Eddie Vedder

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/the ... 19503.html
BRIAN BOYD


Ukele Songs Universal

**** (4/5)

When the news leaked out, a lot of people thought they were reading a headline from the Onion . Surely, the angsty lead singer of Pearl Jam couldn’t put out a whole album using just his voice and the Hawaiian four-string?

Ukulele Songs is just that. The second big surprise is that it’s a musical triumph – a cheeky, audacious move from an unpredictable talent. This mix of originals and covers could be the surprise dinner-party hit of the year. After all, the ukulele, after years in the musical margins, is now achingly “on trend”.

He opens with a cover of Pearl Jam’s own Can’t Keep , which works here as a short, sharp, shock introduction. What’s striking here – as in so many of the 16 songs – is how Vedder’s familiar vocal takes on a new, richer dimension when put against the most simple of musical arrangements. With all the songs under three minutes and many below two, there’s a judicious use of timing here (and, let’s face it, nobody wants ukulele noodling).

The biggest surprise, given the limited instrumentation, is just how different he can make the songs sound. The stand-out track, Broken Heart , which features one of his most evocative vocal deliveries, is world’s apart from a song such as Light Today.

There’s a new-found sweetness to his approach. He sings More Than You Know and Goodbye with the sort of caress we’ve never heard before. It’s a tribute to how quickly you get used to the sound that when a cello insinuates its way into Longing to Belong (the first single), you feel as if the sound has suddenly got all cluttered-up.

At the tail-end of the album is a cover of The Everly Brothers’ Sleepless Nights (on which he is joined by Glen Hansard), before Cat Power crops up on Tonight You Belong To Me and beautifully judged Dream a Little Dream brings the magical mystery tour to an end. Buy it. See pearljam.com/users/ eddievedder

Download tracks: Can’t Keep , Broken Heart , More Than You Know

nice review. I agree Broken Heart is the gem here.

i've taken a week off from this album and really look forward to throwing it on while grilling this weekend

I don't want to bring back the whole "what constitutes a cover" debate, but can you cover a song that you yourself wrote?

Nice review.

man he looks old there.

http://allmusic.com/album/ukulele-songs-r2170522/review



There is no irony in the title of Eddie Vedder’s first full-fledged solo album: these are indeed songs performed on a ukulele, an instrument uncommon but not unknown to rockers. George Harrison was a well-known advocate of the small four-string instrument, and Vedder’s hero Pete Townshend once cut a lovely little gem called “Blue Red and Grey” on ukulele, a song that could easily slide onto this gently ramshackle collection of covers, re-recordings, and new tunes. To say that this is a minor album is to dismiss its intimacy and miss its appeal: Vedder’s self-imposed curse is that he takes everything very seriously indeed, so to hear him without the weight of the world on his shoulders is disarmingly inviting. He has nothing more in mind on Ukulele Songs than singing, whether it’s with duet partners Glen Hansard and Cat Power or just on his own, tossing out love songs, something he generally has avoided with Pearl Jam. Vedder never has been ashamed of his bleeding heart -- it’s something that grounds Pearl Jam even when they’re in full-blast bombast mode -- yet it’s refreshing to have a record where that heart is pushed toward the center, beating fully and proudly on his lightest, sweetest album yet.

I'm excited to finally hear this.

I'm pretty glad the reviewers get this; it deserves the good reviews it's getting.

after listening to this album a fair amount i'm not sure what I would give it. a 7/10 I think. it's a very pleasant and enjoyable listen, and at this point there are only 1-2 songs I really don't care for, but I can't really imagine ever WANTING to hear any of these songs, even if the album is a nice listen.

Huh. Seems a little Pit-y to not just include this in the Uke Songs thread.

we've always had review threads though. push for the merge. I just thoughpwople wouldn't like that thread blocked up with actual reviews Instead of their own whining about it.

I was just bored when I posted that, Dave.

you did the right thing Dime. Don't let anyone tell you otherwise.

Yeah it does.

http://www.spin.com/reviews/eddie-vedde ... nkeywrench

(6/10)

Going against self-serious type, Eddie Vedder releases an album of -- truth in advertising -- ukulele songs, taking a breather from Pearl Jam's big-rock caravan. His unadorned plucking rings sweet and simple, supporting little love songs that rely mostly on Vedder's lovely baritone. Only "Can't Keep" and "Without You" could conceivably be expanded into PJ songs; the rest feel too weightless, though duets with Glen Hansard and Chan Marshall (on uke standard "Tonight You Belong to Me" via Steve Martin's The Jerk) are pleasant enough. If you've ever fantasized about Vedder singing you, or your kids, to sleep, consider your wish fulfilled.

The author took a bit of an online beating for this sentence; for good reason.

Online beatings; they're the worst kind!

Ed looks better in person.

Especially when he has a big fuckin smile on his face.

http://www.antiquiet.com/reviews/2011/0 ... gs-review/

Eddie Vedder Shines His Tropical Heartlight On ‘Ukulele Songs’ ****
By Johnny Firecloud
Thursday, May 19, 2011

Pearl Jam frontman Eddie Vedder’s second solo effort is a beautifully intimate collection of love songs, but the experience demands an emotional investment that will limit replay value for the tech-spaz masses. Make no mistake: rather than a gathering of Rock songs stripped to fit an instrumentation concept, this is most definitely a ukulele album, in both spirit and sound. All the trappings associated with such must be fully considered when listening, because the delicate nature of the record’s instrument centerpiece doesn’t support the weight of high-energy expectation.

