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Pearl Jam's Albums: #2
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I know, I know. Many of you are disappointed that the first two albums are my Top Two. I know it proves a huge group of you correct in your belief that I know nothing about Pearl Jam and am just an idiot pretending to be a fan. Well, if that is what this means, so be it. If I were to cower to some of you and place Binaural or Yield at number one, I would be compromising my own integrity as a writer, a Pearl Jam fan and a human being. Why? Because Vs. and Ten are simply my honest favorites. In my eyes, there is nothing quite like the initial sound of Pearl Jam and the band's primal first reaction to the onslaught they received after the world was first introduced to that sound. This author can honestly report that no two albums that have been released during my lifetime have affected me emotionally, intellectually and especially spiritually as Pearl Jam's first two releases.
To me, it does not seem to be a mystery why people like me have been ranking these two albums so highly for so long. Check out the readers' song poll and witness how the Top 25 contains nine songs from Ten and Vs., along with four others that were written and recorded during this era. Add these two numbers together and the 1991-1993 era makes up over half of the readers' Top 25. Some of you might argue about track flow and production, but when simplified, the truth becomes quite obvious regarding the first two records: they are the best two collections of songs Pearl Jam has ever put together. When I see or hear fans acknowledge the greatness and classic nature of several of the tracks from the first two albums but knock those albums as whole entities, I am disappointed. Something seems mightily pretentious and false about those attitudes and reflects a desire to often be unique and edgy, as opposed to just a pure, honest and passionate fan. This, of course, does not represent most of the people I have met, spoken with, heard from in my comment box or through e-mails. Many of you agree with me, while most of you who do not simply enjoy the other albums more. What I really love is reading your reasons for your differing opinions. I learn new facts and points of view each time I receive your input. Unfortunately, the small minority that makes up much of the aforementioned kind of nonsense just has a loud voice. These are the same people that will hear (or have already heard) Backspacer and focus solely on what the band did wrong on the new album. Oh well. Let's drown the bastards out.
2. Vs., 1993 - When I listen to Pearl Jam's sophomore effort, 1993's Vs., I hear the sound of a band, in particular that band's lead singer, coming to terms with the force of something unexpected and somewhat terrifying, an album of pure, unfiltered reaction. Vs. was Pearl Jam's statement to the world following the massive success of Ten and the entire rise of the Seattle "grunge" movement in the early 1990's. Fans, the media, other artists, etc. have slapped labels on Pearl Jam repeatedly over the years, from the aforementioned "grunge" to "classicist/classic rock" to "arena rock" to "post-punk" to "hard rock." The band owned up to all these labels and more on their second album, a combustible attack of energy more worthy of its title than any other LP in the PJ catalogue. Pearl Jam has rocked hard on at least parts of all of its records, but Vs. easily stacks up as the hardest rocking and most aggressive release of the band's career.
Covering a wide array of subjects from various angles, the primary aspect of Vs. that holds it together is the similarity of most of the music. A mere three ballads sprinkle the album, each with its own edge nonetheless, while the rest of the songs easily fit the description of hard rock, even when various genres such as funk, folk, blues and country rock find their way into the mix. Lifted from Vedder's madman muttering in the intro, middle break and outro sections of "Animal," the band almost named their second LP "Five Against One," a fact present in the album's artwork. Vs. is a better title that essentially means the same thing, a concise symbol of the band's us-against-the-world attitude of 1993. Present in everything from Vedder's severe shift in stage persona to his lyrics to the fierce attack of the band's instruments and determination to live in their own image of themselves, rather than that of outsiders, Pearl Jam was volatile and scary in this era. Before the darkness and anti-commercial experimentation that emerged on the next year's Vitalogy, the band had to first endure its period of worldwide success following the release and meteoric rise of Ten and its snarling chip on the shoulder period that is embodied in every single second of Vs. If Vitalogy was the band's official retreat and descent into isolation, Vs. was their initial instinctual reaction to their fame and criticism, a wild, untamed beast of a record intent on destroying anything and anyone that stepped in its path.
