Pearl Jam- Opinions - Page 2

1. No Code
2. Yield
3. Vitalogy
4. Vs.
5. Riot Act
6. Ten
7. Pearl Jam
8. Binaural

Vitalogy
Vs.
Binaural
s/t
Yield

No Code
Riot Act
Ten

I divided them because there's some shifting among the top five and among the bottom three, but not much between the two ranges. There are PJ albums I listen to a lot and some I don't listen to very often. And I'll absolutely admit that Ten is down there not entirely due to its inherent quality, but radio overplay.

Tremor Christ alone is the reason Vitalogy will always hold the top spot for me.

1. No Code/Binaural
3. Vs./Vitalogy
5.Yield
6.Ten
7. S/T/Riot Act

That and Satan's Bed. Album is chock-full of awesome, but God I love that song.

My list switches all the time.

Today I feel about Pearl Jam the same as I do U2. Glad they're out there, still carrying the banner of Rock, but can't imagine considering them my favorite band. I'm still more likely to rotate a Nirvana CD into the stereo.

U2 still rocks live. But they stopped evolving artistically several records ago. I really hope they get back on track next year. Their early stuff is still tremendous.

Pj is an entire different animal. And they kick nirvana's ass any day.

Probably an unpopular view, but one I agree with.

It may be unfair to predict what would have happened had Cobain not died, but I'll do it anyway. I'm going to wager that, acoustic detours aside, he would still be putting out very much the same kind of music he did back then - if anything, it would probably just sound more commercialized, like the Foo Fighters. He didn't have the chops or smarts to evolve in the way that Pearl Jam has.

What makes you say that?

If anything, would've thought his career path lied somewhere in between Sonic Youth and Beck.

I've read parts of his journal. Not a smart guy, not a particularly enlightened artistic mentality, and a lot more the product of direct influence than most fans would care to admit.

There's nothing in his music that suggests anything even close to the experimentation that Sonic Youth or Beck have done. I'm not the biggest Beck fan, but the guy's managed to incorporate a fairly staggering amount of sounds into his music, and there were signs even early on in the way that he was fusing hip-hop and folk. Lee Ranaldo and Thurston Moore spent time in New York's No-Wave scene playing with Glenn Branca. They're a smart group with a wide frame of reference, and it's one definitely not limited by the standards of what's commonly considered rock music.

Cobain, on the other hand, was a competent punk rock guitarist with an appealing voice and a background in punk, metal, and pop music. His lyrics have been given a lot more attention for their prescience, post-death, but they're not really that notable on paper. They're a product of their time, mostly - a lot of people were doing that sort of angst. The songs are super-simplistic, which is great if you're a teenager trying to learn how to play guitar, but not a good argument for continued relevancy unless you happen to have been the one to have invented that particular sort of simplicity (and he's not - HuskerDuMudhoneyPixiesetcetcetc.).

Anyway, I'm not suggesting that he couldn't have evolved. After all, few could have guessed that a band as straight-up as Minor Threat could yield a band as musically adventurous as Fugazi. But there's not much substance backing the idea that Cobain would have been able to evolve out of the stuff he was writing at the time. I suspect he would have proven to be a lot less Bowie and a lot more Mark Arm. Nothing wrong with that, of course, but I think talk of him being an evolver is just a lot of overstatement by fans who make Nirvana out to be more of a musical phenomenon than the cultural one it was.

Damn, glad I never read his Journals!

You're probably closer to the truth than I was (guilty of holding on to the "Legend"; the cultural impact was important to me)-not to derail-but didn't you think In Utero was a big artistic step, and hinted at experimentation rather than acoustic detours ?

Have to believe he'd be more interesting, even if failing than the Foo Fighters.

EDIT-"Competent punk rock guitarist"? A couple of years ago, Rolling Stone put him in their top ten guitarists of all time. Rolling Stone magazine, Dave!

