

Gigaton - After the last decade and a half of disappointments and boredom, I didn’t have high hopes for this record. Then we heard “Dance” and my mind was blown. This was absolutely unexpected and incredibly interesting in all the right ways. It was shocking and awesome to get such a pleasant surprise. And this song is the first one in at least a decade that should stand the test of time as a great PJ track. SBWM has continued to raise my excitement and my expectations. The production on this record sounds great so far, and no band needed that more than Pearl Jam. I now can’t wait to get the full Gigaton release and digest what promises to be the first really strong PJ album in a really long time.

OK but rank them tho

My best guess as of today...

1. Binaural
2. Vs.
3. Yield
4. Vitalogy
5. No Code
6. Ten
7. Riot Act
8. Gigaton
9. Avocado

—————————————
10. Lightning Bolt
11. Backspacer

Monkey_Driven wrote:You guys are old.

PHATJ wrote:

theplatypus wrote:

PHATJ wrote:Ten - I probably haven’t listened to this album in full in at least a decade. But when it came out, and for the decade-plus that followed, this album meant as much or more to me than any other. So many classic songs, even if I don’t crave hearing them anymore. Release is possibly my favorite song of all time, and about 4-5 others on this album are rock icons. And deservedly so.

Vs. - I have the same relationship with Vs. as I do with Ten. This is one of my most loved albums of all time. I go back to this more often than Ten, and it has aged better probably. This probably is my favorite era for Ed’s vocals, and Dave A.’s drumming on Vs. is my favorite of any PJ album.

Vitalogy - This was one of the first albums I truly recognized as a comprehensive piece of art. I was 14 years old, and everything about Vitalogy amazed me. The album sounded incredible on my discman. The album artwork was beautiful, and dark, and weird, and cool as fucking hell. I’ve never had a more thorough experience than when I was obsessing with Vitalogy in the year or so that followed its release. It’s still a great experience now.

Merkinball - Two amazing songs. I Got Id and Long Road are both PJ classics, and the sound of this release is perfect. I still love these songs.

No Code - Wonderfully different than what came before. The change to Jack Irons made No Code sound like a radically different Pearl Jam, but they still sounded awesome. An interesting variety of songwriting was complimented by a wildly creative and interesting album art presentation. No Code changed the trajectory of the band, any direction forward seemed possible. This album still sounds great, and I’ve listened to it more frequently than the earlier records over the last few years.

Yield - This was the first album I was old enough to drive for. I was in high school, skipped my second through fourth period classes to drive to Best Buy, buy the album (which came with a vinyl version of the GTF single), and drive around listening to the entire thing on max volume. It was a glorious experience. Yield sounds fucking great, is full of fantastic songs, and the band along with Jack is at pique performance. Having this album accompanied by a VHS copy of Single Video Theory was possibly the absolute height of my Pearl Jam devotion and love. It doesn’t much better than that.

Binaural - Sleight of Hand. Best song PJ has ever recorded. This album came out when I was in college and smoking tons of weed, partying all the time, and spending lots of time with girls. Even though I was having a blast being 20, I still loved darker, moody music. Binaural was and is a challenging album. The addition of Matt Cameron changed PJ’s sound again. The recording process produced some really interesting sounding sounds with great depth. I’ve always loved many of the songs, but I disliked other tracks for years too. I also wanted the original track list for a really long time. Like more than a decade. At times I still feel that could’ve been the clear best album PJ ever made. That said, I’ve grown to love Binaural for what it is, and over the last few years, this has been my favorite PJ album.

Riot Act - It was a new time in my life. I was 22, working and traveling full time, and a year away from marriage. I remember driving what seemed like hundreds of dark and rainy nights, listening to Riot Act and wondering about a completely unknown future. Riot Act was long and varied, and uncertain. That related to me. But I also remember it being the most uneven PJ album. I really disliked some of the songs for the first time, but there were also seven or eight songs that I thought were great. This is still basically how I feel about it. I place it in the “Love” category because this was the last album I have had a truly intimate relationship with over the years. These first seven albums defined my youth and early adulthood. No group of albums by any band has meant more to me in my life.