While Ten was full of often up-tempo, energized hard rock, including songs like "Porch," "Why Go," "Deep" and its two openers, "Once" and "Even Flow," nothing on that release served as quite appropriate preparation for the one-two punch of Vs.' openers, "Go" and "Animal." As soon as "Go" shifts from its second gear warm-up false start into its fifth gear highway speed alarm-like blitz, it is as if the animal on the cover, whether it be a sheep or a dog or a space monster, has found its way through its fence and suddenly pounced on you, the listener, sure to rip your flesh to shards and leave nothing in its wake. Eddie Vedder stated once that "Go" was about his truck refusing to start, and some have both taken this seriously and taken it as a joke on the singer's behalf, but regardless of its subject matter, it is difficult to interpret the song as anything other than a musical punch in the gut, a relentless beast of a song. If anything, "Go" is a semi with a tractor-trailer behind it, a pulverizer that would demolish a little pick-up truck if the two met on the same path. The music, from drummer Dave Abbruzzese's riff to Stone Gossard's siren-like guitar part to Ament and Abbruzzese's deep, racing rhythm section to Vedder's overwhelmed vocal delivery, is all great, but seems to take a back seat to the movement, anger and mainline obliteration of the song's power. The aggression itself, in other words, was more important at this point than much of the composition. After the crazily rising tension that closes "Go," including Mike McCready's insanity-inducing guitar solo, it cuts out suddenly, leaving behind a brief moment of background studio noise, before the band storms back in with the mean hard rock funk-blues of "Animal."
Vs. comes across overall as a less personal statement for Mr. Vedder than Ten, but their is still a large amount of Ed's personality and battle with demons, both internal and external, present on his group's second LP. "Animal" is the first example on the album of this personal battle. While Vedder appeared to be writing about his own struggles with the media, fame and all the pressure involved, the song also spoke for the group, evident in its willingness to make the "Five Against One" lyric into a primary candidate for the album's title. Echoing the philosophy of another Vs. track, "Rats," "Animal" presents the proposition that in many cases, non-humans are better creatures and offer preferable company to humans, i.e. "I'd rather be with an animal." At this point, Vedder was obviously struggling to see the good in people, instead being drowned with press saturation and the selfishness of the human race. It is an incredible feat that the band contained so much rage in a two minute, 49 second song without Ed or another band member physically lashing out at the opponents in question.
Social issues take hold of Vs. for the rest of Side One after "Animal," beginning with "Daughter." Stone Gossard composed the music for the track, an acoustic-based rootsy folk number that takes some eerie turns that reflect the subject matter at hand. Lyricist Vedder took the opportunity of using his band's catchiest song up to that point to sing about the horrors of child abuse, specifically for a young girl with a learning disability. "The shades go down" remains a haunting symbol of that abuse, an example of the fine subtlety present in much of Ed's early lyric writing. The song broke the mold for the band, its first track to appear on a record with a largely stripped-down sound, a style PJ would later embrace for the duration of entire albums. It remains a staple of "Alternative Rock" radio, as well as popping up on Classic Rock stations, largely due to its accessibility. One of my favorite descriptions of any Pearl Jam song comes from Chris True of allmusic.com, who describes "Daughter" as, "sort of classic Pearl Jam," adding, "It's earnest, it's got tension, and that nod to classic rock. It's Pearl Jam."
"Glorified G" and "Dissident" strip the listener of any notion that Vs. would lighten up any more than "Daughter," at least for quite awhile. Instead, the former brings in a huge drum fill that gives way to a rollicking country-hard rock riff and a screaming vocal from Eddie Vedder about the danger in the American sense of entitlement regarding the right to bear arms. The latter is a burner, a thick, bluesy, shuffling song still grounded in hard rock and built around a bending lead guitar riff, Vedder again concerning himself with socio-political issues, this time discussing a woman harboring a dissident on the run from the powers that be. Each song contains that early-era Vedder vocal that he cannot quite match 16 years later, a sound that owes its debt to Roger Daltrey, Jim Morrison, Vedder's immaculate vocal chords at the time and his passion and intensity regarding the subjects at hand.
That vocal prowess continues for the next two songs, the first being the tribal rhythmic funk rock of "W.M.A.," the second the dash of funk guitar that adorns the shredding hard rock punk of "Blood." "W.M.A.," or "White Male American," is one of the more unique songs in the band's library, sounding like nothing else. Abbruzzese provides the song's foundation in a persistent tribal drumming pattern that mixes American hard rock with African tradition, while Jeff Ament's bassline funks the track up. The guitars and Vedder's vocals all swirl around each other deep in the song's mix, Vedder's screeches and wails coming and going like the policeman's baton he is describing, taking the listener by storm, then leaving him out to dry after the pounding. If not played by Pearl Jam, "Blood" might come across as more of a punk song than hard rock, but the punk influence actually takes a back seat here, even when the song's power chords are center stage. Ed puts this song on fewer and fewer setlists as time goes on, almost definitely due to its strain on his vocals. It is probably the toughest song in the Pearl Jam catalogue to sing. The most interesting feature of the track, however, is the funked-up guitar work of the verses, a style that separates Pearl Jam from all of its Seattle and so-called "grunge" counterparts.
