Amph What Album Did You Just Hear?

The song is just about vinyl records, though. Everything else is reading into lyrics that might sound deeper than they are.

 

Yes, I heard this ahhaha
The line with the flame always makes me think twice, however.

 

Neil Young & Pearl Jam - Mirrorball (1995)

After only three albums into their career, Pearl Jam followed up Vitalogy with an unforeseen detour of sorts - a collaboration album with Neil Young. Mirrorball is essentially the Lulu of the band's discography where it is less a collaboration, and more the band being the backing act. For starters, Eddie Vedder is virtually nowhere to be heard on this album. Do not listen to this album expecting a mix of Neil or Eddie-led tracks, nor is there anything in the way of a duet between the two vocalists. The reason? Vedder had some problems of his own:


(Courtesy of Faceoff - https://en.faceoffrockshow.com/post/neil-young-mirror-ball-1)

Therefore, Mirrorball could oddly even be thought of as the fourth Pearl Jam album where Neil Young takes the lead. None of Neil Young's personnel plays on this record. No Nils Lofgren, no Booker T Jones, nor do Crazy Horse play on Mirrorball - it is entirely Pearl Jam. Unlike the Metallica and Lou Reed collaboration, Mirrorball is not a concept album, nor is it inspired by an external work (a play, book, film, musical etc...). Instead, the album is a raucous, energetic, and live-feeling album of unabashed rock and roll. Not that any of this can be described as unexpected given Neil Young's unofficial title as the 'Godfather of Grunge', along with the fact that Pearl Jam and Neil Young had developed a relationship of sorts fairly early in the band's career:


(Courtesy of Rolling Stone Magazine - https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-album-reviews/mirror-ball-122619/)

Saved at Time Stamp:


On top of that, in 1995 (the same year Mirrorball would be released), Eddie Vedder inducted Neil Young into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame:



On paper, it was a marriage made in heaven. Best of all, the band would tour, but with a catch:

1. No Eddie Vedder
2. Dates were limited to Europe only as the band were still at war with Ticketmaster:



Recorded in just under a month, Mirrorball is a no-frills affair. Hardly offering an acoustic instruments, while being devoid of orchestra, electronica, experiments with art rock or minimalism - Mirrorball is just raw rock and roll. The opening track, 'Song X', sets the tone for the entire album with Neil Young's grotty and distorted riffing, complete with his dissonant weary vocals, singing the Smurf''s-esque:

Hey ho away we go
Along the road to never
Hey ho away we go
We're on the road to never

From the beginning, Pearl Jam are not playing like they do on a regular Pearl Jam album. Stone Gossard keeps his play style direct while the drumming of Pearl Jam's newcomer, Jack Irons (formerly of the Red Hot Chili Peppers who had joined the band for one track during Pearl Jam's Vitalogy sessions), provides a Phill Rudd-like backbeat. The fills are simple and do nothing but service the lead. There's no fancy fills, solos, or interludes. Pearl Jam and Neil Young play like a pub band from start to finish. The first three tracks on this album do not let up on the muscular guitar tone of the record. As with the opening song, the second track ('Act of Love') keeps things simple:

You know I'll always help you baby
But I just can't do that
I know I said I'd help you baby
Here's my wallet
Call me sometime
Act of love
Act of love
Act of love
Act of love

Musically, 'Act of Love' is just as undeviating from its first verse. Self-awareness of the aversion of sophistication is evident on the album's third track, 'I'm the Ocean', where Young sings:

People my age
They don't do the things I do
They go somehwere
While I run away with you
I got my friends
And I got my children too
I got her love
She's got my love too

On this track, the band throws in some new tricks by incorporating a pump organ into the frenetic arrangement with some piano flourishes. 'I'm The Ocean' is an album highlight, as is the barnburner, 'Downtown' (not to be confused with the track of the same name from Neil Young's Tonight's The Night album). Young transports the band back to the Woodstock era, singing:

There's a place called Downtown
Where the hippies all go
And they dance the charleston
And they do the limbo
Yeah the hippies all go there
'Cause they want to be seen
It's like a room full of pictures
It's like a psychedelic dream
Downtown
Let's go downtown
Downtown at night
Downtown
Let's have a party
Downtown at night

Unlike Woodstock, every note of this song is pure grunt, even beginning with Neil Young stopping the band to correct a mistake with his riff. The song feels improvised with the most ad hoc attention paid to detail where it is simply rock music for its own sake. It's no coincidence that tracks like this, 'I'm the Ocean', and 'Big Green Country' make for the best moments of Mirrorball. The album is strong work but isn't without its filler.