Ukulele Songs doesn’t offer the slightest hint of a turn down Vedder’s familiar Who-tinged Rock alleyways, and Eddie checks his signature activist sentiment at the dock before hitting the island. These are lyrically potent and, often, poignant heart songs through and through, many of which were written during a time of significant transition in his life; Within the past decade, Vedder has divorced his teenage sweetheart, remarried and begun a family. And it clearly shows.

Thus, the PJ frontman shows his most intimate colors as a romantic balladeer in this 16 track collection, but with a running time of under 35 minutes there’s little danger of drowning in the sap. Only two songs cross the three minute mark, leaving most impressions soaked in a sense of fleeting, like sand slipping through the fingers.

In a recent Chicago Tribune interview, Vedder explained the ukulele’s impact on his songwriting. “I learned so much about music by playing this little, miniature songwriting machine, especially about melody. The motto is less strings more melody. I was able to apply it to whatever I’m trying to write. It’s become part of songwriting for me, the knowledge I gained from hearing the melodies come out, and then applying that to guitar or vocals.”

Jammers know Can’t Keep well as the opening track to PJ’s Riot Act, but will delight in hearing the song as it was originally intended. As is the case with certain quieter Vedder compositions, sometimes the full band treatment squeezes the intimate spirit from the song in the Pearl Jam world. It’s fully intact here, and thus far easier to envision the setting that much of the record is implied to have sprung from: an isolated island paradise, feet covered in sand, a moment of bliss translated into music. The vigorous strumming suggests an urgency in the proud defiance, his primal wailing at the end a token of free-spirit bliss.

Eddie’s known among his peers for vanishing acts, lengthy jaunts to remote island surf spots with the likes of wave god Kelly Slater, where he spends considerable time amongst the waves between campfire creative sessions (as increasingly evidenced through Pearl Jam’s catalogue). The consistency of sound on Ukulele Songs allows the listener – if they should permit – to immerse themselves in the romantic tropicalia of the album’s origins without a tethering reminder of the swarms of reality.

Among those halfway out the door before the needle drops, there’s little defending the teenage-spark affection of a line such as “Sun sets on this ocean / Never once on my devotion” in Without You. But for the initiated and immersed, the kindest of all sledgehammers hits center chest when he sings “I’ll keep on healing all the scars that we’ve collected from the start / I’d rather this than live without you,” through a gorgeously cascading melody, with a naked declaration of warts-and-all grownup acceptance and true love rising through the ruins of yesteryear’s agonies. Prepare to hear this played at many future weddings between those who’ve gone enough rounds with life to empathize.

Seductive, crushing allegiance in sonic fluidity, Satellite was written from the perspective of Lorri Davis Echols, steadfast wife of Damien Echols of the controversially incarcerated West Memphis 3. It’s just one of several that Vedder debuted during two solo performances in the early Spring of 2002, alongside You’re True, Goodbye and Broken Heart, but among those decade-old gems, Satellite stands clear as the most captivatingly majestic, a heartwrenching testament to unwavering devotion in the face of nearly insurmountable odds. The doubled vocal chorus is a burst of rich color, Vedder’s self-harmonizing tenor blanketing the moment like so many stars in an island sky.

If Satellite is best from those early debuts, You’re True is easily the most transformed, with a completely new second verse, bridge and rhythm shift. The track suffers as a result of the changed lyrics, but maintains its gorgeously melodic uke exit. Meanwhile, the overdue acknowledgement of betrayal in Sleeping By Myself leaves a hole within, a strong competitor for heartbreaker of the record against the sad sendoff of Goodbye (“And for what feels like the first time / I don’t know where you are tonight / I guess that this is goodbye”).

Ukulele Songs is littered with non-musical moments as well, glimpses into personal instants or subtle mood manipulations – the Zippo-flick cigarette light before Goodbye, for instance, or Eddie’s incredulous laugh at the Longing to Belong onset. The eight-second Hey Fahkah consists entirely of Ed messing up a chord, laughing (perhaps drunkenly) to himself and uttering an alien grunt. But crashing waves and footsteps walking through guide us into (and out of) Light Today, a short revelation built on a circling, simple riff. It’s a mood-builder, a short trip down to the water for a moment of revelation before returning to the fire.

Glen Hansard works a fantastic accompanying harmony on Sleepless Nights, a yearner we’re sure to see at the PJ20 festival weekend. It’s powerful, but outshined by the overdose of adorable that is Tonight You Belong to Me, a reworking of the classic song from The Jerk, with Vedder as Steve Martin and Cat Power as Bernadette Peters. No trumpet solo this time around, however – but the magic is undiminished.

Ukulele Songs won’t be received well in Rock circles, and younger Pearl Jam fans without personal reference will find themselves divided by the sounds of a man in midlife stride, embracing his mortality and wearing his heart on his sleeve. But for those of us who know what to expect, or have had their journey thus far lit in some way by Vedder’s more personal compositions, it’s a long-awaited moonlit gem.

This album deserves the mostly good reviews it's gotten.

It never ceases to amaze me how stip ends up with an opposite opinion from mine on anything PJ almost all the time.