Not to sound like a total dick, but Cobain has been deified to to the point of absurdity and it really pisses me off. Pearl Jam were always better, more commercially successful while Cobain was alive and I think, although I can't really prove it, more respected in the musical community. I think this pissed Cobain off as he made some pretty nasty remarks about Eddie Vedder.

I mean, Rolling Stone put Kurt Cobain in their top 20 guitarists ever, is that a fucking joke? I don't even know what to say to that.

You should be!

I like In Utero, but do I think it was a big artistic step? It was a step forward for the band, I suppose. It's certainly noisier, partially due to the production. The songs are a little less traditional sounding, sure. But in the grand scheme, the innovations were kind of minor. To oversimplify a little, they were aping Surfer Rosa instead of Doolittle. Not that big a stretch, unless you weren't paying attention to non-mainstream music at all at the time (which I realize is entirely probable and nothing to be ashamed of for people even just a little younger than me).

I think Cobain had talked about doing an acoustic album near the end of his life - that's why many assume the next step would have been more along the lines of the Unplugged set.

Could be. Or he might have become entirely obsolete, as he struggled to innovate with what was a fairly marginal musical ability and an artistic vision that was tied firmly to the angst of being a teenager/young adult.

Rolling Stone? Shit. Consider that statement retracted!

That list was quite atrocious. I will say, while he was not even close to a great guitarist, he damn sure was an influential one. How many bands came out after Nirvana with guitarists that seemed like they just picked up a guitar and learned some power chords just a few months prior to releasing an album?!? And, I'd say his influence practically killed the lead solo for well over a decade in mainstream music. While I love Nirvana, even moreso the PJ (just personal taste,) I hate what Nirvana's perceived simplicity spawned in the years after they were popular. Hell, even PJ's Ten had some good soloing. Of course Nirvana isn't entirely to blame, but that's how I recall the period ushered in with Nevermind.

A far as the fanfic of WWKD , even had he not put the business end of a shotgun down his gullet damn near 15 years ago, I can't imagine any scenario where he would have survived more than another year or two. Maybe we would have gotten one more Nirvana album.

I think it's more that these bands were actually able to get on the radio. Non-technically-accomplished guitarists have been putting bands together and recording records since the 60s.

One thing that could have been a positive from all of this is a sustained observation of the fact that solos just aren't always necessary. Let's face it, most guitar solos on pop radio sound obligatory at best. They're only there because "that's what you do over the bridge." I'm completely in favor of doing away with all solos not played by someone with a bit of creativity (technical prowess a plus, but not a requirement).

Vs., Vitalogy, Binaural

Stone and 'Cready are pretty underrated as far as that goes...and as far as the term "underrated" can even be used these days.

I detect sarcasm. Hey, RS gave 3 stars to Hootie's Cracked Rear View, bitch. Their integrity is unpugnable.

Are you me? That could be my fave PJ tune ever. I hyped that song up so many times in the earlier PJ forums back in the day. The KISS influence is there in spades, especially in the heavy rumble of the chorus. It works. Oh boy does it work.

Since everyone else has done it (I'll add some star ratings, too):

Vitalogy *****
Pearl Jam ****1/2
Riot Act ****
No Code ****
Vs. ****
Lost Dogs ****
Ten ****
Yield ***1/2
Binaural ***1/2

I don't give out ***1/2 and above with much frequency, so as you can see this band's catalogue is quite something to behold, especially in retrospect.

On a completely different note, Eddie Vedder's Chicago Cubs-inspired theme, 'All the Way', which he performed solo at a Chicago show, has been released:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CqHTScDBsDU

Doncha just love that audience? Such a magical performance.

It's also available as a digital download via the Ten Club, and might be released on CD and 45 single in the future:

http://pearljam.com/news/?what=News#274

I'd be interested in seeing from everybody either your current top ten favorite Pearl Jam songs or just ten of their songs you'd put on a mix for a friend. Maybe even in a sequence that would flow well. Not an easy task, I know, but can we take a stab at it? I'm going to take tracks from across their discography and post my list later today. The difficult part for me will be taking songs from Ten into account beause a lot of them sound so much better live.

