Rearviewmirror

Rearviewmirror by Pearl Jam



Editor's Note: It was an innocent point that I made on a Wednesday night between rounds of Trivia. R.E.M. was the greatest American band ever. The table looked at me as if I had just called Mao a great human. Thus the debate began: Who is the greatest American band? We eliminated every singer song writer or solo performer. So Marvin Gaye, Bob Dylan, and Billy Joel, for example, were eliminated. Other than that, anything went. This week I present the arguments for who I think should be in the running.

Pros: By default, they became the face of alternative rock after Cobain killed himself. Still today, when you think alternative Pearl Jam might be the first band that pops into you head... in the mid 90s there was no one as big as Pearl Jam... Ten. Vs. Vitalogy. Talk about a murders row of commercial and critical success, that's quite a line up. Yield and even their self titled album from two years ago are good efforts that can be listened to at any time... They didn't sell out (yet), but this means something since of most of the bands on the list, their commercial success either came later or never came (R.E.M. and Wilco respectively). Pearl Jam didn't make music videos just to make them, they fought Ticketmaster, and all their songs and albums seem genuine and honest...Voted number 1 back in 2005 by USAToday readers (this can also be seen as a con)... Yield is probably one of the more important rock records to ever be released. In 1998, for those who enjoyed rock'n'roll and weren't in their 20s, this album was a beacon of light in a sea of rap-rock, boy bands, and Britney. It proved to us teenagers at the time that rock wasn't dead and it would be back eventually sounding much like this. Of all of Pearl Jam's records, this is easily their most thoughtful and forward thinking album... At their best, Pearl Jam rocks out like no other band in the last 20 years.

Cons: No Code—it was such a stinker at the time when the band shouldn't have been producing stinkers. Vitalogy teeters on being a great album, and Yield showed that the band still had plenty of great song writing left in them so what happened with No Code? The album almost sunk the band, it took Yield to get them back in the good graces of the rock world. And that should never have happened. Athletes in their primes have bad days, not bad years. And if we look at Pearl Jam in the athlete metaphor, then No Code was a really, really bad year. And really, really bad years aren't easily forgotten in the long run... Then the first five years of the 21st century (Riot Act and Binaural a real stinkers)... The band really hasn't picked up new fans as much as the old fans continue to hang on... Did they ever really develop and mature as a band in a positive way?... And it seems like nearly every Pearl Jam album over the last ten years has been one where the band has a lot to prove... not a good thing.

Best Album: Vs. -- While Ten gets props from everyone and their mother, Vs. is a more consistent and interesting album. Ten deserves all the praise it receives because it was so raw and fresh at the time and the album still holds up today, but personally, I think the album gets lost at times. Vs. on the other hand is a tight, well made, solid album with some spectacular songs: Daughter, Glorified G, Rearviewmirror, Elderly Woman Behind a Counter in a Small Town, Dissident... as far as impact, Yield of all albums may have had the longest lasting impact, but Vs. is Pearl Jam's best. One you can put on at a party, chillin' around the house, or driving in the car. Records like that don't come all that often.

Best Song: Jeremy -- The song is slowly becoming timeless (for more read here).