Even for a primal album like Mirrorball, 'Throw Your Hatred Down' and 'Peace and Love' feel undercooked. It's a shame too because 'Peace and Love' is the only track on Mirrorball where Eddie Vedder contributes vocals, albeit in the background. 'Truth Be Known', meanwhile, is a great ballad in its own right but feels out of place since this is the only time that the album takes for a breather (except the album closer which only clocks in at 1:15). From there, is just business as usual.

The near nine-minute length of 'Scenery', though a little indulgent, can be forgiven for its impressive riffs and flow. Featuring extended solos over a slow southern rock jam, 'Scenery' feels off-the-cuff and improvised, if not just a few minutes longer than it needs to be. Overall, that's how I would describe the album. Mirrorball knows what it wants to do, and does nothing further. While played out in areas a little more than necessary, the collaboration keeps things simple enough for it not to be taken too seriously. In true Neil Young style, Mirrorball aims to do nothing more than to capture the moment of a handful of sessions.

If may not offer the drama of 'Stop Dragging My Heart Around', the anthemic heights of 'Under Pressure', nor the elegance of Cheek to Cheek, but it offers enough common sense in not making any grand gestures of being something bigger than itself. It wouldn't have been hard for this not to be the case when Pearl Jam was at their absolute height. Impressive stuff.

4 out of 5

 

Frank Hannon did an interview on a podcast over the weekend called Talk Louder and during the convo he mentioned that while on tour with Def Leppard Steve Clark invited him to go tour the Gibson factory in Nashville. This sent me straight to Song and Emotion on Psychotic Supper. RIP Steve Clark.

 

Chris Stone performing ragtime tunes on his Moog.
I've had the vinyl for years, and just discovered someone has posted it online.
It's great to play at parties, at a high volume.... or by oneself, at a high volume.
I also just learned in the video's description that Chris Stone composed for the Phantasm sequels, and wrote music for The Secret of My Success, among others.

 

Lou Gramm
Ready or Not 1986
The Foreigner front man's first solo album. Not sure if it's a great album but he has one of the great rock voices. Midnight Blue, Heartache, and Ready or Not are standouts. Good Lord this man can sing.

 

Veckatimist by Grizzly Bear
I had the track Cheerleader as free download many years ago, but it wasn't until Southern Point was an entry in the JCC's playlist thread (sorry, can't remember who it was) that I really took notice. I was looking to buy a couple of new albums the other day, so I looked through my 'faved' list of tracks on Spotify and picked this album. It's very, very mellow, almost languid, but it's incredibly nice when you're in that kind of mood.

 

I don't know if DebonaireNerd is continuing his Pearl Jam album reviews, but the recent posts about them in here motivated me to go back and listen to them more recently. As I mentioned before, I have their first five albums, which means I don't have any of the albums after Yield. My favorite albums of theirs remain No Code and Yield (the 4th and 5th studio albums).

 

Bringing It All Back Home
Bob Dylan's 1965 masterpiece is a front to backer and one of the greatest albums in history. Picked up a new edition on vinyl at Barnes & Noble.
Bob Dylan's 115th Dream cracks me up so much. What a hilarious story.

 

I was feeling nostalgic...

 

Pearl Jam: No Code (1996)

The more things had changed by 1996, the more it stayed the same for Pearl Jam. Continuing to enjoy their success as a band who were still selling records and singles in more than healthy numbers, Pearl Jam's identity crisis as both celebrities and artists peaked. Their crusade against Ticketmaster's practices persisted to the point of needing to play lesser-known venues, in far fewer numbers because certain venues could only be played where Ticketmaster took a cut of the ticket sales (saved at timestamp):



In my review of Vitalogy, I lambasted the band for their flag-waving because the ultimate result was nothing - to this day, it is worse than ever with the band themselves contributing to this issue. But, their approach here was commendable because, like Prince, Pearl Jam were willing to test the business model by introducing one of their own. Where Prince would be the first-ever artist to sell an album exclusively online, Crystal Ball (yes, before of Radiohead), Pearl Jam were the only chart-topping platinum-selling artist who were a radio staple at the time to tour without Ticketmaster. So, did it work? Ask the fans (saved at timestamp):



