Shane’s Music Challenge: PEARL JAM – 1993 – Vs

Shane | 1 February 2014 | Reply

PEARL JAM – 1993 – Vs
By Shane Pinnegar

Listened to this, rather excitedly, today – seeing them for the first time ever on Sunday!!

So – instead of heading down a compliant, record company friendly road after the unexpectedly immense hit of their debut Ten, Pearl Jam instead railed against their success and burrowed down into some seriously frenetic and almost punk songs, sitting alongside their Seattle-take on roots Americana.

To their surprise it was a huge hit – something they were rapidly getting unable or unwilling to cope with (but that’s another story) – songs like the harrowing Daughter, Elderly Woman Behind The Counter In A Small Town, the screamfest of Blood and even the abrasive but enthralling Rats captured the imagination of the New Grunge Disciples.

Like the first wave of punk, the first wave of grunge was noticeable for each leading light ploughing completely different fields, despite some shared influences and a similarly exploratory mindset.

Vs showed us that Pearl Jam intended to bring a lot of rootsy Americana into their take on the nascent genre, and it stands them apart from fellow grunge travellers Nirvana, Alice In Chains and Mudhoney.

Roll on Sunday!

Goodies: Daughter is horrifying but essential, W.M.A. rails against gun toting White Mail Americans, and the aforementioned Elderly Woman… is hauntingly melancholy – though there’s no filler on the record, every note and word is in just the right place (even the cover kicks against the mainstream with it’s image of animal cruelty).

9/10