Pearl Jam Discussion

[Nimrod's Son]

I really hope it's not in Chicago.

[Andy /]

me, too.

[Nimrod's Son]

They should do it in Vegas.

[dustrock]

Live On 10 Legs is incredible. Mike is a little low in the mix but it sounds great.

[Andy /]

i guess this recording of ed backed by two italian dudes at a bar show back in 96 has been out there forever, but i never heard it. i think it's great.


http://www.pearljamonline.it/PJ20/Li...12.04.1996.rar

12/04/96 – Goa Club: Rome, Italy [75m]
attendance: 250
set: Off He Goes (Ed solo), The Kids Are Alright, I Can’t Explain, My Generation, Corduroy, Immortality, MFC, Not for You, (Crazy Mary), Love->Building On Fire, Lukin, Next to You, Rearviewmirror, Rock ‘n Roll Star, Improv, Around the Bend, Rockin’ in the Free World
notes: Apparently an “invite only” gig at this tiny club, Ed plays another unexpected set, accompanied by Italian musicians Fausto Casara (drums) and Francesco Aliotta (bass). This intriguing setlist is played with great enthusiasm and with few pauses except for frequent guitar tuning changes. The largely Italian crowd sings along in a great mood. An unusual slow starting version of The Who’s ‘My Generation’ (with a lyrical substitution of “why don’t you all fuck off?”) followed by an initially almost unrecognizable fast version of ‘Corduroy’ are delightful. ‘Immortality’ features a slow start and Ed has the guitar solo here, a rarity. A ‘Jeremy’ riff is played before Ed announces, “This is a new song … my favorite new song right now,” leading to ‘MFC,’ a new, fast paced, short rocker, inspired by the traffic in Rome (which later appears on Yield).

‘Love -> Building On Fire,’ the Talking Heads’ first release, is a rare surprise. After having fun with a funky guitar tab on The Police song, ‘Next to You,’ and Ed’s enthusiasm on ‘RVM’ briefly leaves his new bandmates in the dust initially, until he slows down, makes a quick apology and they continue together. Ed is in rare form here … he apparently wasn’t ready to end the tour after the wonderful Lisbon shows and this performance is a real treat!

[sppunk]

Damn iPhone can't dl .rar files apparently. Says link not available.

[Andy /]

VS/Vitalogy re-issues are up for preorder

Epic Records and Legacy Recordings celebrate Pearl Jam's 20th anniversary with the release of newly restored and expanded editions of Vs. and Vitalogy.


Vs. and Vitalogy will each be available in Definitive Legacy Editions, Deluxe Editions and together in a Limited Edition Collector's Boxed Set on Tuesday, March 29th. Each album will also be released in new commemorative, vinyl editions on April 12th in time for Record Store Day 2011 (April 16th).

Pre-orders for the Vs. and Vitalogy Limited Edition Collector's Boxed Set begin today at www.PearlJam.com.

Details on the new Reissue Formats of Vs. and Vitalogy are as follows:

1. 1. Definitive Legacy Editions (CD and Digital)

The definitive Legacy editions of Vs. and Vitalogy -- including the original studio albums, newly remastered, along with album-era bonus tracks -- will each be available on CD and digital formats:

• • The definitive Legacy edition of Vs. includes three bonus tracks recorded by Brendan O'Brien at The Site studio during the Vs. sessions:

- a previously unreleased acoustic version of "Hold On";
- "Cready Stomp" - a previously unreleased studio outtake;
- and the band's cover of Victoria Williams' "Crazy Mary" featuring Williams on backing vocals and guitar.

• • The definitive Legacy edition of Vitalogy includes three bonus tracks:

- the previously unreleased guitar/organ-only mix of "Betterman";
- a previously unreleased alternate take of "Corduroy" from the Vitalogy session (recorded by Brendan O'Brien);
- a previously unreleased demo version of "Nothingman," taken from the original DAT (recorded at John and Stu's in Seattle on October 14, 1993, featuring Richard Stuverud on drums).

