I've always liked Miers' reviews because he "gets" it. I should post one of his columns on Britney Spears and those of her ilk at some point.

http://www.buffalonews.com/editorial/20 ... 028717.asp

Pearl Jam takes on the issues of the day
By JEFF MIERS
NEWS POP MUSIC CRITIC
5/2/2006
3.5 stars

Over the course of the last few weeks, early reviews and feature pieces surrounding the impending release of "Pearl Jam," the Seattle band's eighth studio effort, suggested that the record somehow redeemed the group's willful "career suicide" of the past decade.

Almost unanimously, these pieces claimed the band commenced veering way off track following 1994's "Vitalogy," distancing itself from the mainstream, shunning the press, MTV and radio, and becoming increasingly strange, if not downright obtuse, with each successive release.

"Pearl Jam," out today, is said to right these perceived wrongs. This is utter and complete nonsense.

In the decade since Pearl Jam turned its back on the mainstream, it methodically set about becoming the best live rock band on the planet, explored alternative means of communicating with its audience away from the media spotlight's glare, found a way to make plenty of money while charging ticket admission prices in the area of 75 percent less than the majority of its peers, and released its three best albums - "Yield," (1998) "Binaural" (2000) and the career-defining "Riot Act" (2002).Over the course of these releases, the band evolved from progenitor of anthemic "grunge" to bona-fide, far-reaching, creatively untethered rock band.

"Pearl Jam" does not "undo" any of this, nor should it have been expected to. There is indeed no sense fixing what ain't broke. If there is any marked difference between the "weirdo art rock" tendencies of Pearl Jam 1993 - 2005 and the "kinder, gentler, more accessible" Pearl Jam represented by this new disc, it must only be in the mind of critics who've been asleep since the band turned inward and expanded its artistic capabilities more than a decade back.

That said, this record is a corker from start to finish, and it certainly finds the group, and vocalist/guitarist/principal lyricist Eddie Vedder, in particular, mining the righteous (but not self-righteous) anger that has long been the catalyst for its strongest work.

What's Vedder worked up about this time around? Take a wild guess.

It would be a serious stretch to suggest, as some have, that "Pearl Jam" is a "concept album" aimed at slinging mud the Bush administration's way. Vedder as a writer is far too hip and intuitively astute to stoop to mere broadsides. That would be like shooting fish in a barrel, or preaching to the silenced choir, at this point. Instead, he finds the universal in the particularities of this time, this place, this set of leaders and the culture of fear and uncertainty they've propagated.

Vedder's targets are the ethos of narcissism and negativity that, ironically, is part of Generation X's legacy, particularly among the artists in Pearl Jam's peer group ("Life Wasted"); what he cites as the Bush presidency's tendency to "write checks that others pay" ("World Wide Suicide"); apathy among the populous ("Comatose"); religious fanaticism masquerading as compassion ("Marker In the Sand"); and the real, human cost of the "new and improved" trickle-down economics ("Unemployable").

As ever, Vedder approaches these topics as poet, not moral authority figure. And, as has been the case with all of Pearl Jam's best work, he offers hope throughout, contrasting a grim outlook against a romantic, optimistic one. Lyrically, this is among Vedder's finest work.

But Pearl Jam is not really a folk music band, and the lyrics, while providing the emotional and spiritual contexts for the songs, are only part of the story. The rest is the mighty PJ sound, one that kicks continually against the pricks and insists on the continued relevance of a guitar-based heavy rock music that is unafraid to explore and exploit the dynamics of light and shade.

Pearl Jam is one of the last democratic bands - what esteemed critic Dave Marsh called, in his exemplary biography of the Who, "Before I Get Old," the "truly great rock band" - one in which the contributions of each member are essential to a whole that handily outweighs the sum of its parts. Thus, every musician receives writing credit on "Pearl Jam," which at once ensures a diverse and variegated record, and one in which the power of the true band is celebrated. Vedder, a prolific writer on his own, could easily have turned PJ into his personal kingdom, with the other four members "backing" him. Happily, he - like his co-conspirators, guitarists Stone Gossard and Mike McReady, bassist Jeff Ament and drummer Matt Cameron - remains committed to the band ideal.

Surprisingly, given all the advance buzz suggesting that this album marked the return of the "radio-ready" Pearl Jam, the record is dense and not instantly accessible. It requires at least a dozen close listens before its Pandora's box-load of charms can be unlocked. Part of the reason for this is the complexity of the music itself; drummer Cameron is extremely adept at making odd time signatures seem wholly natural, and can easily morph from a 6/8 waltz-like time, to a straight up 4/4 rock feel without the listener being jarred by the experience.

Similarly, the guitar parts work by exploring an orchestrated construction that is likely more intuitive than painstakingly "written out." All of this adds up to a demanding rock record that, if given the proper attention by the listener, will reap rewards for years to come, rather than simply tossing off ephemeral instant pleasures.

"Riot Act" remains the real feather in Pearl Jam's cap, but this new record is wholly excellent - brave, poetic, melodic, challenging, knotty, and during its peak moments, truly transcendent. Which is to say, it's yet another great Pearl Jam record.

e-mail: jmiers@buffnews.com

great review. he seems to really like riot act.

i have a man crush and i plan on e-mailing him to tell him that.

fuck buffalo

Nice review. Especially since he didn't write "Pearl Jam" is good because it's loud.

Probably the best review of the album I've seen thus far... although I completely disagree with him on Riot Act.

someone's still dealing with the 7-1 loss on home ice. I believe i said it before the series and i'll say it again. Classy Philly fans.

Nice to see the hometown rag give huge praise to the album.

he spelled mccready wrong in the part about the democracy of the band.