"Rearviewmirror" is a cornerstone Pearl Jam song, arriving at number two in the readers' poll of the band's greatest songs. Reportedly the first PJ song the band ever recorded and performed with Eddie Vedder playing a guitar, the song is a fueled steamer, the kind of track that is impossible to listen to without getting pumped. Its therapeutic, cathartic lyrics are in the vein of much of Ten, but Vedder seems to be longing and reaching for more resolution than he was two years prior. In the context of Vs., "RVM" is vitally important in its assertion that "finally the shades are raised," a direct progress in the album's story arc from "the shades go down" in "Daughter." Vedder is personalizing the "Daughter's" struggles with abuse here, relating his own experience with hers. It seems as though his ability to "emancipate" and escape from his persecutor (likely his step father, but probably others as well) is his way of holding hope for girls like the young lady in "Daughter." The band's power and sheer force is at its most potent in "Rearviewmirror's" coda, a hard rock punk machine gun fire that tears down the entire concept of personal oppression.
"Rats" completes the thread of funk on Vs., going deeper and and funkier than "Blood," "W.M.A." or "Animal" and in the process being the closest thing to "fun" on the LP. Vedder's lyrics addressing the goodness of the grotesque animals that inhabit the song's title versus the human race rob the track of most of its "fun" quality, thus making Vs. one of the band's most serious efforts. The inclusion of Michael Jackson's "Ben" in the outro to "Rats" does reign as one of Vedder's finest tongue-in-cheek moments and saves the song from complete lyrical dread.
Vs. is the home of the greatest closing trio of songs on any Pearl Jam record. Two ballads bookend a barnburner here, the first being the sturdy folk rock of "Elderly Woman Behind the Counter in a Small Town," the second being the soft, slow jazz of "Indifference," and the barnburner in between being the classic rallying anthem, "Leash." These songs are difficult to put in a small, organized drawer, as their power is only evident in complete and consecutive listening experiences. "Small Town" is the warmest song on the record, a welcome change of pace following the musical bleakness of most of the rest of the album. But make no mistake, the track is still very earnest and very determined to reach an emotional level that very few other bands even attempt to touch. Even more stripped down than "Daughter" and daring to rely almost solely on major chords, "Small Town" was another first for the band, a ballad that did not have to be edgy or dark. It remained sad nonetheless, its heartbroken quality mostly present in Vedder's singing and adaptation to the song's chord progression. "Leash" is the secret weapon of Vs. While there is plenty of hard rock and songs of anthemic quality on the record, none match the camaraderie or high-flying spirit of "Leash." Vedder stated that the song was about the same girl who found herself in an impossible situation in Ten's "Why Go," but this song is universal. It is obvious, even without knowledge of its prominence on live sets during the Ten tour, that it was written during that earlier era. Mike McCready's guitar work remains some of his best, along with more of Vedder's fantastic singing. "Indifference" follows and puts the album to rest gracefully. Vedder probably meant to do the opposite, but his lyrics in the song spoke for the two generations that primarily took their stake in PJ, a snapshot at endurance, perseverance and, of course, "Indifference." The band plays a bare-bones jazz instrumental beneath Ed's huge singing, Gossard's two primary guitar riffs simple but unforgettable, the track's organ and Jeff Ament's bass delicate and inviting.
Vs. was released to a ridiculous amount of success. The album sold more in its first week of release than the band's last three LPs have in their entire runs, breaking a record at the time that stood for five years. It kept the Pearl Jam myth alive and strong and set the stage for the insane burst of isolation that came next for the band. The Vs. tour was what inspired PJ's famous (losing) battle against Ticketmaster and was the beginning of the end of the early days. While the band did not make any videos to promote the album, did not put the title of the album anywhere on the cover and only released singles to compete with imported releases that overcharged and greatly upset the band. Everything about this record and its entire era was a battle and the greatest influence on the course of Pearl Jam's entire career. Regardless, the music is more than a testament to its time, but moreover to the band's entire sound and ability as a band. "Grunge" was cool and edgy at the time, but PJ remained itself, determined to record what it liked and take risks all of its copiers could never handle. Pearl Jam harkened back to the classic rock ear not only because of its sound, but because it refused to be a commodity, a tool of the industry. Vs. was the natural course of action for a group of guys that did not like fame and found the whole experience a bit silly. Vs. was the band's big fight back that, in the long run, the band won. Vs. indeed.
Vs. YouTube Playlist: www.youtube.com/view_play_list
For all things Pearl Jam, visit my home page here: www.examiner.com/x-3940-Indianapolis-Pop-Culture-Examiner
Also, check out Mel Duncan's Pearl Jam coverage here: www.examiner.com/x-16134-Pearl-Jam-Examiner
Questions, comments, complaints, stories, ideas, etc.? E-mail me 24/7 at cpeelle83@yahoo.com
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