Honestly, it worked quite well if the above is anything to go by since either the ticketing system (whether you purchased via Pearl Jam's own fanclub or through their answer to Ticketmaster) seemed to operate without a hitch. I believe Pearl Jam when they said that they wanted to connect with the fans and the music more than the publicity. But, much like their aversion to music videos, how long would this really last? People berate a band like Metallica for capitalising on their fame, but they have never been disingenuous about it. Metallica made their first video, 'One', and continued to make videos. They enjoyed mega-mainstream success with their 1991 self-titled album, and the tours became increasingly bigger. But, they never sold it as anything else. My frustration with Pearl Jam, conversely, is while there is a genuine attempt to connect with fans, deliver the music, and challenge the system, the gesture is often cut short by their very own bottom line. Therefore, how much of it did they mean by the end of it? Don't get me wrong, I love Pearl Jam. But, much like Radiohead, the balance between improving the system and contributing to its ills seems to be off balance.

Radiohead are a highly apt comparison for Pearl Jam because of the struggles with celebrity and artist that is shared by their lead singer, which would ultimately inform the creative decisions of the band's fourth album, No Code:


(Courtesy of The Quietus: https://thequietus.com/articles/20627-no-code-pearl-jam-grunge-anniversary-radiohead-kid-a-review)

Compared to No Code, Vitalogy is a baby step toward being a sonic departure for Pearl Jam. Beginning with the bizarre artwork itself, exactly like Led Zeppelin's fourth album, Pearl Jam opted NOT to put their name on the front cover. Remember, the internet in a domestic setting was only in its infancy at the time, so few fans (if any?) knew that No Code was on its way to stores:


(Courtesy of Victor Li - https://victor-li.com/nocode/)

Adding further to the changes, No Code would also be Pearl Jam's first album with their new drummer, Jack Irons. Although Jack contributes drumming to one of Vitalogy's tracks, while playing drums on the entirety of the Young/Jam collaboration album, No Code is Jack's first tenure as a full-time band member on a Pearl Jam album. Being the predecessor of Chad Smith during the 1980s RHCP albums, Jack brings a looser feel to his drumming with subtle jazz infusions. His style is also quite melodic, such as the country-infused 'Around the Bend', the late-night jazz vibes of album opener, 'Sometimes', and the folky 'Off He Goes'. Those three songs being only three of many styles explored on No Code.

'Sometimes', up to this point, is the band's most experimental work where Vedder creakily croons in a whisper as if not to wake the neighbours over the quiet storm of soft jazz. The lister is then thrown into the explosive punk-laden 'Hail, Hail':

Ah is there room for both of us? Both of us apart?
Are we bound out of obligation? Is that all we've got?
I get the words and then I get to thinkin'
But I don't want to think I want to feel!

Vedder's delivery matches the rapid-fire pacing of the music with a shaky rage. Gossard's solo centres the track and prevents it from being one note, while backing slide guitar gives it a southern tinge. In comparison to the barbaric tumultuous bark of 'Lukin', 'Hail, Hail' is ferocious, but within Pearl Jam's familiar range and serves as an album highlight. But, for every time Pearl Jam treat the listener to the familiar, something abstract is presented in its wake. That includes the meditative, 'I'm Open' where Vedder performs the entire song in a spoken word vocal telling a coming-of-age tale:

After spending half his life searching he still felt as blank
As the ceiling at which he stared
He is alive but feels absolutely nothing
So is he?
When he was six he believed that the moon overhead followed him
By nine he had deciphered the illusion trading magic for fact
No tradebacks...
So this is what it's like to be an adult

Musically, there's no percussion and all of the arrangements are reduced to a warm hum, much like an early 90s R.E.M song. 'Who You Are', meanwhile, is a Harrison-esque eastern-tinged number rich with sitar and acoustic guitars, and sung in a mantra-like chant. In fact, spirituality is an ongoing theme throughout the record, most notable on 'Present Tense':

Do you see the way that tree bends? Does it inspire?
Leaning out to catch the sun's rays...a lesson to be applied...
Are you gettin' something out of this all encompassing trip?
You can spend your time alone redigesting past regrets oh...
Or you can come to terms and realize
You're the only one who can forgive yourself oh yeah...
Makes much more sense to live in the present tense...

