conorr90

This is one of those where I recognise the importance of the album more than I enjoy listening to it. Although I do enjoy it - it's just a pretty intense listening experience (especially Frankie Teardrop), so I wouldn't often.

This is a core album for me - Pearl Jam were one of my favourite early bands, and probably the first one I properly deep dived into in my teenage years. I was about 10 years late to the grunge train, but all of the themes still appealed to me. It really has a bit of everything: dark crime stories, lefty politics, garbled lyrics you have to look up, and Jimi Hendrix-esque guitar solos. It also has arguably the best break up song of all time, Black.

Overall, it's not my favourite PJ album - that would be either Vs or Vitalogy (or sometimes Riot Act), but this is an almost perfect album for where they were at the time.

I can see why people wouldn't like them compared to the other big 4 of grunge, but I think a lot of that hate is related to their popularity (something they did actually try to push back against). I did get tired of hearing Even Flow, Alive and Jeremy after a while, but the deep cuts on this (Oceans, Porch, Garden, Release) are well worth diving in again.

I also took this opportunity to compare the original version with the 2013 Redux version back to back. I'm surprised at how different they are, I never really noticed before. The Redux version is much brighter and clearer, with way more separation.

Really surprised at how much I love this album! I have only listened to Pale Green Ghosts, which is very electronic, so this is not what I expected at all. Very interesting to see Midlake's involvement too, I wasn't aware of that link. I really like the songwriting and instrumentation on here. The lyrics remind me a bit of Harry Nilson and Father John Misty.

The only negative I was hoping to list is that it's a bit too long, and the last few songs could be dropped. But today, on like my 4th listen, I found out that everything after the title track are bonus tracks! So I think this gets a 9/10 from me after that adjustment.

I was really hoping there would be some Fugazi in this book - omitting them would be a crime! I've loved this album for a long time, although I think 13 songs is better (not sure why that doesn't qualify as their debut).

As a teenager, I listened to a good bit of classic punk (The Ramones, Sep Pistols, The Clash, etc.), but always found it a bit boring, lacking something. What it was lacking for me, I realize now, was mainly melody. The Clash were more interesting to me, because they blended other genres into their music after the first (boring, IMO) album.

I also was pretty big into Green Day, but grew out of them fairly quickly when I got to college age. I think I discovered Fugazi around that time, but didn’t fully get into them until a few years later.

This album was an eye opener for me, and turned me on to a whole lot of other hard-core and post hard-core. Still listen to it a lot today, and often reminds me of cycling to and from work in Galway. I love the guitar, and groovy bass and drums. The singing takes a bit of getting used too, and some of the lyrics are a bit sloganistic, but I don't mind.

This is some of the least offensive music I've ever heard. Like the definition of easy listening; something to soundtrack a waiting room. Seems a bit derivative of Peter Gabriel or Phil Collins, but I dont know who really came up wigh this sound first. I do know they both did it better. While You See a Chance, Spanish Dancer, and Night Train are decent - but I doubt I'll be back in this waiting room again willingly.