Ten? That I can do.....

Release

Can't Keep

Given To Fly

Go

Not For You

Spin the Black Circle

Severed Hand

State of Love and Trust

Push Me Pull Me

Do the Evolution

10 faves as of this very second (no order):

Life Wasted

Satan's Bed

Green Disease

Dissident

Whipping

Lukin

Even Flow (will never get tired of this even with the overexposure)

Marker in the Sand

Present Tense

Rats

Wash

Sad

God's Dice

Light Years

In My Tree

Red Mosquito

Garden

Immortality

Indifference

No Way

Jeremy

Elderly Woman Behind the Counter in a Small Town

Corduroy

Immortality

Smile

Low Light

In Hiding

Cropduster

Down

Marker in the Sand

Footsteps (live)
Croptuster (I thought the world, turns out the world thought me)
In my Tree
In hiding
Black (Live)
Satan's Bed
Leash
Wash
Better Man (live)
Given to Fly

Bonus Tracks live Covers:
Crazy Mary
Rocking in the Free World

Rearviewmirror

Sleight of Hand

In My Tree

Satan's Bed

Immortality

Sad

Unemployable

Porch

Present Tense

Hard To Imagine

No particular order, and that list changes just about every day, but as of now those are the PJ songs I'm loving the most.

Six people listed their current 10 favorite Pearl Jam songs, and there is probably 45-50 different songs listed. What does that tell you?

We're....all....navelgazing douchebags?

:/

Precisely.

Sorry "State of Love and Trust" and Binaural, but this is just how I feel right now:

Even Flow (Ten)
Animal (Vs)
Rearviewmirror (Vs)
Spin the Black Circle (Vitalogy)
Better Man (Vitalogy)
In My Tree (No Code)
In Hiding (Yield)
Green Disease (Riot Act)
Life Wasted (s/t)
Marker In the Sand (s/t)

Well shit, how could I forget about "State of Love and Trust?"

Time to fall asleep to the Singles soundtrack.

I've pretty much loved that thing from end to end ever since it came out. And aside from the greatness of "State of Love and Trust", I especially dig the hell out of Hendrix's "May This Be Love" and "Drown" by Smashing Pumpkins (one of their very best songs, in my opinion).

Hold On.

That little gem gets kinda lost in the Lost Dogs. But the song is amazing.

I was listening to the self-titled disc a couple days ago (this thread has put me in a PJ kick as of late), and I forgot how amazing 'Come Back' is. It has the bedtime-lullaby purity of 'Yellow Ledbetter' mixed with some of Vedder's greatest lyrics and singing to date. The music's haunting, epic, and emotional.

Ten V2.0

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/28160227/

Oh boy, oh boy:

But the package sure to send hardcore fans into a tizzy is the “Super Deluxe Edition,” which features two CDs, a DVD and four vinyl records. It is housed in a linen-covered, slip-cased clamshell box with a replica of an item second to none in Pearl Jam lore.

In 1990, when Ament and guitarists Stone Gossard and Mike McCready were getting the nascent Pearl Jam going in Seattle, they recorded three instrumentals to send to the then-unknown Vedder, who’d been recommended by Red Hot Chili Peppers drummer Jack Irons.

Vedder, then living in San Diego, overdubbed vocals onto the tape, in the process creating the songs “Alive,” “Once” and “Footsteps” (he was invited to join the band within weeks). Poor quality bootlegs of the demo, dubbed “Momma-Son,” have circulated for years, but the “Super Deluxe Edition” will include a crystal-clear dub of the tape on a replica cassette.

In addition, fans will receive Pearl Jam’s previously unreleased Sept. 20, 1992, concert at Seattle’s Magnuson Park (dubbed Drop in the Park) on two vinyl LPs and a replica of Vedder’s composition notebook packed with notes, photos and memorabilia from the “Ten” era.

i wants

I usually don't preorder stuff, but this, definitely.

