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 Post subject: Pearl Jam vs. Foo Fighters
PostPosted: Tue Sep 25, 2012 4:09 am 
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I was at De Luna Fest this weekend. Anyone else who was there can tell you by crowd size and reaction, the Foo Fighters are the bigger band. This must have happened in the last 6 years because I last saw them on the same bill at Bridge Benefit in 2006, and PJ went on after the Foos then.

I suppose the next 10 or 20 years need to pass to know for sure, but it made me wonder how history will remember these two bands 50 years from now.

If you look at the two groups next to each other, I see Pearl Jam having an advantage in only two things, but those two things are probably the most important. 1) They have Ten. It's a seminal album. It's Appetite for Destruction, Nevermind, the Black Album. It's that rare album where the non-hits seem like hits because it was an album that most people listened to from front to back. It's the reason more people at a show sing along to Why Go than World Wide Suicide, even though the latter was a number one rock hit. 2) They have influence. This is a direct result of 1 and the way Eddie came across in the Jeremy video. Kings of Leon, Seether, Gaslight Anthem, etc. I personally believe there is a guy in all of these bands who wanted to be 1992 Eddie Vedder. He was mysterious, he had charisma, and the way he suddenly looked left as the camera came around raised goosebumps. The mtv unplugged performance solidified those feelings. Now I'm talking about me, aren't I?

Then there are the Foos. I think the biggest factor working against them is that Dave was the drummer in an even bigger band. They don't have Ten, but they have the Colour and the Shape. It's a classic, but not on the same level. That said, Monkeywrench, My Hero and Everlong stand up well next to Evenflow, Jeremy, and Alive. They lack influence, but they seem to be respected by as many established older musicians as PJ. Maybe more. And now that Eddie has gotten older and revealed himself to be kind of a cranky, self-important doucher, is there anyone who wouldn't rather have a beer with Dave Grohl? Plus, which one can still sing the old songs like he used to?

It just seems to me that the bands are moving in opposite directions. Over the last 6 years, Pearl Jam hasn't made an album or a song that a casual music lover would recognize. The majority of their core fans routinely complain about the quality of these two albums and consider them the band's worst to date. The Foos, meanwhile, have also put out two albums (almost 4 since the double album In Your Honor was a mid-95 release) and spawned The Pretender, Rope, Walk, and One of These Days, all fairly recognizable rock radio hits. Their last album, Wasting Light, debuted at number 1. In the last two years, Pearl Jam has played 6 shows in the United States, not counting the Oracle thing. The Foo Fighters played 8 shows in fan's garages. Grammys - thanks to Ed, I know they mean nothing, but the last two Foo albums got 11 nominations and 7 wins while Backspacer got 2 nominations and 0 wins. Even when Pearl Jam does something right like the PJ20 movie, it gets shown on fucking PBS while Back and Forth and Live at Wembley are on VH1 and Palladia all the time. And they're better.

If anyone takes the time to read this unplanned drivel, I'm not really looking for responses like, "The Foo Fighters haven't made a good album since their debut, so this is stupid." Laying aside how you feel about either band, I'm genuinely curious how you think history will remember them. Does what they do next even matter? Will they be judged by their highest peak or their sustainability? Or maybe it's just Grohl himself who will be remembered as the closest thing (but not even close) to McCartney this generation has. It just seems like no matter where Pearl Jam is, he's in a band getting a little more attention. Oh, and as a side note, the Foo's cover of Band on the Run is pretty fantastic.

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 Post subject: Re: Pearl Jam vs. Foo Fighters
PostPosted: Tue Sep 25, 2012 4:18 am 
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I think Ed would be all right to have a beer with as long as the topic didn't veer toward politics (which wasn't some revelation of recent times: "Pro-choice", anyone?).

I think PJ will definitely be looked upon with more respect. As the decades go on I think generally bands get forgiven for their latter day work which is usually less inspired. FF never had the vast influence that PJ had in their heyday...plus there was the tinkering that critics generally love. This bullshit when they don't matter presently will be looked past. The Rolling Stones get played all the time and are revered...and look at the shit they did after their heyday.