Beginning as a slow-burn, the instrumentation incrementally gets louder and explodes into a full jam. It's an album highlight. No Code doesn't particularly get anything wrong. Of course, it isn't without its filler like that heard on the Young/Crazy Horse-esque, 'Smile', which feels more pastiche than its pays tribute or Pearl Jam does making the sound its own. 'Red Mosquito', meanwhile, feels like a cut left-over from the Vitalogy sessions minus the urgency or flow given the loud-quiet-loud arrangement which becomes more predictable from verse to verse. But, then there's the surprise highlight of the catchy Ramones-esque, 'Mankind', which is sung by 'Stone Gossard'. Upbeat yet visceral, the song features warm vocal melodies over its punky gutteral.

No Code is more varied than Vitalogy, but not messier because the experimentation is more focused where the album feels like a collection of ideas on a tracklist. No Code finishes feeling like a cohesive album offering a theme (identity, spirituality, realisation) running throughout. Despite the tensions mounting at the time, the music feels less an exercise of compromise between members and more like the five members playing as a unit. It may not be the most commercial-savvy album that Pearl Jam have to offer but, to date, it is among the band's most mature and engrossing.

4 out of 5

 

Pearl Jam: Yield (1998)

I will never understand how the band's fifth album, Yield, is the one record of theirs which is discussed the least. It's certainly not an album that is hated or ill-spoken of, but it's just that one record which seems to have fallen between the cracks. When I do hear of discussions surrounding this record, it is often seen as a return to their earlier sound. Yet, this is not what I hear. While the experimentation on this album is more mannered than what was heard on Vitalogy or No Code, there's still plenty of variety on this album which gives it a feel which is fresh and engaging.

The feel of renewal to this album, as compared to the more laboured tones of their last two records, is to do with the fact that it is Pearl Jam at their most collaborative:


(Courtesy of Louder Sound - https://www.loudersound.com/feature...-in-love-with-being-a-killer-rock-n-roll-band)

The band members themselves were also less angry. By the time Yield was released, Eddie Vedder would be in his mid-thirties. The title, Yield, is a reference to the fact that there was a sense of compromise which was involved in aging:


(Courtesy of Ultimate Pearl Jam - https://ultimatepearljam.com/pearl-jam-yield-album/)

As you may have guessed, such a compromise included ending their ongoing feud with Ticketmaster by playing larger and more well-known venues (saved at timestamp):



From a thematic and spiritual point of view, Yield does very much as advertised. It's the sound of a band coming to terms with their own realisation as celebrities and artists. Frankly, it's the antithesis of the punk or alternative rock mindset, but that doesn't make Yield any less urgent. To me, Yield is Pearl Jam's best album of the 1990s, and also the band's most varied at the time. Overall, the album is more mid-tempo. That's not to say it is devoid of uptempo rockers. 'Brain of J.', 'Do The Evolution', and 'MFC' offer plenty in the way of Vedder's ferocious bark.

But, outside of that? Yield is a much more mature affair, and a welcome focus in their sound as compared to the more off-the-wall experimentation of their previous two albums. The real charm on Yield is to be found in its mid-tempo rockers. On the album's second track, 'Faithful', Vedder sings about complacency in the human condition:

We're faithful, we all believe, we all believe it
So faithful, we all believe, we all believe it
M.Y.T.H. is?
Belief in the game controls that keeps us in a box of fear
We never listen voice inside so drowned out
Drowned you are, you are
You are everything, and everything is you
Me, you, you, me, it's all related

Sonically, it channels mid-90s R.E.M with a Led Zeppelin tone (especially in the percussion) with southern influences. 'No Way', offering a similar tempo, features wailing guitars with a slight trip-hop swagger. Excepting the album opener, 'Brain of J.', Yield doesn't develop a raucous energy until the tongue-in-cheek toned, 'Do the Evolution', where a raspy Vedder shouts:

I'm ahead, I'm a man
I'm the first mammal to wear pants, yeah
I'm at peace with my lust
I can kill 'cause in god I trust, yeah
It's evolution, baby, yeah
I'm at peace, I'm the man
Buying stocks on the day of the crash, yeah
On the loose, I'm a truck
All the rolling hills, I'll flatten 'em out, yeah
It's herd behavior, uh huh
It's evolution, baby, good

Sonically, it's the most punk that Yield has to offer. Yield, instead, is a substantially contemplative affair. For instance, there's the folky love song, 'Wishlist':

I wish I was an alien at home behind the sun
I wish I was the souvenir you kept your house key on
I wish I was the pedal brake that you depended on
I wish I was the verb 'to trust' and never let you down
I wish I was a radio song, the one that you turned up

Vedder here plays a sweeter, more humbled character when lamenting unrequited love. Usually, when a song of this theme featured on earlier Pearl Jam albums, there was usually a more sombre or downtrodden tone. Instead, on 'Wishlist', the tone is more at peace than in a rut. The same can be said for the R.E.M-esque, 'Low Light' - an album highlight:

Clouds roll by
Reeling is what they say
Or is it just my way?
Wind blows by, low light
Side tracked, low light
Can't see my tracks
Your scent way back
Can I be here all alone?
Clear a path to my home
Blood runs dry
Books and jealousy tell me wrong
All I feel, calm
Voice blows by, low

But, Yield's true summary is to be found in 'All Those Yesterdays', serving as an exclamation of sorts to the album title:

Let them wash away
All those yesterdays
All those yesterdays
All those paper plates
You've got time, you've got time to escape
There's still time, it's no crime to escape
It's no crime to escape, it's no crime to escape
There's still time, so escape
It's no crime, crime...

The experimentation, meanwhile, is mostly limited to the psychedelic 'Push Me Pull Me', a spoken-word track wth harmonic backing vocals and a frenetic bass line. Yield, for me is an oddity in their discography in that it doesn't get its due attention. If there's room for a reevaluation of No Code, it's strange how Yield has slipped through that net unnoticed.

5 out of 5

 

Definitely agree with these positive assessments of those two albums.

 

Duran Duran Rio
Is there a more 80's album than this? It's good, though, with some great tracks and no weak ones. The Chauffer remains as impenetrable as ever, and is still my favourite of the album.

 

Love Simon's voice. I also love Come Undone.

 

No Code, out of any album in their discography, has definitely grown on me the most.

But Yield was excellent from the first listen. It's still excellent.

 

Pearl Jam: Binaural (2000)
By now you would have noticed that this series has been fairly light on clips and article citations. Don't get me wrong, I love the band, the albums, and the music as a whole. But this has got to be the most boring band to cover when it comes to personality. Compared to my series for The Rolling Stones and Metallica, it is a chore to find material on this band or, at the very least, stories which offer knee-slapping hilarity. Sadly, the Binaural review will be the one which suffers the most from this because the Binaural era is very light on reading or video material when it comes to the making of this album.

It's a disappointment to be because, controversially, Binaural is my favourite Pearl Jam album - along with the era as a whole. Not only are the songs which made it to the record incredible, but even the b-sides and unreleased tracks from these sessions which were featured on their two-disc rarities compilation, Lost Dogs, among their best-ever material. I am equally lost as to why this album, out of any in their discography, that fans typically rank this one as their least favorite. Where Yield is seemingly forgotten, Binaural is largely the unwelcomed stepchild in Pearl Jam's discography.

By the 2000s, pro-tools and various digital recording techniques were all the craze due to the time and overall expense involved in recording onto tape. Pearl Jam, however, chose to restrict the making of this album to recording techniques to that of analogue. Specifcally, the band had utilised a 'binaural' technique of recording (saved at timestamp):



Out of any album in their discography, Binaural is sonically the richest when it comes to an atmospheric band in the room sound. A lot of this, along with recording technique, is thanks to the band expanding into even further territory when it comes to their choice of genre of experimentation. This time around, blues and psychedelia are the major staples of this record. On Binaural, I especially applaud 'Parting Ways' for citing this song as the track which actually got me into Pearl Jam.