Avocado - when this album came out, I was married, had two young daughters, and was a puffy-chested 26 year old, thinking I had everything figured out. I was crazy excited for the first new album in four years - which seemed like a forever wait back then. I was so disappointed when I heard WWS. It was the first single that I hated out of the blocks. I thought it sounded like the generic shitty rock that was mostly on the radio at that time, and I still do. The B-side was Unemployable, which reminded me of Cropduster and made me optimistic about the new album because I really liked that song. On release, I had a mostly positive reaction, but I could tell that this was a decided step down from previous albums. I thought the tour that followed was great. Ed sounded good. These new songs sounded a lot better live than they did on the album. The band seemed energized and ready to make great music. There were rumors that they had a significant amount of material already recorded or in the works, and another record didn’t seem like a distant idea. It seemed like a pretty good time to be a PJ fan. I got a tattoo.

Backspacer - Avocado had been good. I was ready to rock. Then we got Backspacer. There are maybe two songs I like on this album. It’s boring, bland, uninteresting music accompanied by dumb lyics and crappy melodies. I just don’t like it. This was the first time I genuinely thought PJ made something crappy. I was hoping they’d make a new album quickly and put this thing to bed, but that was a silly thought.

Lightning Bolt - Four more years passed, I was going through a divorce and hoping for something deeply meaningful that I could hold onto and give me something good in a difficult time. This album didn’t do that. My favorite song, the title track, was just as disappointing as I thought it was great at the time. The fade out ruined what should’ve been the absolute best part of the song. There were only 3-4 songs I was able to get into, and the rest was either really annoying, super boring, or just plain dumb. It seemed like PJ had crossed into a territory it would be really hard to recover from. My obsession had grown into a malaise as I still deeply loved the older material, but thought that band, the creative one, had all but disappeared.

Gigaton - After the last decade and a half of disappointments and boredom, I didn’t have high hopes for this record. Then we heard “Dance” and my mind was blown. This was absolutely unexpected and incredibly interesting in all the right ways. It was shocking and awesome to get such a pleasant surprise. And this song is the first one in at least a decade that should stand the test of time as a great PJ track. SBWM has continued to raise my excitement and my expectations. The production on this record sounds great so far, and no band needed that more than Pearl Jam. I now can’t wait to get the full Gigaton release and digest what promises to be the first really strong PJ album in a really long time.

OK but rank them tho

My best guess as of today...

1. Binaural
2. Vs.
3. Yield
4. Vitalogy
5. No Code
6. Ten
7. Riot Act
8. Gigaton
9. Avocado

—————————————
10. Lightning Bolt
11. Backspacer

The top six are almost interchangeable. Those are six of my favorite albums of all time.

That was awesome PhatJ

liebzz wrote:That was awesome PhatJ

Thank you

PHATJ wrote:

Spoiler: show

Ten (1991) - I probably haven’t listened to this album in full in at least a decade. But when it came out, and for the decade-plus that followed, this album meant as much or more to me than any other. So many classic songs, even if I don’t crave hearing them anymore. Release is possibly my favorite song of all time, and about 4-5 others on this album are rock icons. And deservedly so.

Vs. (1993) - I have the same relationship with Vs. as I do with Ten. This is one of my most loved albums of all time. I go back to this more often than Ten, and it has aged better probably. This probably is my favorite era for Ed’s vocals, and Dave A.’s drumming on Vs. is my favorite of any PJ album.

Vitalogy (1994) - This was one of the first albums I truly recognized as a comprehensive piece of art. I was 14 years old, and everything about Vitalogy amazed me. The album sounded incredible on my discman. The album artwork was beautiful, and dark, and weird, and cool as fucking hell. I’ve never had a more thorough experience than when I was obsessing with Vitalogy in the year or so that followed its release. It’s still a great experience now.

