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Jacob’s Deep Discog Dive - Pearl Jam: 4/12

Yeah this is definitely the black sheep of Pearl Jam’s 90s output. It’s also an album that truth be told I’m still not 100% sure how I truly feel about. I think the album does serve as a pretty decent comedown after Vitalogy’s more chaotic feel, but it also kinda has a slight feel of uneasiness which does make the album a fairly unique listen. However, I find this album arguably more then any of their other albums feels very totally confused in some aspects. A lot of the slower jams like Off He Goes and Around the Bend kinda tend to clash with the more punky garage rock esc material like Hail Hail and Habit and both sides of this coin feel like they come from completely different worlds even despite the tunes being very solid on their own. There are even moments that feel like neither like the very jammy and melodic Red Mosquito and the dynamic progression of Present Tense which are probably my two favorite moments on here truth be told. Overall, I think the songs themselves on this album are pretty solid, if not a little dozy in places, but I find the album just feels rather inconsistent tonally as it feels like it doesn’t truly know it’s identity

Sometimes: 7/10
Hail Hail: 8/10
Who You Are: 7/10
In My Tree: 8/10
Smile: 7/10
Off He Goes: 8/10
Habit: 7/10
Red Mosquito: 8/10
Lukin: 6/10
Present Tense: 8/10
Mankind: 7/10
I’m Open: 6/10
Around the Bend: 8/10