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 Post subject: Re: Pearl Jam vs. Foo Fighters
PostPosted: Tue Sep 25, 2012 4:19 am 
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Ed looks like such a dork in the Jeremy video.


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 Post subject: Re: Pearl Jam vs. Foo Fighters
PostPosted: Tue Sep 25, 2012 5:08 am 
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Interesting post Inglishteecher. I was thinking something similar when that Richest Singers list was published and Grohl was worth $250mil to EV's $80mil. Can't imagine more than a 3rd DG's money coming from Nirvana royalties.


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 Post subject: Re: Pearl Jam vs. Foo Fighters
PostPosted: Tue Sep 25, 2012 5:28 am 
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Grohl is the closest thing we have to Paul McCartney? That's the funniest goddamn thing I've read all day. I think of him more as the closest thing we have to Bon Jovi. Or that guy from Foreigner.


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 Post subject: Re: Pearl Jam vs. Foo Fighters
PostPosted: Tue Sep 25, 2012 6:10 am 
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inglishteecher wrote:
Even when Pearl Jam does something right like the PJ20 movie, it gets shown on fucking PBS while Back and Forth and Live at Wembley are on VH1 and Palladia all the time. And they're better.

I don't even like Foo Fighters yet thought their retrospective documentary was about a hundred times better than PJ20.

That film was such a wasted opportunity.


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 Post subject: Re: Pearl Jam vs. Foo Fighters
PostPosted: Tue Sep 25, 2012 6:21 am 
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I predict that maybe 5-10 Foo Fighters songs will survive the life of the band and will continue to get played on various formats of rock radio, the same way Tom Petty and James Taylor songs get played now. You can't really trace any thread of influence to these people, but within their era-specific niche, they were as much a part of their culture as anyone, and as long as there's an interest in remembrance of the culture itself, the songs will pop up here and there in some capacity.

Pearl Jam does have the distinction of being associated with a legitimate cultural movement, but I don't think the thread of bands they've inspired is one that history is really going to follow. More likely is that they'll be vaguely lumped in with a group of bands that inspired a vague other group of bands (i.e. "the Seattle sound of the early '90's that gave rise to legions of disaffected alt-rockers"), similar to how they're listed on that giant family tree of bands in "School of Rock." At best, they have a few songs that will be permanently canonized on classic rock radio. Whoop de doo.

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 Post subject: Re: Pearl Jam vs. Foo Fighters
PostPosted: Tue Sep 25, 2012 7:33 am 
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The order in which bands perform at Bridge does not necessarly reflect stature, although sometimes it's kind of a seniority thing. Incidentally, I thought the Foo Fighters stole the show somewhat at the 2006 Bridge. They were outstanding.

I's pretty sure Pearl Jam will have a more revered legacy in the future that will be similar to the way Zepplin is seen now. The Foo Fighters were not a breakthrough band like PJ but hats off to Dave Grohl for what he has accomplished. The Foos will be celebrating 20 years in not too long. He took what was literally a solo project (see debut album) and grew it into one of the great rock bands of this generation. Dave has always been very savy in balancing commerical appeal with indie values, which probably has a lot to do with why so many people think so highly of them.


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 Post subject: Re: Pearl Jam vs. Foo Fighters
PostPosted: Tue Sep 25, 2012 11:28 am 
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I was at Midtown Music Festival in Atlanta this weekend, where Foos closed Friday and PJ Saturday. Everyone there was saying that there were way more people there Saturday for PJ than Friday for The Foo Fighters.

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 Post subject: Re: Pearl Jam vs. Foo Fighters
PostPosted: Tue Sep 25, 2012 11:50 am 
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Foo Fighters has been the more popular band for at least a decade-- in 2002, the Foos were topping the charts with One By One while PJ were settling into old-fogey obscurity with Riot Act. However, Pearl Jam, at their biggest, were far bigger than the Foos could ever hope to be.

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 Post subject: Re: Pearl Jam vs. Foo Fighters
PostPosted: Tue Sep 25, 2012 1:18 pm 
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I thought the Foo Fighters and Green Day were the only two rock bands in the world.


