PEARL JAM: Dark Matter
Over three decades years into their storied career, Pearl Jam are still courting controversy. No, they’re not currently name-checking any politicians, and they’re no longer battling Ticketmaster. But if you’ve been following the online chatter, it would seem that the most controversial thing about their new album Dark Matter is the production itself. Yes, hit-making producer du jour and Pearl Jam megafan Andrew Watt has indeed dialed up a little sheen on the band’s twelfth record- but to read some of the kneejerk response, you would think that Pearl Jam had morphed into, say, Imagine Dragons.
And Dark Matter is certainly a bit more polished than any Pearl Jam record since Ten- or perhaps, ever. But consider that a sizeable number of fans have been quietly longing for the band to return to that glossy, stadium-ready sound ever since their immediate retreat from it. Those particular fans will probably love at least some of the new material. “Waiting for Stevie,” for example, sounds like a cut off of the Singles soundtrack. And it’s not as if the band was heretofore completely resistant to studio polish or brushes with the mainstream. “Last Kiss,” anyone? “Sirens,” while we’re at it?
The good news is that the songwriting is still charmingly inventive and scrappy, even if the sound of the album is a little more radio friendly than, say, Riot Act. “Wreckage” and “Upper Hand” are midtempo gems. The title track is as satisfyingly brutal as anything the band has released since the ‘90s. Even “Running,” which was a pretty underwhelming second single, sounds better in context, and with repeat listens.
And like every studio album that the band has released this century, repeat listens are key. Eddie Vedder and company are still masterful at composing tunes that require three or four spins. If you don’t like “Won’t Tell” on first listen, you’re not alone. It lands, at first, like warmed-over latter-day U2. But a few spins later, I’ll be damned if the same song doesn’t sound like good U2- and that’s a big, big difference.
I imagine that once the dust settles and the small, vocal online chatterbugs have voiced their gripes about compression and so on, most fans will hold up Dark Matter as a major success. For a lot of diehards, it’s easy to forget that Pearl Jam has been here for 33 years and counting. Consider that most rock bands can’t even get along after three decades, let alone write a song as charming as “Wreckage.” For the band formerly known as Mookie Blaylock, consider this a solid three-pointer in the fourth quarter. B+