1. 2. Deluxe Edition (3 CDs or Digital Download Bundle at Various Digital Service Providers)

• • Deluxe Edition CD version - Vs. and Vitalogy will be available together in a CD deluxe edition which includes:

- the Legacy edition of each album;
- a copy of Live at the Orpheum Theater, Boston, April 12, 1994. A special performance recorded at the tail end of the mythic Vs. tour, Live at the Orpheum Theater showcases a dream setlist created especially by the Pearl Jam crew and has for years been one of the most sought-after recordings among serious aficionados.

1. 3. Limited Edition Collector's Boxed Set (5 LPs, 4 CDs, 1 Cassette, Digital Download, Composition Notebook, Memorabilia-filled Envelope)

Vs. and Vitalogy will be available together in a limited edition collector's boxed set that includes 59 unique Pearl Jam performances on four CDs, five LPs and one cassette in addition to a number of guest artist performances. The Limited Edition Boxed set is only available for sale at pearljam.com.
Contents include:

• • Definitive Legacy editions of Vs. and Vitalogy remastered with bonus tracks on CD;
• • Remastered vinyl editions of Vs. (single LP) and Vitalogy (double LP);
• • Double vinyl LP and CD of Live at the Orpheum Theater, Boston, April 12, 1994 plus an exclusive digital download of the concert. A special performance recorded at the tail end of the mythic Vs. tour, Live at the Orpheum Theater showcases a dream setlist created especially by the Pearl Jam crew and has for years been one of the most sought-after recordings among serious aficionados;
• • Exclusive collector's cassette featuring live tribute and studio performances from a number of Pearl Jam's fellow artist friends. Broadcast on January 8, 1995, this recording is part of the legendary Monkeywrench/Self-Pollution Radio series produced by the band;
• • 80-page composition book filled with photos, drawings and artwork by Eddie Vedder and Jeff Ament;
• • A glassine envelope containing a collection of Vs. and Vitalogy- era memorabilia including beautiful lithographs of each band member, postcards, posters and much more.

1. 4. Record Store Day Vinyl Editions (LP) - Available April 12th

Vs. and Vitalogy will be available at independent record retailers in new commemorative, vinyl editions on April 12th in time for Record Store Day 2011 (April 16th).

• • Vs. (single LP) and Vitalogy (double LP) - both remastered

[McCollum]

Can someone post the PJ - Christmas single from 2008 that has Santa Cruz & Golden state on it? i can't find a good quality version of it these two songs.

[Raskolnikov]

Anybody get any Ed solo show tickets?

I was going for San Diego, and promptly was met over and over again with the server error message. By the time I stopped getting that message, it was too late, they were gone. Ended up going for the Long Beach ones and getting a pair - less than desirable, but oh well - another vacation day burned up, I guess.

Looking forward to my Vs/Vitalogy 3CD combo awaiting for me when I get home today...

[Andy /]

i got shut out of tix for minneapolis; first time that has happened for me. their site is fucked and frustrating, but as this is the first time it's happened to me, i'm not going to complain beyond that. i have friday off, so i may try and hit up the box office- i am not going to pay the extra $28 it would be to try on ticketbastard.

[wounded]

pretty standard pitchfork review. I get the impression the author is pissed people enjoy them live.

http://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/...heatre-boston/

In 2011, Pearl Jam celebrate the achievement of having been Pearl Jam for a very long time. It's their 20th anniversary, and they're marking the occasion with a blowout, yearlong victory lap: a massive curated festival, a career-spanning documentary directed by Cameron Crowe, and loving reissues of their second and third albums, Vs. and Vitalogy. It's an unusually protracted foray into the limelight for what was once a chronically spotlight-averse band, but they seem to be wearing the moment lightly, savoring it for its valedictory worth and gladly soaking up the adulation. In the years that spanned the original release of these two albums, they spent most of their effort scrambling to escape stardom, and Vs. and Vitalogy bear their struggle's deepest marks.