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 Post subject: Re: Pearl Jam vs. Foo Fighters
PostPosted: Tue Sep 25, 2012 1:42 pm 
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Dave Grohl/Foo Fighters have set themselves up over the years to be able to do anything they want and not receive major backlashes from the critics, public and their fans. And by anything they want i mean - crank out the same bland sound over and over again. (I like the foo's and they have many great songs but c'mon...)

PJ set the bar really high - maybe too high- which can result in major backlashes from those closest to their music.


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 Post subject: Re: Pearl Jam vs. Foo Fighters
PostPosted: Tue Sep 25, 2012 1:51 pm 
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With the caveat that I

A: Don't like the Foo Fighters and

B: Only really know their hits after the first two albums

what David Ghrol managed to do better than anyone is fuse pop music with a grunge aesthetic. That'll be a popular formula and he has milked it (and promoted it) better than almost anyone, and has done it for a long time (really the only band that maybe did this better was Bush on their first album--and then Gavin Rosdale decided he wanted to be a real artist and didn't have the songwriting skills to do it). He's helped immensely by the fact that there haven't been any super bands really in a decade (not good bands mind you--immensely popular) since the way music is promoted and distributed has moved away from giant bands. So being one of the last bands standing from that previous era, and still willing to market themselves accordingly (and the Foos and Green Day are excellent at it) means they're going to do well.

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 Post subject: Re: Pearl Jam vs. Foo Fighters
PostPosted: Tue Sep 25, 2012 2:00 pm 
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The Foos never offered anything new. The biggest problem they have is that they sound like generic alt-rock.
Eddie's voice alone and the influence it had, put PJ in category above the Foos.

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 Post subject: Re: Pearl Jam vs. Foo Fighters
PostPosted: Tue Sep 25, 2012 2:04 pm 
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Foos have better marketing. and Grohl is infinitely less irritating and preachy than Ed can be.

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 Post subject: Re: Pearl Jam vs. Foo Fighters
PostPosted: Tue Sep 25, 2012 2:10 pm 
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You think this is the kind of debate that brought "pop elements" into Backspacer? :?

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 Post subject: Re: Pearl Jam vs. Foo Fighters
PostPosted: Tue Sep 25, 2012 4:05 pm 
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i was at acl in 2009, first night KOL played, the place was packed, They were touring their hit album....Eddie came out for slow night so long...and everyone just exploded...thats how big Pearl Jam is.
The day PJ played there, there was more people waiting for the band and even if they didnt quite know backspacer, you can felt the exitement about seeing pearl jam.
I think the foos are having their big moment now, they have their first number 1 record released last year with a lot of promotion, they have the hits...but pearl jam will be always more influential and important for everyone.
I like both bands by the way.


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 Post subject: Re: Pearl Jam vs. Foo Fighters
PostPosted: Tue Sep 25, 2012 4:33 pm 
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Apples and oranges to my mind. Foos are a one trick pony and play to that and it works well for them. Their sound has never really evolved or done anything too far away from their template. Could be argued Pj hasn't either but they have more than Foos ever have. Both are excellent live bands and give great performances but Foos are pitched to the public with a lot more muscle and play the PR game happily or so it seems. PJ are just a lot more subtle and relaxed about it. I like em both but Pj by a whole lot more.

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 Post subject: Re: Pearl Jam vs. Foo Fighters
PostPosted: Tue Sep 25, 2012 4:36 pm 
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I'm not even a fan of the Ten/Vs. PJ era but the OP's got to be kidding if he thinks the Foos come anywhere near the influence of early Pearl Jam. I live in India and almost any decent music listener here knows who Pearl Jam is and the lyrics to Alive--the Foos not so much.


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 Post subject: Re: Pearl Jam vs. Foo Fighters
PostPosted: Tue Sep 25, 2012 4:48 pm 
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There's certainly a difference between "popular" and "influential." Foo Fighters are winning more Grammies and selling more albums, but very few artists are learning from them and incorporating their influence into their music in the way Kurt learned from the Meat Puppets or Pearl Jam learns from Neil or Gaslight Anthem learns from Pearl Jam.

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