And I know it's been previously announced but

gets me all giddy.

Just because i can and i'm a massive fan,
http://es.youtube.com/watch?v=XHz68G...eature=related

I'd recommend watching a few of those videos of the Buenos Aires show. Too bad it's not the first date, the band knew what they were up against the second night.

God i miss them.

This thread is awesome just because some people are seeing the light, placing Pearl Jam above Nirvana. And because Pearl Jam IS awesome.

Here's a question: other than the fact that they both hit it big around the same time, why do these bands constantly get compared? They have very little in common.

I like Pearl Jam (Vs. and Vitalogy especially) but I think they're over praised and I definitely don't like them compared to Nirvana. Cobain's lyrics are better, and nothing Vedder has done (even given his extra time post-Cobain's suicide) has changed my mind. Nirvana’s music might be simpler, but declaring a guy unintelligent because you read his private journal isn't really that fair. I mean, shit, if you're going to call someone unintelligent, maybe you should begin with the fact that he committed suicide.

Also, there's a big difference between someone’s written words and someone’s musical ambition. I don't get why we're equating the two. There have been countless interviews with anyone from Mark E. Smith to David Berman to Steven Malkmus where, frankly, they came off sounding pretty stupid. Doesn’t mean they don’t have the smarts when it comes to their music and expressing their art. And considering that they only had three major releases, Nirvana showed a lot of group for the type of band that they were. The Pixies had a formula (one that yes, Cobain aped) but how much "growing" did you see from Surfer Rosa to Trompe le Monde? Does that make them an inferior band to Pearl Jam? Because I'll throw down if someone argues that!

Now, if you left it at that, I'd be in total agreement.

I don't think either of these guys are grade-A lyricists, but I give Vedder the edge. Cobain had a way with visceral imagery (especially on In Utero, which was probably his lyrical peak), but it's kind of juvenile angst stuff - even when the subject matter is more concrete ("Scentless Apprentice," "Frances Farmer..."), he's really just pinning his constant preoccupations to barely-there conceits.

Vedder has, at times, relied too heavily on sloganeering and the same kind of abstract non-specificity that Cobain used, but he's also written some observant character sketches("Elderly Woman..." "Unemployable," "Nothingman"), detailed story-songs ("Given to Fly"), and heartfelt, personal songs that rely on exactly the specificity that Cobain avoids ("Corduroy," "Satan's Bed," "Love Boat Captain").

But, again, I don't think either is a master lyricist - if Vedder were, the PJ songs with lyrics written by other members of the band wouldn't blend as seamlessly as they do (it's only Gossard that tends to be noticeably bad in this department).

I think I'm going to have to go with the journal, if we're picking indicators of intelligence. I don't think David Foster Wallace or Hunter S. Thompson were stupid men. But if they happened to have kept journals, I'm going to guess that they were better-written than Cobain's is.

We (meaning "me," I suppose) are not "equating" the two. "We" are saying that they're relevant. I don't expect to see a notebook full of complex musical theory doodlings - he wasn't that kind of a musician. But he's been praised as a "voice of a generation" and other such things that indicate a lyrical insight. An insight that is entirely missing from his journal entries and, for the most part, his lyrics.

True, but we've got what we've got when it comes to Cobain. His music doesn't sound visionary to me. When people assert that he was just warming up, we really only have his existing work, interviews, and his journal to go on. And I don't see it.

The Pixies innovated all on their own, though. They came bursting out of the gate with a sound that no one else had (the most obvious comparision points, like Husker Du, don't even sound all that much like them) - when you do that, you get a lot of leeway with regard to additional innovation. Nirvana were a punk pop band with some Pixies tendencies and a charismatic frontman. Pearl Jam were arguably more original right off the bat (even if they were just recombining a bunch of hackneyed 70s rock moves into something more distinct), but they became increasingly unmistakeable. Take away Cobain's voice, and I'm not sure that would be the case with Nirvana.