This willful abdication of fame has become their most well-known, oft-told story, and seeing these records given lavish repackaging only highlights that it feels like ancient history now. Consider: The opening salvo in Pearl Jam's war against commercialism was their decision, for 1993's Vs., not to make a video for MTV, a situation with no present-day analogue. Their protracted feud against Ticketmaster seems similarly remote now that Pearl Jam seemingly never stop touring: whether you live in Albany, West Palm Beach, Ljubljana, or Katowice, Pearl Jam probably just stopped by or will be there shortly, treating their entire discography like an all-you-eat buffet. These days, few bands are more comfortable in their own skin than Pearl Jam, and the monolithic mass culture bearing down on them 1993 has vanished into thin air.

But even if the media context has long crumbled, the sound of a young band absolutely freaking the fuck out is still loud and clear on Vs. and Vitalogy, and it makes them Pearl Jam's most resonant and affecting records. Their huge-selling debut, Ten, hit with an impact that could not be repeated, and they would go on to make some very good music later in their career. But as a band, this remains their most vital and endearing period-- the last time the entire world cared deeply about what Pearl Jam would do next.

Their music, as always, remains the least complex part of this equation. Pearl Jam's retooled take on classic rock was often lumpy and flat-footed, and they sounded hopelessly unfashionable next to their punk-influenced contemporaries. But focusing on these flaws, as most rock critics did and still do, misses out on the music's signature virtue, which is communication. It is this burning and self-evident need for human connection, more than anything else, that has always elevated and redeemed their most dubious efforts, and it was a quality personified by Eddie Vedder, an empathetic lead singer who transmitted a vivid emotional intensity. At its most winning, Pearl Jam's music exudes his best personality traits: warm, earnest, generous, passionate, and, yeah, harmlessly dopey sometimes.

Consider, for example, Vs.'s cringe-inducing gun-control song "Glorified G". "Kindred to being an American," Vedder pronounces in a hokey fake-jingo accent, over a corn-pone Skynyrd guitar lick: it's the sort of wince-inducing mess we get when he attempts to be caustic. Vs. is filled with this sort of clumsily wielded, early-90s political indignation, and it can make for precarious listening. Nevertheless, Vedder's anguished tenor anchors us through some rough waters-- including "Dissident", which, for some reason, focuses on the Lifetime movie-worthy story of a lonely spinster giving shelter to and falling for a charismatic young revolutionary, only to give surrender him to the authorities. It is a profoundly ludicrous song. But the way Vedder hollers "she gave him away," you'll catch yourself momentarily shaking your head in disgust at the woman's cowardice. Hell, even "Glorified G" boasts a killer bridge.

In retrospect, however, Vs. appears as the moment where it became crystal-clear that Pearl Jam's ballads were ultimately stronger than their rockers. For all their clenched fury, songs like "Go", "Animal", and "Blood" mostly just thrashed awkwardly in place. "Daughter", by contrast, is plaintive and lovely, and "Elderly Woman Behind the Counter in a Small Town" has survived nearly two decades of dorm-room slaughtering intact, an effortless and sunlit acoustic ballad that Rod Stewart could have written for Every Picture Tells a Story.

By the time of 1994's Vitalogy, Pearl Jam had spent a lot of energy on extra-musical fights. Recorded during breaks on their strenuous Vs. tour and subject to the communication breakdown of the entire band, Vedder took his strongest hand yet in the album's direction, pushing further from arena rock pyrotechnics. Somewhere in there, the original drummer-- good-natured hesher Dave Abbruzzese-- was fired due to "personality conflicts." (Read: he enjoyed being famous.)

The resulting album is still a defiantly weird beast, though not really in the way Vedder intended it to be. Under his direction, Vitalogy became their "experimental" album-- which, in Pearl Jam lingo, translates to "the one with all the most transparently awful ideas." On "Spin the Black Circle", we are treated to the spectacle of an empathetic, intuitive surfer straining to be a splenetic NYC punk rocker, while the band behind him falls over itself trying to keep pace with a simple hardcore riff. The polyrhythmic chanting of "Aya Davanita" sounds like corporate-retreat weekend warriors seeking their inner third eye in a drum circle. The accordion-and-tuba spoken-word of "Bugs" is an avert-your eyes, car-crash attempt at Captain Beefheart surrealism. And "Hey, Foxymophandelmama, That's Me" is an eight-minute sound collage featuring snippets of dialog from mental patients.

