5/6 "A Royal Comeback". It's actually a nicely written review. It could have had a little bit more about the songs, but all in all, I like it the way it is. It talks about history, the sound of the band and Eddie Vedder, and about the sound of the new album. It recommends the songs: «World Wide Suicide», «Comatose» and «Severed hand».
Dagbladet is a national newspaper in Norway, and third biggest in overall newspaper sales in Norway.
5/6 It's a very positive review, where the reviewer talks about how the album is more hard, brutal and honest (than Riot Act probably). The way he praises the band it sounds like a 6/6 review.
Aftenposten is a serious broadsheet, and is more of an Oslo paper than a national paper, but still the second biggest on sales on a national level.
3/6 Very poorly written review. "only the first 2-3 albums had anything worth listening to" and "Surprisingly good, from a band I'm fed up with."
Nettavisen is an online newspaper that was recently purchased by the biggest commercial tv channel in Norway.
how can a guy who clearly dislikes the band be able to write an objective and good review of the album?
And VG...they are sadly the most influential paper in Norway, but Dagbladet is much more of a "music-paper"...
Anyways, i`m looking forward too the puls.no review.
Agree....that review was just sad. One of the worst I've read..
Dagbladet is much more of a music paper, like you say. PJ was actually on the front of the paper edition today. Also had a case with a large picture on their website frontpage yesterday (probably still there)....
_________________ 2003: MSG1, MSG2, Holmdel 2006: Lisbon 1, Lisbon 2, Madrid, Marseille, Paris 2007: London, Düsseldorf 2009: Manchester, London 2010: Rock Werchter
Joined: Tue Nov 30, 2004 4:02 am Posts: 44183 Location: New York Gender: Male
if any of you want to translate the reviews into english I'll post them in the master file.
_________________ "Better the occasional faults of a Government that lives in a spirit of charity than the consistent omissions of a Government frozen in the ice of its own indifference."--FDR
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.
stip wrote:
if any of you want to translate the reviews into english I'll post them in the master file.
Here are three translations.
Dagbladet:
5/6
"A Delicious Mess" -a royal comeback
Pearl Jam entered the grungerock-scene with an album which still stands up as a very good one. "Ten" is no less than a classic, with song like "Jeremy", "Alive", "Even Flow" and "Black". The album established Pearl Jam as a band of the premier league of grunge, and they sold a lot of records, but the band didn't get as much street credibility as Nirvana, Soundgarden and Alice in Chains.
Through the nineties, the band continued to release good albums, but the interest diminished - like it did for most of the original grunge bands. But Pearl Jam hasn't laid in their oars, and thanks for that! Their Self Titled album is an extremely good piece of handcraft. Here are more classic rock than snarling grunge, and that's great.
"Bubbeling surplus energy" Here Pearl Jam shows muscles and a bubbeling surplus energy that fits the old heroes
Pearl Jams prime trademark is the shaking, carismatic and suggestionizing vocals of Eddie Vedder. And it hasn't gotten any worse over the years. The voice doesn't seem that intense and desperate anymore, but that's totally OK, because I'm sure the middle aged members of the group isn't that raging anymore either.
A real band is like good, brown liquer. When you're young it rips your throat and it's tough and uncompromising. But with age both good alcohol and rocksignatures becomes more well-seasoned and balanced without loosing their sting. That's the way Pearl Jam anno 2006 feels like. Not that the band is known to put out bad products, but this just feels right.
"The Propulsion Of The Devil" The brand, the great songs, the propulsionous backdrop and the snarling guitars that so hasty pushes the songs forward, is very alive.
"Pearl Jam" is allmost free of the bands manic stamp, but it's just as urgy and full of the propulsion of the devil as the bands earlier works. Just listen to "World Wide Suicide", "Comatose" and "Severed Hand".
VG:
3/6
Jam-session for those initiated
It’s usually a bad sign when a band long into their career puts out a self titled album. Those things should be reserved for the debut, everything else reminds of a nasty lack of ideas. Even though the lack of ideas are not acute in the Pearl Jam camp nowadays, it doesn’t feel important to spend much time on them in 2006. Since the Breakthrough with the classic “Ten” in 1991, they’ve been on a perpetual crusade to eliminate their name from the grunge-company they never was a part of. This has given them an repressed, obstinate undertone which feels more wrong than tough. And rock bans like this needs to be tough.
In their time, Pearl Jam were both sore and tough, now they’ve only got these qualities occasionally. The ones who love Eddie Vedders fat voice gets what they want, and the band is more extrovert than in a long time. But this is more than anything else routine rocking for the congregation.