In 2001, Eddie Vedder accepted an invitation from my favorite song writer, Neil Finn, to perform at a series of concerts in Auckland as part of the '7 Worlds Collide' project. Among the songs performed with Neil Finn was 'Parting Ways' - I consider this version to be the definitive version as it also features Radiohead's Philip Selway and Jonny Greenwood:



Admittedly, as much as I love the atmospherics on Binaural, the album is a more upbeat record than YIeld. The album's first three tracks, for instance, are straight ahead rock numbers. 'Breakerfall' is my favorite Pearl Jam opening track, while 'God's Dice' (written by Ament) maintains the momentum with its realisation of age lyrics:

My will is crashing, synapses flashing slow
Ah, days like frame by frame, where do they go?
Ah yeah, why fight? Forget it, cannot spend it after I go
Roll them high
Throw them again
All gods' dice

Aside from psychedelia and straight-up rock, blues is the album's strongest signature with 'Thin Air', 'Rival', 'Nothing As It Seems', and 'Thin Air' - the interesting thing to note on these songs? Not one of them are written by Vedder. Gossard and Ament's make their strongest contributions to Pearl Jam on these songs where Vedder's pen is at its least dominant. The more collaborative approach is especially evident on 'Light Years', a Gossard, McCready, and Vedder collaboration about one's passage through time:

With heavy breath
Awaken regrets
Back pages and days alone they could've been spent
Together but we were miles apart
Every inch between us becomes light years now
No time to be void
Or save up on life
Uh you've got to spend it all

The song is abundant with bluesy bass in its mid-tempo swoon.

As for my absolute favourite cuts? 'Of the Girl' - not only the best track on the album, but possibly my all-time favourite Pearl Jam song ever written boasting a brooding and low-fi blues tone with slight gothic elements. It's also become something of a live staple for the band since its release. I'm also a very big fan of the cosmically tinged 'Sleight of Hand', a groove-heavy ballad about a man struggling to find meaning and fulfilment in his life:

Mondays were made to fall
Lost on a road he knew by heart
It was like a book he read in his sleep, endlessly
Sometimes he hid in his radio
Watching others pull into their homes
While he was drifting

'Sleight of Hand' is heavy on wail and crescendo with Vedder's trademark vocal soaring over the top.

I cannot find a bad thing to say about Binaural - at all. It's mature in all the right ways and experimental with their greatest sense of focus thanks to their most collaborative approach ever heard on a Pearl Jam album.

Their best.

5 out of 5

 

Sunny Day Real Estate - Diary
Good album, but I'm lucky if I can make out 20% of the lyrics.

 

I finished all of Billy Joel's albums. I had previously heard 52nd Street, The Stranger, and Piano Man, so I listened to Cold Spring Harbor, Streetlife Serenade, Turnstiles, Glass Houses, The Nylon Curtain, An Innocent Man, The Bridge, Storm Front, River Of Dreams, Fantasies And Delusions.

Of these, The Nylon Curtain, The Bridge, and River Of Dreams were my favorite. Fantasies And Delusions is an album of classical piano compositions released in 2001. He hasn't released any new albums since.

Next, I listened to every album by The Black Crowes: (skipping Shake Your Money Maker and The Southern Harmony And Musical Companion both of which I had heard before) Amorica, Three Snakes And One Charm, By Your Side, Lions, Warpaint, Before The Frost...Until The Freeze, Happiness Bastards.

All of these are worth a listen if you are a fan of this band. Lions, Warpaint, and Before The Frost...Until The Freeze stand out for me (the last is an album recorded in front of a live audience.) Happiness Bastards is a recent (March 2024) release and their first album since 2009.

Next up: Black Flag. I had listened to their debut album Damaged before, so I went back and listened to their later releases: My War, Family Man, Slip It In, Loose Nut, In My Head, What The...

This punk rock band had a creative surge, releasing three albums in 1984 and two in 1985, then nothing until their final album What The... in 2013. Family Man contains some interesting spoken word tracks, Slip It In has some entertaining lyrics, and What The... is mainly comprised of two-minute punk rock songs, if that's what you're into.

I'm in the middle of a listen to all of Black Sabbath's albums and loving every minute.

 

For a moment, I thought you were responding to Binaural

 

You think the J-Man has one last album in him?

 

I think so. He seems to have been content with touring for the past 20 years, but he released a single earlier this year, and he probably has a collection of songs laying around to compile and release some day. Never say never.

 

Such a freaking amazing album

 

@solojones: I'm a metal guy, but this album has always been one of my all time favorites.