Merkinball (1995) - Two amazing songs. I Got Id and Long Road are both PJ classics, and the sound of this release is perfect. I still love these songs.

No Code (1996) - Wonderfully different than what came before. The change to Jack Irons made No Code sound like a radically different Pearl Jam, but they still sounded awesome. An interesting variety of songwriting was complimented by a wildly creative and interesting album art presentation. No Code changed the trajectory of the band, any direction forward seemed possible. This album still sounds great, and I’ve listened to it more frequently than the earlier records over the last few years.

Yield (1998)- This was the first album I was old enough to skip school and drive. I was a junior in high school, skipped my second through fourth period classes to drive to Best Buy, buy the album (which came with a vinyl version of the GTF single), and then drove around listening to the entire thing at max volume. It was a glorious experience. Yield sounds fucking great, it‘s full of fantastic songs, and the band along with Jack is at pique performance. Having this album accompanied by a VHS copy of Single Video Theory was possibly the absolute height of my Pearl Jam devotion and love. It doesn’t get much better than that.

Binaural - Sleight of Hand. Best song PJ has ever recorded. This album came out when I was in college and smoking tons of weed, partying all the time, and spending lots of time with girls. Even though I was having a blast being 20, I still loved darker, moody music. Binaural was and is a challenging album. The addition of Matt Cameron changed PJ’s sound again. The recording process produced some really interesting sounding songs with great depth. I’ve always loved many of the songs, but I disliked other tracks for years too. I also wanted the original track list for a really long time. Like more than a decade. At times I still feel that could’ve been the clear best album PJ ever made. That said, I’ve grown to love Binaural for what it is, and over the last few years, this has been my favorite PJ album.

Riot Act - It was a new time in my life. I was 22, working and traveling full time, and a year away from marriage. I remember driving what seemed like hundreds of dark and rainy nights, listening to Riot Act and wondering about a completely unknown future. Riot Act was long and varied, and uncertain. That related to me. But I also remember it being the most uneven PJ album. I really disliked some of the songs for the first time, but there were also seven or eight songs that I thought were great. This is still basically how I feel about it. I place it in the “Love” category because this was the last album I have had a truly intimate relationship with over the years. These first seven albums defined my youth and early adulthood. No group of albums by any band has meant more to me in my life.

Avocado - when this album came out, I was married, had two young daughters, and was a puffy-chested 26 year old, thinking I had everything figured out. I was crazy excited for the first new album in four years - which seemed like a forever wait back then. I was so disappointed when I heard “World Wide Suicide”. It was the first single that I hated out of the blocks. I thought it sounded like the generic shitty rock that was mostly on the radio at that time, and I still do. The B-side was “Unemployable“, which reminded me of ”Cropduster”, and made me optimistic about the new album because I really liked that song. On release, I had a mostly positive reaction, but I could tell that this was a decided step down from previous albums. I thought the tour that followed was great. Ed sounded good. These new songs sounded a lot better live than they did on the album. The band seemed energized and ready to make great music. There were rumors that they had a significant amount of material already recorded or in the works, and another record didn’t seem like a distant idea. It seemed like a pretty good time to be a PJ fan. I got a tattoo.

Backspacer - Avocado had been good. I was ready to rock. Then we got Backspacer. There are maybe two songs I like on this album. It’s boring, bland, uninteresting music, accompanied by dumb lyics, and crappy melodies. I just don’t like it. This was the first time I genuinely thought PJ made something crappy. I was hoping they’d make a new album quickly and put this thing to bed, but that was a silly idea.

Lightning Bolt - Four more years passed, I was going through a divorce and hoping for something deeply meaningful that I could hold onto and give me something good in a difficult time. This album didn’t provide that. My favorite song, the title track, was just as disappointing as I thought it was great at the time. The fade out ruined what should’ve been the absolute best part of the song. There were only 3-4 songs I was able to get into, and the rest was either really annoying, super boring, or just plain dumb. It seemed like PJ had crossed into a territory it would be really hard to recover from. My obsession had grown into a malaise, as I still deeply loved the older material, but thought that band, the creative one, had all but disappeared.

