Review: Ten Remixed
I have previously shared my love for Pearl Jam on the pages of Der Kulturblog. At this point, I’d like to invite PJ haters to isch poff, lest they offend my family, my honour, and my ripped jeans. Yes, yes, we all know Mudhoney are more genuinely grunge; and yes, PJ derivatives such as Nickelback suck with much suckitude.
Still, no reason to hate the mighty PJ. You want Sub Pop credentials? I give you Gossard/Ament’s origins with Green River. And the fact that the Eddie Vedder baritone has been mimicked by a generation of Bo Bice’s is as relevant as the Mexico Beatle is to the beauty of the VW Bug. (On a side note, how good is Vedder’s Into the Wild album?)
Much of my attachment to Pearl Jam is a matter of timing. At fifteen in 1991, I was a little too young and uncool to have appreciated the first wave of BritPop that had invaded the English shires from its home in Manchester. But when Seattle arrived in the UK, it was just the right mix of anger and passion to fuel an English teenager’s (ridiculously overblown) angst. I started with Nevermind and then worked backwards — to Sonic Youth and Mudhoney — and sideways to Alice in Chains and Pearl Jam. From its first play, Ten set itself apart. The mellow “Master/Slave” intro before the frenzy of “Once”; “Even Flow” then “Alive” before “Why Go,” “Black” and “Jeremy.” Those initial songs, and their progression, are as familiar as anything to me in music. (That, and the Imperial March.)
It is true that Pearl Jam are not really a grunge band. Ten is a 70′s rock (cf. The Who) album with a good dose of blues-metal (courtesy of Mike McCready), but without the metal bling or the pretension of stadium rock.[1] Pearl Jam’s conscious slide out of the limelight is well-known, but it is worth repeating that seven albums removed from Ten, they are still churning out the good stuff and entertaining a very loyal, Deadhead-like fanbase.
PJ’s recent efforts are a lot barer than their 1991 debut, and you can easily imagine that the band have been itching to strip away some of the treble, beef-up Ament’s bass, and remove some of the egregious vocal and guitar wankiness. So here it is, Ten (remixed by Brendan O’Brien). You can buy the record in four packages, from the super deluxe version, to a cheap double album. Each version has a remastered copy of Ten plus the remixed version, plus bonus songs.
The deluxe version (£20) includes a DVD of their MTV Unplugged performance, the brilliance of which still lingers. I remember when I first saw it. I had just returned from a school trip to Bordeaux where we had listened to Ten on a walkman over and over again. (The cassette was blue with “Ten” written in red on the label and had REM on the other side.) I had set the VCR to record MTV and watched it almost as soon as I walked through the door. Vedder’s change of key during “Black,” and his stool-surfing in “Porch,” were coolness McCool.
Such things are amplified in the eyes of sixteen year-old males who love music, play the guitar, and want to be Rock Gods. That they vividly stay with me at 33 when listening to Ten is evidence that this record is more than just an album. Oh, that’s pure Emmentaler, I know, but for those with ears to hear, you’ll find many ways to enjoy this “new”Ten.
[1] Of course, releasing box sets for a fortune is a very stadium rock thing to do. Oh well.
Posted on April 2, 2009, in Music. Bookmark the permalink. 13 Comments.
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Your situation sounds very familiar to mine. I’m about the same age as you and I saw them live at a club during my senior year of high school (1993 or 1994, I can’t remember) a couple of months before they became the biggest band in the world.
I have not purchased the reissue (and I don’t plan to), but I did recently play Ten for the first time in, I dunno, 12 or 13 years just to see how it held up. Fearing the worst, I played the whole thing in one setting. While I certainly don’t like it as much as my 17-year old self did, I think about half of it acquits itself quite well.
A couple of things that stand out:
1. It’s a lot more mannered than I remember. Everything seemed slower and more restrained than in my memories. This may be memories of the live show blurring with memories of the album itself.
2. While Eddie Vedder is unquestionably a terrific and unique singer, he’s also a douchebag. I’m not normally one to get excited about lyrics one way or another, but could this guy be any more “angst-ridden teenager scribbling in a notebook” if he tried? I hope the remix buries his voice just a bit – it’d be great to be able to hear him but not understand what he’s saying.
On the whole, I did enjoy revisiting the album and I still find myself singing the songs in my head a few days later. I don’t know if I’ll revisit it again anytime soon, but it was fun. So fun, in fact, that I made the mistake of listening to the second PJ album, Vs. Holy moly was that a mistake.
Brian,
Young Eddie was too earnest, this is true. He’s mellowed with age, as has the band.
I haven’t heard anything since Vitalogy (which I did not like at the time). I’d be interested in hearing something from the years since. Which title(s) would you recommend? I have access to Binaural, Riot Act, and Yield.
I was impressed that Pearl Jam tried to take on Ticketmaster.
Sadly, as far as I know, that effort failed miserably.
Of that list, and in this order:
Yield
Binaural
Riot Act.
But No Code is better than all three. Jury’s still out on the eponymous Pearl Jam.
I love Eddie a ridiculous amount.
Nice post, Brit. I think I’ve already told you the story of the time I went to a Brad instore and had Stone autograph my vinyl copy of a Green River record, and completely froze when I got up to him? So much I could have said about the early days and I couldn’t speak a word. Stupid autism.
I just got Ten on Rock Band. Awesomeness.
Jeremy was a great crescendo to a great album.
PJ was my first music obsession. As soon as I had a job I started collecting bootlegs and import singles for the unreleased B-sides. There was an awesome little record store just up the road that always had something to tempt me. I spent a lot of payday afternoons there.
I don’t love listening to PJ albums straight through very much anymore but each of their albums has some really great songs. Ten is mostly made up of great songs, lyrics aside (but boy did those lyrics work for me when I was a kid).
Having listened to that record compulsively in high school (and covered many of the songs in various bands) it is fun to go back and revisit it. I hadn’t listened to Ten for years but upon revisiting it, the excessive reverb annoyed me, which on checking the remix they have all but stripped. As someone who had a taste of Seattle before moving to the midwest before grunge hit it big (Soundgarden’s Louder Than Love is still a great album), this album was like manna; and in my opinion, it was the best of the era.
“The deluxe version (£20) includes a DVD of their MTV Unplugged performance, the brilliance of which still lingers.”
Well that is just great, now I have no choice but to purchase the deluxe set. I had given up all hope that PJ would release their Unplugged set.
Although, the first thing that comes to mind when I think back on their unplugged performance is Eddie standing up on the stool during “Porch” and writing Pro-Choice on his arm.
Vedder’s soundtrack to Into the Wild is the greatest thing he’s done in the past 10 years. Check it out.