Here's the funny thing, though, about of all Vitalogy's ill-advised wandering-- it paid off elsewhere. Through all these misadventures, you can hear what was once the most rigid rhythmic backbone in rock began to stretch and pull like taffy, so that when Pearl Jam relax into a Stooges/MC5 proto-punk groove on "Last Exit", they sound rough, loose and limber like never before. In the snarling, adenoidal "Satan's Bed", Vedder actually manages one or two acerbically funny lines. It all came together on "Corduroy", which moves fluidly from quiet brooding to seething explosions to, in the chorus, a simple, humane plea, set to Vedder's single greatest melody.

"Corduroy"'s famous plea, of course, was from Vedder to his own too-adoring fans. "I don't wanna be held in your debt," he sang shakily to millions-- and, entranced, they screamed it back at him. The poignancy of Vitalogy, and the source of its actual weirdness, is how it veers from Vedder's impulse to hide from everyone and his instinctual desire to reach out. Nothing captures these warring impulses better than "Nothingman" and "Better Man", two folk-rock pillars of their catalog that are as open-hearted and yearning as anything they ever wrote. Even when he was trying his hardest to scowl at the world, Vedder couldn't help feeling, all over the place, for everyone. Misanthropy was always unbecoming on him. Most of his best, most beloved, and resonant songs are about other people's problems: "Nothingman", "Better Man", "Daughter", "Elderly Woman". In concert, the kiss-off of "Corduroy" has become Pearl Jam's most joyful, communal moment.

Live, Pearl Jam have always been a legendarily intense experience, and they've made an alarmingly consistent practice of making at least momentary believers out of anyone who sees them. The Vitalogy and Vs. reissues come bundled with a recording of the band at their early peak, at a 1994 show at Boston's Orpheum. It's a rousing set, and it opens compellingly, on Ten's slow-burn "Oceans". But years of live-Pearl-Jam-recording fatigue has dulled the impact of another official release-- this is a band that once decided to officially release every single show of a world tour, after all-- and Live at the Orpheum Theatre contains no real revelations. As they have done for years, they cover Neil Young's "Fuckin' Up" (the version on Live on Two Legs hits harder.) They play "Even Flow"; they don't play "Jeremy". The only real surprises are when Vedder drastically changes the words to "Immortality", and when he brings out Mudhoney's Mark Arm for a vicious rip through the Dead Boys' "Sonic Reducer". (Unable to bring himself to utter the dreaded g-word, he introduces Arm as "one of the forefathers of... uh... all the great music that everyone listens to.") It's a fine set, but it's hardly necessary.

In the ensuing decade-plus after Vs. and Vitalogy, Pearl Jam have gone from utter exile to a comfortable perch on the fringes. That's where they sit now, finding refuge in their live shows, which have developed a traveling-cult aura that clearly recalls the Grateful Dead's. For the members of Pearl Jam, however, the live shows don't just bring together their faithful; they rewrite the band's own troubled history. In 2011, it doesn't matter what song they drag out in concert: "Lukin", the one-minute punk brain-fart from No Code? The poignant but relatively rare B-side single "I Got Id"? The ukulele song from Binaural? No worries: The crowd knows every word and will go absolutely apeshit for it. They can thrash joyfully through "Spin the Black Circle" as if Jeff Ament and Mike McCready didn't grit their way through the recording session. Hell, they can even play "Bugs" live now if they want. These days, they have the aura of happy, weathered warriors, proud to have just made it out together. The live show remains the most optimal set of conditions to give yourself over to their ham-fisted grandeur; go see them, if you have a chance. They'll be by soon.

[Raskolnikov]

Originally Posted by AndySlash

i got shut out of tix for minneapolis; first time that has happened for me. their site is fucked and frustrating, but as this is the first time it's happened to me, i'm not going to complain beyond that.

Yeah, I know what you mean... for the last PJ tour, I scored four sets, no problem - odd that this was so grizzly. Trying to get another pair today for my bro for LB via Ticketmaster (in like 2 mins) so we'll be shelling out another good stack of cash. Damn, these things are not cheap!