Gigaton - After the last decade and a half of disappointments and boredom, I didn’t have high hopes for this record. Then we heard “Dance of the Clairvoyants” and my mind was blown. This was absolutely unexpected and incredibly interesting in all the right ways. It was shocking and awesome to get such a pleasant surprise. And this song is the first one in at least a decade that should stand the test of time as a great PJ track. Superblood Wolfmoon has continued to raise my excitement and my expectations. The production on this record sounds great so far, and no band needed that more than Pearl Jam. I now can’t wait to get the full Gigaton release and digest what promises to be the first really strong PJ album in a really long time.

I'm probably 4, maybe 5 years younger than you, J, and my feelings towards most of the albums overlap a lot with yours. The main difference is I didn't experience them in order or at the time that they came out until Avocado and forward.

Brett wrote:

PHATJ wrote:

Spoiler: show

Ten (1991) - I probably haven’t listened to this album in full in at least a decade. But when it came out, and for the decade-plus that followed, this album meant as much or more to me than any other. So many classic songs, even if I don’t crave hearing them anymore. Release is possibly my favorite song of all time, and about 4-5 others on this album are rock icons. And deservedly so.

Vs. (1993) - I have the same relationship with Vs. as I do with Ten. This is one of my most loved albums of all time. I go back to this more often than Ten, and it has aged better probably. This probably is my favorite era for Ed’s vocals, and Dave A.’s drumming on Vs. is my favorite of any PJ album.

Vitalogy (1994) - This was one of the first albums I truly recognized as a comprehensive piece of art. I was 14 years old, and everything about Vitalogy amazed me. The album sounded incredible on my discman. The album artwork was beautiful, and dark, and weird, and cool as fucking hell. I’ve never had a more thorough experience than when I was obsessing with Vitalogy in the year or so that followed its release. It’s still a great experience now.

Merkinball (1995) - Two amazing songs. I Got Id and Long Road are both PJ classics, and the sound of this release is perfect. I still love these songs.

No Code (1996) - Wonderfully different than what came before. The change to Jack Irons made No Code sound like a radically different Pearl Jam, but they still sounded awesome. An interesting variety of songwriting was complimented by a wildly creative and interesting album art presentation. No Code changed the trajectory of the band, any direction forward seemed possible. This album still sounds great, and I’ve listened to it more frequently than the earlier records over the last few years.

Yield (1998)- This was the first album I was old enough to skip school and drive. I was a junior in high school, skipped my second through fourth period classes to drive to Best Buy, buy the album (which came with a vinyl version of the GTF single), and then drove around listening to the entire thing at max volume. It was a glorious experience. Yield sounds fucking great, it‘s full of fantastic songs, and the band along with Jack is at pique performance. Having this album accompanied by a VHS copy of Single Video Theory was possibly the absolute height of my Pearl Jam devotion and love. It doesn’t get much better than that.

Binaural - Sleight of Hand. Best song PJ has ever recorded. This album came out when I was in college and smoking tons of weed, partying all the time, and spending lots of time with girls. Even though I was having a blast being 20, I still loved darker, moody music. Binaural was and is a challenging album. The addition of Matt Cameron changed PJ’s sound again. The recording process produced some really interesting sounding songs with great depth. I’ve always loved many of the songs, but I disliked other tracks for years too. I also wanted the original track list for a really long time. Like more than a decade. At times I still feel that could’ve been the clear best album PJ ever made. That said, I’ve grown to love Binaural for what it is, and over the last few years, this has been my favorite PJ album.

