so, honestly, pearl jam's place as "grunge" was always questionable to me. yes, they were from seattle, wore flannel, and members of the band were in proto-grunge bands like green river. but they were also in mother love bone, who were decidedly not grunge (very glam. very very glam).
pearl jam certainly did "grow" from their first album, "10", which recently was reissued, with a bonus "alternate mix" disc and some other junk (really, for a band that really played the anti-corporate rock game for a long time, despite being in some ways the poster boys for it in the beginning, this was an extremely commercial move). they really ended up hitting a more "classic rock" vibe than anything else, fitting very nicely in with their work with neil young. really, they could have fit really easily in the 70's AOR era, along with the eagles, fleetwood mac, etc.
but "10" (or "ten"... whatever)....
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(the original cover was called the worst album cover of the 90's here, which is pretty much a good assessment - the new version, a wider shot, which I think you could get if you took out the cd booklet and unfolded it, isn't much better. or "grungier" despite the sepia toning...)
really, the re-release of "ten" now - not even for an anniversary, which at least would make more sense, as that's still a couple of years off now - is at best, a masturbatory effort of nostalgia that used to be filled by "classic rock" stations and now we get on games like "rock band" and "guitar hero." and I know, we get this sort of thing a lot these days - everyone's reissuing things, regardless of the point, so I can't completely hold it against them. but, again, the band that took on ticketmaster playing what has become a typical corporate rock game....
just weird (and not as weird as what we'll see in a bit).
my biggest problem with "ten" (and hell, I can even admit to having liked the album back in the day...) now is how poorly it holds up. unlike other albums from the same era, it just feels like an early 90's record. even the remastered disc, which was supposedly meant to make it less of the corporate rock-sounding album than it was then, doesn't really do anything different. it's like watching the first season of friends, where everything looked sort of artificial and plastic-y. this was grunge? the wanky guitar work (something they never truly got rid of), the whole "hell is for children" vibe of most of the songs... yeah, there are some definite "sing along" moments - who can resist the chorus to "alive"? but... ech.
and did anyone ever notice that every song, except for "black" pretty much has the exact same drum pattern? anyone? it's ridiculous.
pearl jam did ultimately redeem themselves a little musically (as I said before). they did help spawn the post grunge revolution (bands from live to creed owe "ten" millions in royalties for how they took vedder's growl and took it platinum heights) - which may be the most unforgivable thing about this album, as once pearl jam move on from their work on "ten" (which really took until "vitalogy" to really happen - "vs." was a decent start, but still... no...) hundreds of other bands jumped in with their deep voiced baritone singers and hard rock riffs, launching a hundred "big man voice" bands (even the singer for the verve pipe developed a vedder like growl for their boring hit "the freshmen" or whatever it was called, which in a lot of ways feels like a bad pearl jam outtake).
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the reissue of "ten" seems to be the tip of the iceberg.
pearl jam, after "ten" really became in a lot of ways, paragons of virtue. a little like fugazi (which may be the only time I ever compare fugazi and pearl jam), they really stuck up for their fans (trying to keep ticket prices low, their whole "official bootleg" scheme, which while certainly done with financial interests involved, but also certainly kind of brilliant for fans). yeah, they were with a major label. yeah they were still, in a lot of ways, just another big corporate rock band. but they distanced themselves from everyone else who had come in their wake, and really became a respectable unit.
now...
okay, so they have their reasons. and if the recent spin interview is any indication, their reasons aren't 100% awful. like they say, it's not like they're celine dion or AC/DC. but making Target the exclusive carrier of your new album kind of goes against the entire image you cultivated over the last decade and a half or so.
granted, I do love shopping at Target, but not as a music store (mostly have ever bought food, cleaning stuff, and housewares there). is that what Pearl Jam want to be associated with?
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