Do hard-core Pearl Jam fans rank Ten relatively low based in part on its popularity? Fatigue?

Especially curious to me how often someone puts Ten relatively low in a ranking of PJ albums while placing Vs. (hey! it was self-titled when I bought it!) relatively high.

Vs. was musically and lyrically a rehash of Ten, compared even to Vitology and certainly to something like Binaural.

Wow, this sounds grreat. I love the Unplugged version of Porch.

I'll cop to fatigue, in part, but it's also just not as interesting. A lot of the songs use sort of a similar groove, rely on similar guitar solos, and just generally tend to work on an energy level instead of a formal one.

I don't really get that. The intensity's similar, but the production's much cleaner, it's a far more varied set in terms of song structure, and the band hits its stride when it comes to dynamics. "Release" and "Oceans" on Ten were attempts at quiet songs, but they sound a lot like the rest of the bunch in terms of guitar sound and how Vedder sings. On Vs., you can hear the band experimenting with new ways of lowering the volume on "Daughter," "Elderly Woman," and "Indifference." The rhythms and guitar parts on "Go," "Blood," "Rearviewmirror," "W.M.A.," and "Glorified G," don't sound remotely like anything on Ten. The only real Ten retreads are "Animal," "Dissident," and "Leash" (maybe "Daughter," minus the acoustic guitars and understated performance), and, of those, at least "Animal" equals pretty much anything on Ten.

That said, I do prefer Vitalogy and, on some days, Binaural.

I think to a certain extent it depends on what you're looking for in terms of lyrics (and again---very different bands). I do agree that Cobain wasn't as good as people have made him out to be (and that voice of a generation bullshit is just hyperbole...hyperbole that, to be fair, he resisted but was pressed on him regardless....and which also played a hand in his suicide, which points to his level of intelligence even more so).

But just thinking about the choruses of both of their first three releases and I'm still inclined to go for Cobain. He's more sarcastic and clever, and to rebut your point from before, much more focused.

As an example, the chorus of Even Flow (which commits the undergrad writing sin of telling a story about the homeless) is: "Even flow. thoughts arrive like butterflies. Oh, he don't know. So he chases them away."

But then you take songs like Lithium (with it's sarcastic, questioning depiction of being on anti-depressants) and In Bloom (with it's sarcastic look at young music fans---possibly even white suburban dip-shits who love hip-hop without considering the reality of the content) and you've got more focus, and frankly, subjects that are more interesting in the first place, even if the songs are, to be fair, simple.

You are quite correct that Vedder's strengths are character pieces and sentimental reflections like "Elderly Woman...", "Rearviewmirror" and "Nothingman." At the end of the day, though, I'll go for "I feel stupid and contagious" over "I got hurt but I'm still alive" every time.

As far as the suicide, plenty of brilliant people have killed themselves. What I should have specified as stupid were Cobain's reasons (which I can only speculate about).

I guess I don't agree that it's "far more varied." I hear a lot of Once in Go, Animal springs logically from the superior Why Go, Dissident feels like Alive pt 2.

Something like Glorified G is growth, but I think the root of that funkier rhythm is in Evenflow and Why Go.

And lyrically the album doesn't hold a candle to Ten in my book. Daughter, Leash, Rearviewmirror and W.M.A. could be Stone Temple Pilots songs, fer-gosh-sakes.

For me Vs. just felt like a band pushing itself back and forth between following up on the phenomenal success of Ten and really reaching out and growing in new directions. It's admirable and considering how well it follows Ten I think it is objectively a success almost any way you slice it, but I don't think they really hit the stride they were looking for with Eddie until Vitology, and the mixed bag nature of Vs. holds it down.

This is obviously mostly subjective. But while I could understand fans who have less love for the straightforwardness of Ten and prefer the later stuff, those same folks slotting Vs. into a top 3 spot just seems weird.