Dagsavisen:
5/6
“Goodnight, from Pearl Jam”
“Thank you, and goodnight” this short message is written in thin letters in the back of the booklet of Pearl Jams new record, whose name is only “Pearl Jam”. Maybe it’s just a commonplace little message as a thank you for listening to the record. Maybe something bigger lies behind it. And should this “bigger” mean that Eddie Vedder and Pearl Jam now deliberately are steering towards the doom they have fought against since grunge was announced dead in the middle of the nineties, they will do it with bravura.
“Pearl Jam” is the record we’ve been waiting for since “Vitalogy” (1994), the last of the groups records that had any meaning besides keeping up with the myth of being USA’s most steadfast and mysterious band.
It’s not the songs in them selves even though they too are great and immediat in all their complexity.
It’s not the production, even though this too is full and pointy.
No, what the band has managed to add to “Pearl Jam” is something that can best be described as “soul”.
Eddie Vedder sings about the war, newly salvated, desperation and impotence (no, it’s got nothing to do with a mans lower parts –shampo41) with a thinking commonmans intensity. His mumbeling, but intense vocal style suits this material with a dirty grey patina. The cover art, the guitars of Stone Gossard and Mike McCready, Jeff Aments shredding bass-play – everything is there to emphasise the feeling of greatness and desperate elegancy, and especially “Life Wasted” and “World Wide Suicide” have to be mentioned. The lyrics from LW “death came around, forced to hear its song” – sends the memorys back to the tragic Roskilde-night when Vedder sat crying on stage and watched the catastrophy play out before the band. And WWS is masterly formulated and loaded with feelings about the war in Iraq, as an open wound in the american and international subconciousness.
“Pearl Jam” is a record filled with substancial rock-estethics. It gives meaning, and it sucks the listener in to a world of ripped feelings. In that way “Pearl Jam” feels as relevant as the debut “Ten”, not by hitting the time nerve as good as then, but in the powerful humanistic wave that Vedder throws himself and the band into.
Even the title “Pearl Jam” indicates that this is a new start. Or the end.
_________________ War doesn't determine who's right. It determines who's left. -EV
Last edited by shampo41 on Tue May 02, 2006 1:35 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Joined: Tue Nov 30, 2004 4:02 am Posts: 44183 Location: New York Gender: Male
thanks
_________________ "Better the occasional faults of a Government that lives in a spirit of charity than the consistent omissions of a Government frozen in the ice of its own indifference."--FDR
just bought the album today and i'm listening to it now. got as far as to "Parachutes".. and so far it's the only song i feel that stands out and catches my attention.. the ones before feel too anonymus.. i hope the rest are good..
Joined: Tue Nov 30, 2004 4:02 am Posts: 44183 Location: New York Gender: Male
triplea wrote:
just bought the album today and i'm listening to it now. got as far as to "Parachutes".. and so far it's the only song i feel that stands out and catches my attention.. the ones before feel too anonymus.. i hope the rest are good..
welcome to the board
_________________ "Better the occasional faults of a Government that lives in a spirit of charity than the consistent omissions of a Government frozen in the ice of its own indifference."--FDR
thanks.. been visiting the site for years and probably been a member on the board before, but couldn't remember my name nor password so i just got a new one.. huge pearl jam fan glad to be here
Joined: Sat Apr 02, 2005 5:35 pm Posts: 416 Location: Oslo Gender: Male
Aftenposten:
Hard and brutal 5/6
Pearl Jam
Rock
ASBJØRN BAKKE
The simplest solution is often the best one. Pearl Jam calls their eight studio album "Pearl Jam" and have dropped all musical twists. Gone are the keyboard instruments, foggy experiments and attempts at introverted art-rock. This is hairy and temperamental hard rock with Pearl Jam's traditional melodies intact.
Eddie Vedder has always been a spirited singer, but here he sings the texts about dead escape and dismemberment with an intensity that is glowing red. He sounds like he is trapped into a corner and has nothing left to lose.
With three guitars in the front seat and a bouldering rythm section as an engine, as his commando soldiers catch speed. Pearl Jam roams mercyless towards freedom, knowing that it probably won't end well: "Yeh, I'll be hanging upside down, and there I will swing for all eternity", a fatalistic Vedder shouts in "Comatose". Everything is going to hell anyway, we hear in "World Wide Suicide".
Isn't that one of the strangest things you've ever read?
Joined: Sat Apr 02, 2005 5:35 pm Posts: 416 Location: Oslo Gender: Male
shampo41 wrote:
triplea wrote:
this album needs time, really! only a couple of songs that cought my attention.. a bit dissapointing..
It's the albums that takes time to get into you'll end up loving the most. Fact.
That's often true, but with this and Binaural I fell for both of them the first time I heard them, and so far I like them about equally much. That's a good thing, because I always did love Binaural.
No Code and Riot Act took a little getting used to, but No Code is now my favourite album by any artist ever. Now I still appreciate Riot Act more every single year, and I think it's an awesome album.
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