Album Review: Pearl Jam – ‘Backspacer’

Pearl Jam is undoubtedly one of the Titans of rock music, the band has been playing for the last 19 years, has recorded 9 studio albums, has sold an estimated 60 million records worldwide and is pretty much the only surviving band of the grunge rock explosion that was the early 90s.

 

Pearl Jam - Stone Gossard, Jeff Ament, Eddie Vedder, Matt Cameron and Mike McCready

 

You’d be hard pressed to find someone who doesn’t have at least one favourite Pearl Jam song, such is this band’s impressive repertoire. Whether it’s the slow and powerful behemoth that is ‘Alive’, the up-tempo acoustic/electric classic ‘Daughter’ or their more hook heavy attempts such as ‘Do the Evolution’ and ‘Ghost’, this band has a knack for making records that are consistently good.

Backspacer is no exception to this rule. The band recorded Backspacer with producer Brendan O’Brien (who worked with the band on Vs, Vitalogy, No Code and Yield) and that in itself was definitely a step in the right direction.

O’Brien is not the kind of producer who sweats the small stuff, he knows what works, he knows what the band is capable of and is happy to let the rest take care of itself, under his expert guidance, of course.

The result is that Backspacer is a lot of fun. You’d think after 8 studio albums Pearl Jam would start toning things down a little, maybe write an acoustic album with Leonard Cohenish undertones, but no, if anything Backspacer has proven that there is still a lot of life left in Pearl Jam, despite the fact that the band are all in their mid to late 40s.

Rolling Stone’s Rob Sheffield says it best ‘Backspacer, Pearl Jam’s ninth album, backspaces to that boyish spirit, with the shortest, tightest, punkiest tunes they’ve ever banged out.’
http://www.rollingstone.com/reviews/album/30067214/review/30083898/backspacer

 

Backspacer - Just as fun to listen to as it is to look at

 

In total the album comprises 11 tracks and breaks the record for the shortest Pearl Jam album ever recorded, lasting roughly 37 minutes in total, a fact that almost every review I’ve read about this album has pointed out.

Right from the get-go this album rocks out, delivering a powerful three-hit combo in the form of the opening tracks ‘Gonna see my friend’, ‘Got Some’ and ‘Fixer’ that set the tone for the 8 tracks to follow.

Matt Cameron’s drumming takes centre stage right from the outset because if there’s one thing O’Brien knows well, it’s how to get a drum sound that refuses to play dutifully in the background while the guitars get all the glory.

But that’s not to say guitarists Mike McCready (lead) and Stone Gossard (rhythm) are slacking off on this album, if anyone’s slacking off it’s bassist Jeff Ament, but then again he usually slacks off (give me one killer Pearl Jam bass riff and I’ll eat this review).

 

Look at him slacking off there, that's no way to play a bass guitar!

 

The halting, half picked, half strummed riffs that make up ‘The Fixer’, the quick and dextrous opening to ‘Supersonic’ and the complex melody that is the second track ‘Got Some’ are all examples of how Gossard and McCready are masters of their art.

But the thing that surprised me most about Backspacer is that after 19 years of screaming his lungs out, Eddie Vedder’s voice is still just as powerful as it was back in 1990 when he first growled out ‘Once upon a time I could control myself…’

The man is a vocal God. If you could bottle the magic that makes him sing the way he does, it would sell for millions. He also writes all the lyrics on this album and does so with his customary minimalistic and honest style that comes across as sincere without being preachy.

There is even some influences from Eddie Vedder’s solo album he recorded for the movie ‘Into the Wild’ in tracks like ‘Just Breathe’ and ‘The End’, which add a welcome change from the otherwise riff-heavy tracks that define Backspacer.

 

Buy this CD if you haven't already

 

The only flaw in Backspacer is that all in all, it’s nothing we haven’t heard before from these surviving grunge rockers. The experimentation on the album is kept to a minimum and it can’t stand up to past gems such as Yield or my personal favourites No Code and Riot Act.

It’s a solid album and fans will love it instantly, but I suspect a lot of people might find Backspacer boring on the first few listens, but give it time, it’s a solid album and like all Pearl Jam albums, you’ll catch a track from Backspacer in years to come that will play like an old friend in your head and you’ll be thankful in that moment for bands like Pearl Jam who stick to their guns and do so with style and undeniable charm.

Final Verdict: 7.5/10

Killer Sunday

Yesterday was definitely a pretty killer day as far as Sundays go. Back in school Sundays always used to depress the shit out of me, especially as it got closer to Monday, but once you start working, every free second you have to yourself is precious.