Riot Act - It was a new time in my life. I was 22, working and traveling full time, and a year away from marriage. I remember driving what seemed like hundreds of dark and rainy nights, listening to Riot Act and wondering about a completely unknown future. Riot Act was long and varied, and uncertain. That related to me. But I also remember it being the most uneven PJ album. I really disliked some of the songs for the first time, but there were also seven or eight songs that I thought were great. This is still basically how I feel about it. I place it in the “Love” category because this was the last album I have had a truly intimate relationship with over the years. These first seven albums defined my youth and early adulthood. No group of albums by any band has meant more to me in my life.

Avocado - when this album came out, I was married, had two young daughters, and was a puffy-chested 26 year old, thinking I had everything figured out. I was crazy excited for the first new album in four years - which seemed like a forever wait back then. I was so disappointed when I heard “World Wide Suicide”. It was the first single that I hated out of the blocks. I thought it sounded like the generic shitty rock that was mostly on the radio at that time, and I still do. The B-side was “Unemployable“, which reminded me of ”Cropduster”, and made me optimistic about the new album because I really liked that song. On release, I had a mostly positive reaction, but I could tell that this was a decided step down from previous albums. I thought the tour that followed was great. Ed sounded good. These new songs sounded a lot better live than they did on the album. The band seemed energized and ready to make great music. There were rumors that they had a significant amount of material already recorded or in the works, and another record didn’t seem like a distant idea. It seemed like a pretty good time to be a PJ fan. I got a tattoo.

Backspacer - Avocado had been good. I was ready to rock. Then we got Backspacer. There are maybe two songs I like on this album. It’s boring, bland, uninteresting music, accompanied by dumb lyics, and crappy melodies. I just don’t like it. This was the first time I genuinely thought PJ made something crappy. I was hoping they’d make a new album quickly and put this thing to bed, but that was a silly idea.

Lightning Bolt - Four more years passed, I was going through a divorce and hoping for something deeply meaningful that I could hold onto and give me something good in a difficult time. This album didn’t provide that. My favorite song, the title track, was just as disappointing as I thought it was great at the time. The fade out ruined what should’ve been the absolute best part of the song. There were only 3-4 songs I was able to get into, and the rest was either really annoying, super boring, or just plain dumb. It seemed like PJ had crossed into a territory it would be really hard to recover from. My obsession had grown into a malaise, as I still deeply loved the older material, but thought that band, the creative one, had all but disappeared.

Gigaton - After the last decade and a half of disappointments and boredom, I didn’t have high hopes for this record. Then we heard “Dance of the Clairvoyants” and my mind was blown. This was absolutely unexpected and incredibly interesting in all the right ways. It was shocking and awesome to get such a pleasant surprise. And this song is the first one in at least a decade that should stand the test of time as a great PJ track. Superblood Wolfmoon has continued to raise my excitement and my expectations. The production on this record sounds great so far, and no band needed that more than Pearl Jam. I now can’t wait to get the full Gigaton release and digest what promises to be the first really strong PJ album in a really long time.

I'm probably 4, maybe 5 years younger than you, J, and my feelings towards most of the albums overlap a lot with yours. The main difference is I didn't experience them in order or at the time that they came out until Avocado and forward.

I feel lucky to have experienced them in order. I turn 40 in July, you born in ‘85?

PHATJ wrote:

Monkey_Driven wrote:You guys are old.

I’ll be 45 this year...

Also, really great post, PHATJ.

dad wrote:

PHATJ wrote:

Monkey_Driven wrote:You guys are old.

I’ll be 45 this year...

Also, really great post, PHATJ.

Thanks, man. 40 in July.

PHATJ wrote:Vitalogy (1994) - This was one of the first albums I truly recognized as a comprehensive piece of art. I was 14 years old, and everything about Vitalogy amazed me.

Yep.

Loved reading that PHATJ! Very close to my history with the band's music. Also got legitimately sad when i came across the divorce part.

BTW, I'm not using your age as a pejorative, it's just my relationship/experience with each album is so different with merely a 5-6 year age gap.

Thurman Murman wrote:Loved reading that PHATJ! Very close to my history with the band's music. Also got legitimately sad when i came across the divorce part.