Just as the 80’s was a kind
of revolt against the 70’s,
the 90’s was a kind of revolt
against the 80’s. Only recently,
in the 21st century, has music
become so bifurcated by genre
and sub-genre and sub-sub genre,
that huge movements like punk or
new wave or the grunge of the
90’s seem to have evaporated
right out of the cultural zeitgeist.
Maybe that’s a good thing.
No one is shouting that disco sucks,
that punks are shitty musicians,
that the glam and the glitz of 80’s
pop was shallow, and that grunge
was precious and took itself with
entirely too much seriousness
while refusing to dress up nice for a gig.
It seems that now, every conceivable
combination or distillation of music
genre is out there somewhere represented
in the work of our newest artists.
Apropos of all that, what do the elder
statesmen and women do? Do they stay
in their lanes, or do they explore
new territories? Well, one of
the only giant bands from the era
of grunge that still seems to keep it
together is Pearl Jam. After a brief
and passionate love for them, I lost
interest about three albums into their
career, but then a handful of years
ago, I heard a new single from these
Seattle boys that sounded like a brand
new Talking Heads song. Intrigued, I
bought the 2020 album Gigaton.
The album opens with the kind of
boneheaded rocker you would expect
from Pearl Jam, with a highly literate
lyric from Eddie that is impossible
to understand without looking at
the lyric sheet. I do not look at
the lyric sheet, thus, I am in the
dark. It might be highly literate,
it might not be. I like the tune, though,
even though it’s devoid of a memorable
or original melody. All I know is that
it makes me want to bang my head.
The second tune is the same exact
experience, only faster. The third
song, “Dance of the Clairvoyants,”
is the tune that made me think
Talking Heads, and it still does, and
is a better song for it. The only
part of this tune that I can’t imagine
being performed by David and Tina and
Jerry and Chris is the Chris part.
This is not a drum part that Chris
Franz could pull off, but one that
he would certainly imagine. Song
four, another rocker. Side two opens
with (god forbid) keyboards, and
Eddie is crooning. It’s nice. I like
this. I could stand an entire album
of this. But while the first two sides
of this album are mostly rocking
and full of the intensity you’d expect
from these grunge gods, it’s mostly
forgettable stuff; it lacks hooks,
it lacks melody, it lacks riffs that
might be memorable. The last side, side
3 of the album, begins with a lovely
thing that is kind of atypical of the
band, something a little more sensitive,
something with a feel that is not
the bombastic rock thing, and then
continues with what is almost folky,
heavy acoustic guitar behind Eddie’s
warbling and nothing else. More
sensitive heavy rock balladry, but
the concluding tune, “River Cross,”
seems ambitious and beautiful.
Notwithstanding Pearl Jam’s status,
musical effectiveness and prowess,
and their apparent longevity and
continued relevance over three
decades, this record, as I listen
again, even though I’ve had it now
for six years, seems entirely new,
and not in a good way. It seems
new because I have only listened
to it over that six years a handful
of times, not enough to remember
a single melody or riff, only a vague
recollection that one song reminded
me of Talking Heads, and that’s it.
I think, for me, that Pearl Jam has
run it’s course, and there is no getting
back for me to those moments in the 90’s,
mowing the lawn with headphones in and
banging my head to “Jeremy,” or trying
in my own band to capture some of that
grunge energy that these guys inspired.
Notes on the vinyl editions:
- Gigaton, Monkeywrench Records, 2020, double black vinyl, audio on three sides.
In case you don’t already know: I’m listening to almost everything in my vinyl collection, A to Z, and writing at least one, sometimes two or three long skinny poem-like-things in response for each artist, and on a few occasions, writing a long skinny poem-like-thing in response to more than one artist. As a poet and a student of poetry, I understand that these things look like poems, but they don’t really sound much like poetry, hence, I call them “poem-like-things.” I’ll admit that they’re just long, skinny essays that veer every now and then into the poetic or lyric.