By the time I finished writing up that last post (how epic was that post?!? Fuck, I thought it would never end) it was already about 10 in the morning so I called up my buddy, Ex-Polar Bear Jon because I had to play him one of the best albums I’ve heard this year.

The Ex-Polar Bear and myself love talking shit endlessly about music. Thing about ExBear is that he eatssleepsbreathesshitsloveslives music. He works at ProSound and is one of the best and most badass blues/rock/acoustic grunge guitarists playing in Joburg right now.

So he comes over and we make some coffee and roll a few games of Backgammon (NEVER play Backgammon against me, I will destroy you). He plays me his favourite tracks from the new Pearl Jam, pretty good, pretty decent album, but then the gloves come off.

I start playing the album I called him over to listen, and it blows his mind, soft and slimey, all over the living room walls.

The new Arctic Monkeys album, Humbug, is fucking amazing. Sure, you don’t know me very well at this stage and probably you think this is what I say for lots of albums, but I assure you, it’s VERY seldom that I’ll give an album the accolade of being ‘fucking amazing’.

 

This album does not fuck around. I want it in and around my mouth

 

Tonight I’m gonna try get my lazy ass into gear and write my first album review for this blog, so I can properly explain how happy Humbug makes me on so many different levels, in the meantime, just buy that album, but it now!

Once I had thrashed ExBear sufficiently at Backgammon, he left in shame and (drum roll) I actually got my fucking hair cut.

Man-o-man, it was WAY overdue. I even feel lighter, like my head weighs less and my body temperature has dropped down a degree or two now that that large, dead animal no longer adorns my head.

Things are looking up.

I was a little nervous though cause by a slight coincidence, the last time J-Rab got her hair cut, it was by the same lady and without getting into details, J-Rab and I were going through a bit of a rough patch because I had been a total, total jerk.

J-Rab told the hairdresser some of the story which was why I half expected to walk out of there looking like a lawnmower had driven over my skull.

 

No one deserves a haircut this bad. No one.

 

I voiced this concern to the hairdresser, but she laughed and said no, she is a professional and as much as I deserve it, she wasn’t going to cut my hair and leave me looking like my parents are cousins.

After that it was lunch with the folks, same old same old. Our family has no traditions, none. We have no cultural heritage, no specific dress, no music, no art, nothing. We eat lunch. That is how our little tribe (which is only really my folks and me) bonds. Over snooty lunches in snooty restaraunts. The dining dead.

I picked up J-Rab after that and brought her sexy little ass home. I love that woman about as passionately as it is humanly possible, she just GETS me, she understands me really, really well, is just really fucking cool.

We did the domestics, other stuff too, and afterwards I by mistake called her ‘dude-babe’.

It was pretty hilarious, as I was leaving the bedroom and I meant to say, ‘Fuck babe, I don’t think I can feel my legs’, but instead I said ‘Fuck dude-babe, I um…’

 

This is what my mind conjurs when I think of a 'dude-babe'. Bleaugh.

 

‘Dude-babe?’ she said, laughing her ass off. Haha, so funny, I nearly called my girlfriend ‘dude’.

Freud would have a field day. Actually, first he’d have about four lines of coke, THEN he’d have a field day.

We laughed our asses off about that one, but the real gem of the evening happened just as we were about to doze off together.

I ask J-Rab if I can tell her a joke, so she says OK, and my joke goes like this:

Me: A termite walks into a bar
J-Rab: Okay…
Me: And asks, ‘Where is the bar tender?’

Silence. [SFX: Crickets]

J-Rab: Yeah?
Me: Yeah! That’s it, ‘Where is the bar tender?’
J-Rab: Haha, isn’t there more?
Me: No babe – A termite walks into a bar and asks, ‘Where is the bar tender?’
J-Rab: O-kaaayyy…
Me: Hahhaa, c’mon babe, think about the words, a termite walks into a bar and asks where is the bar TENDER y’know? Cause he wants to eat it.
J-Rab: Um… he wants to eat the bar tender?
Me: Hahaha, aaahh babe, you’re killing me, hahahahahaha!
J-Rab: What?
Me: ‘Where is the BAR TENDER?’ Cause he wants to eat the BAR, cause it’s made of wood and he wants to know where it’s TENDER, y’know, like soft so he can eat it!

We laughed so damn hard about that we both ended up in tears – best. Joke. EVER!

 

Termites: Funny as fuck

 

I couldn’t think of a better way of ending a really killer weekend and as I held J-Rab close and started drifting off I felt so calm and content, my mind clear and happy.

And that my friends, is love.

-ST