Anyways - you guys get the Vs/Vitalogy set? I got the 3CD one, haven't really had time to delve into it yet, sadly. On first listen to about 3/4 of Vs, the remaster was killing me... sounds great.

[Andy /]

i did get tix through the box office, so i am thankful for that.

haven't even ordered the vs/vitalogy stuff yet. was going to order the super box or whatever a couple weeks back, but then read the rumor of an ed show here, so i held off. i'll get it eventually.

[dustrock]

The extra stuff is interesting - the organ version of Better Man is actually surprisingly pretty, and Corduroy is more or less the same except the lyrics are far different.

Acoustic Hold On I actually think blows compared to the band version, which should have been on Vs. if I had my way. Cready Stomp could have been a pretty cool song but I'm not a huge instrumental guy.

Can't really argue with the Pitchfork take on the Orpheum show - it sounds great but I'm live showed out at this point.

As far as the "remasters" of Vs. and Vitalogy, not sure if I've even heard a noticeable difference, whereas obviously Ten was night and day difference.

[Fonzie]

Originally Posted by Raskolnikov

I got the 1994 Christmas single. While it's lame b/c it's the most common, it's not a totally bum deal, seeing as I don't have it.

i got the 1991 single for 5 bucks about 2 years ago.

[Andy /]

damn, son. and i thought finding that one for $15 when i was in LA a few years back was a steal.

[redbreegull]

Originally Posted by dustrock

As far as the "remasters" of Vs. and Vitalogy, not sure if I've even heard a noticeable difference, whereas obviously Ten was night and day difference.

Ten was not just remastered, it was remixed as well. Were Vs. and Vitalogy just remastered?

[Nimrod's Son]

Originally Posted by redbreegull

Ten was not just remastered, it was remixed as well. Were Vs. and Vitalogy just remastered?

Yes.

[Nimrod's Son]

Also I got 2 tix for the Ed Show

[Andy /]

someone on the pearl jam board leaked three files yesterday (a "420 Treat" supposedly):

an "it's ok" daughter tag studio/soundcheck (guesses are 98-00, possibly just before the virginia beach 00 show)
possibly a working demo or live rehearsal of faithfull
and, least interesting, some rehearsal last exits riffs

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=GHAHFDXQ

[pale blue eyes]

Any news on the Christmas single yet? I haven't seen anything.

[Raskolnikov]

Originally Posted by pale blue eyes

Any news on the Christmas single yet? I haven't seen anything.

I love how this isn't even CLOSE to being a Christmas thing for the past few years... more like a "When we get around to it" single. Oh well - at least they always come through on it.

[Andy /]

the 10c manager said on the sirius radio show that they've pulled something out of the "vault" and that, while it's not something new, it's something "cool". he didn't give a when, i'd bet we'd get it in the next month.

[Andy /]

[Raskolnikov]

I am TOTALLY, TOTALLY looking forward to the PJ20 documentary. That clip looks great, too.

I wonder how wide of a release we're talking about - is this one of those things that will only be in theaters for one night, or is it going to hang out at art house style theaters for a while?

[Andy /]

i'd bet on a 1-2 week run at indie theaters at the least. cameron crowe's name being attached will garner interest, i'd think enough to warrant more than a one-off type deal. i guess we'll see.

[Nimrod's Son]

Anyone going to Alpine Valley? I would have considered it but giving people less than two weeks notice for flights, time off, hotels, etc. is kind of bullshit.

[Andy /]

labor day weekend, mike. not memorial day.

[Nimrod's Son]

Originally Posted by AndySlash

labor day weekend, mike. not memorial day.

oh. maybe i read that wrong.

did you see the hotel packages? looks like to go to the festival will cost like $5g unless you're a local.

[Andy /]

10c booked those rooms and marked them up significantly. people who bought into the rumors early and reserved rooms got them for 1/4 of what 10c is trying to get, even just a couple weeks before the announcement. it's ridiculous, really. people are going to pay that much to stay at a fucking country inn and suites?

i've camped at one of the state forests every year i've gone to alpine, about a half hour away from the venue. fuck hotels.