Music Review:
Pearl Jam “BackSpacer”
By: Dan Kellett
It seems Pearl Jam has scrubbed that grunge right out of it’s hair. With Pearl Jam’s emergence from a 10 year hiatus the new ‘Backspacer’ album re-introduces us to the Vedder who dangled from a water pipe in the Evenflow video, it appears the drawn out rhythm he invoked in the past along with his guttural moaning tones have been traded in for shorter bursts of double time energy and bounding hymn-like declarations. Visit our Video aggregate section for the making of Backspacer.
Vedder takes the stage in the opening track, ‘Gonna See My friend’ which unexpectedly goes stampeding by leaving the listener reeling to catch up. The high fret dancing bass line and almost screaming dual rock guitars at the start put you on notice immediately that this will indeed be a different ride. Eddie belts out an anthem of impending independence, a separation of sorts from those invisible tethers he never identifies. The song is in essence pure punk rock, all the way.
The next significant change happens on track 3, ‘The Fixer.’ This is when the spirit of this album as a whole is presented. Through a combination of simplistic repetitive verse structure and the odd melody choices that only Vedder can pull off, the message of hope and optimism begins to manifest. The Fixer has been the bands mainstay song on the radio waves and is the white flag of surrender to Venders’ previous attempts at avoiding commercialism. Click here to see the band performing The Fixer Live.
Close to the end of this song it dawned on me, the proverbial chicken before the egg question; is the absence of any remnant of grunge in this album a result of enlightenment and hope in the song writers, or did the calculation of love and the certain haunted serenity that is present in ‘Backspacer’ dictate the outing of drop D tuning and low moaning tones? Has the tremble of Wood, Staley and Cobain changed for Pearl Jam the lure of the temple of the dog? The grunge scene is completely absent from this album as the band steps into the arena of the prevailing times stadium masters
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After passing through the jump up and down fun of ‘Johnny Guitar’, your pulse is forced to slow by the classic finger picking of an acoustic, which is soon accompanied by a gentle key tone in ‘Just Breathe.’ This swells from time to time like a warm wave. The hope and light continues as Eddie serenades in deep steady vocals with lines like….
‘I’m a lucky man to count on both hands the ones I love’
And stanzas like….
‘Did I say that I need you?
Oh, Did I say that I want you?
Oh, if I didn’t now I’m a fool you see,
No one know this more than me.
As I come clean.’
This song has ‘off beat chic flick sound track’ written all over it. You know, when troubled guy has messed up a relationship with sincere girl and he is reflecting on a dock while peering over the ocean, contemplating his mis-steps, yeah, that’s where this song comes in.
‘Amongst the Waves’ and ‘Unthought Known’ are right where they should be in the story of ‘Backspacer,’ 6 and 7 of 11, smack in the middle, the plateau, the climax. They are the embodiment of the message this album seeks to deliver. The opening stanza of ‘Amongst The Waves’ resonates an escape from down, from failure to potential personal victory, the glass half full.
Amongst the Waves thunders like a thick cloud of rejoice and feels like a rebirth of sorts. It soars and begs no apologies. As in most of this compilation, the music seems only to serve Eddie, his voice and emotive projections are the centerpieces of the work throughout and that is highlighted in this song.
‘Unknown Thought’ continues the elation ‘Amongst The Waves’ starts. It re-centers the message with questions from the start of the song. It builds with piano and thick clean strumming guitars to a crescendo from which Eddie paints a lyrical picture of perspective and possibility, the idealism of individual impacts in a vast reality.
The song winds down with yet another question.
‘A distant time, A distant space, That’s where we’re living
A distant time, A distant place, So what you giving?
What you giving?’
Backspace ends with a heavy dose of that ‘haunted optimism ‘The End.’ The song deals rather directly with depression and the want for reclamation of self, all the while exuding a desperate plea. Don’t give up on me, don’t let me give up on myself.
Overall this album appears to be less about Pearl Jam and more about Eddie Vedder, carrying with it a slight reminiscent tone of “Into the Wild” Vedders last solo project from the hit movie. Eddie carries the album in merit headfirst into their new direction with their first independent project. It will be interesting to see how far this album will go without the backing of a major label. If we had to give this album a rating out of 5 stars this album would shine into the night with 4 stars smack dab in the middle of Eddie’s forehead.
excellent review – having heard little of the album, the review opens my mind to listen for something completely unexpected without going so far as to dictate what i should be expecting to hear