so i have joined the rm board after years over at the haven...too little discussion of what pj is all about over there...MUSIC
i have a question:are there any rvm reviews floating around.I`ve read the seattle post-intelligencer one and that was awesome .I`ve also read the pitchfork and that was , well, not so good.
Joined: Tue Oct 19, 2004 7:17 am Posts: 785 Location: The Control Room
Pitchfork reviewed it, but there's another thread devoted to that, so I won't post the link here.
From Allmusic.com...
Stephen Thomas Erlewine wrote:
Joe Strummer once claimed that the Clash had stardom in their hands, then they dropped it on the floor and broke it. Pearl Jam took the opposite tact: they purposely left stardom behind. Nirvana may have ushered in the age of grunge and alternative rock, but Pearl Jam were the biggest band in the land during the first half of the '90s, dominating radio airwaves, MTV, and college dorms alike. Most bands would have embraced such widespread acclaim, but the quintet bristled at this vein, and started to restlessly explore new musical territory, a move that eventually whittled their fan base down to just the hardcore by the beginning of the next decade. That hardcore following was still large, and the band could still have the occasional surprising crossover hit, like the 1999 cover of J. Frank Wilson's teen tragedy classic "Last Kiss" that went to number two on the Billboard charts, but they were no longer the biggest band in the land. Spanning two discs, Rearviewmirror (Greatest Hits 1991-2003) chronicles that journey and it does an expert job not only of capturing the moment when Pearl Jam were monstrously popular, but proving that they still turned out good music even when they were fading from the spotlight. Unlike most career-spanning, multi-disc retrospectives, Rearviewmirror does not emphasize latter-day albums in order to achieve a sense of balance that's inherently phony. Of the 33 tracks, only 12 date from the post-Vitalogy era, which means that the bulk of the collection concentrates on their early-'90s heyday, and nearly every radio hit and concert staple is here, outside of the Victoria Williams cover "Crazy Mary" and "Tremor Christ." While their presence would have been nice, they're not terribly missed, partially because such non-LP cuts like "State of Love and Trust," "I Got ID," "Last Kiss," and "Man of the Hour" are collected here, but mainly because the compilation plays so well. The songs are divided into the "Up Side" and "Down Side," meaning the first disc has all the rockers and the second disc has all the ballads. At first, this seems like a questionable strategy, since it's usually preferable to have all the hits follow in chronological order, but what makes this work is that the songs on each disc are presented in chronological order, and they sustain their mood quite well (this is partially helped by Brendan O'Brien's new mixes of "Once," "Alive," and "Black," which retain the feeling of the original songs but remove much of the dated glossy sheen in the production). Distilled to their hits and anthems, all of Pearl Jam's best qualities shine through and they sound bigger, better, and frankly more coherent than they do on their full-length albums. And that's why Rearviewmirror is a cut above most '90s hits collections: it not only gives casual fans all the hits, but it captures why the band mattered, while providing a better listen than their proper LPs in the process.
_________________ I'm intercontinental when I eat french toast.
Maybe that's because Binaural is a better record than RVM.
yeah,right
Seriously.rvm has not ONE bad song on it...
But because it has songs from so many different eras, it doesn't manage to have the thematic or unified qualities that make an album more than just a collection of songs. It does surprisingly well, considering how much this band has changed, but I've never yet heard a greatest hits that could compete with an artist's actual catalogue.
Joined: Mon Nov 29, 2004 6:32 pm Posts: 719 Location: Originally from the big city of Oslo, Norway. Studying in Ås at the moment.
Here's a review from VG, the biggest newspaper in Norway:
http://www.vg.no/pub/vgart.hbs?artid=256668 If your norwegian sucks, I can tell you that it got five eyes on the dice (Which, in case you don't know, has got six sides).
I'll try to translate:
[size=18]Great Startpackage for new Pearl Jam-fans Pearl Jams first Compilation-CD ''Rearviewmirror'' contains two CD's with 33 songs from the band's 14 year long career. So ofcourse there are lots of legendary songs.
But stricktly speaking, it would be enough to make a compilation from the three first records, plus maybe ''Of He Goes'' from ''No Code''. Many songs from the latest (and relatively uninterresting) records could have been swapped with ''Garden'', ''Oceans'' and ''Porch'' from the bands definitive masterpiece ''Ten''. And where are ''Indifference'',''Tremor Christ'' and ''Whipping''?
Luckily both ''Breath'' and ''State Of Love And Trust'' from ''Singles'' are here, and to hear SOLAT again at least makes me warm around the heart.
The disc ''Up Side'' gives a very good insight in some of the nineties' very greatest musical moments. So for the ones who has'nt got any Pearl Jam albums yet, ''Rearviewmirror'' is a goldmine. MARIT AABY VEBENSTAD[/size]
If she only likes the three first albums, i think it's pretty weird to give it five out of six... But I guess I should'nt complain...
_________________ War doesn't determine who's right. It determines who's left. -EV
Pearl Jam: Rearviewmirror: Greatest Hits 1991-2003
Released: Nov 16, 2004
Genre: Rock
Styles: Alternative Pop/Rock, Grunge, Hard Rock
Number Of Tracks: 33
It not only gives casual fans all the hits, but it captures why the band mattered, while providing a better listen than their proper LPs in the process.
4.3/5
Sound: Being that Rearviewmirror is the greatest hits compliation for Pearl Jam, there is a lot of variation in the styles and sounds of the record. Pearl Jam is known for the amount of variety they've produced in their albums throughout their career, and this is the epitome of it. Your first notion when looking at the track list are the remixes of the three songs chosen from the album "Ten", which are "Alive", "Black", and "Once". Think of them as not remixed but remade using newer modern equipment. Every song on this album is of pure quality. [5]
Lyrics: Eddie Vedder is a lyrical genious, moreso in my opinion than Kurt Cobain. Rearviewmirror expresses everything that Vedder has felt/stood for in his music career in definite fashion. Not only is Vedder's lyric-writing superb, but his vocals are just as great. He can alter his voice at any time and have it still sound good, unlike a lot of other artists you see nowadays. My only problem with his vocals is the fact that you can start to hear the deterioration of his voice on the tracks from later albums. Vedder needs to quit smoking. [4]
Overall Impression: A little personal sidenote, I feel that some of the tracks on here should be replaced with other tracks. I would have loved to see "Indifference" off Vs., "No Way" off Yield, and at least another song off Lost Dogs, such as "Sad", "Dead Man", "Fatal", or "Wash". These could replace "Immortality", "Light Years", and "Save You". If you own all of Pearl Jam's albums, like I do, then odds are you won't be purchasing this but downloading the remixes and the track "State of Love and Trust". I wouldn't blame you for it, but it's always nice to have a "best-of" CD to keep with you in the car and this is a great "best-of" album. Then again, it is a best-of album, so odds are you have all the albums that these songs appear on. But if you haven't picked up all of Pearl Jam's records or you haven't ever heard of Pearl Jam (shame on you!) want to find out what you've missed, then this is a choice purchase for you. If someone stole this, I'd break their face if I could find them, but I'd most definitely repurchase the CD if I couldn't find a face to break. [4]
And suddenly we are running upstairs, slamming doors, locking ourselves in teenage bedrooms, suppressed tears and fathers knocking on doors and raising voices. But we don't care -- our reflections are so big, bold and radiating that no one will ever be able to relate to -- Except for Eddie Vedder.
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.I`ve also read the pitchfork and that was , well, not so good. 
