It was upon hearing Eddie Vedder yell “sometimes you find yourself having to put all your faith in no faith” in the opening track Getaway that I inadvertently let out a tiny squeal of excitement. The past few years have seen Pearl Jam become a bit of a ronin of a band, a rebel without a cause as they say. As songwriters, Vedder and his cohorts are at their element when there’s something worth ranting about, and by that measurement Lightning Bolt, the band’s tenth studio album, is their strongest record since 2002’s Riot Act.
With Lightning Bolt, Pearl Jam brings in some of the ferocity of their earlier records (most notably Vitalogy and Yield) and melds it with their newfound sense of comfort and accessibility. In some ways the album is quite similar to the band’s last record Backspacer, from the economical runtimes to the recruitment of Brendan O’Brien as producer, and much like the 2009 record the album starts off with a one-two-three punch in the tracks Getaway, a tight arena rock track that brings to mind classics such as State of Love and Trust and Hail Hail, the album’s first single Mind Your Manners, a punk-infused number in the vein of Spin the Black Circle and My Father’s Son, a dark but fiery track that wouldn’t have felt out of place as a Riot Act deep cut.
It’s expected then that the album pace itself a bit after assaulting the ears with a barrage of angry rock, which is why it feels like the much hyped Sirens was carefully placed as the follow-up. An irrefutably radio-friendly ballad, Sirens is a bit too long for pop and really doesn’t make much of an impression upon first-listen, but after subsequent plays you start noticing each individual member coming into their own within the song, from Jeff Ament’s soulful bass to Stone Gossard’s ambient guitar playing and Mick McCready’s wailing guitar solo, giving some credibility to all the pre-release hype.
The album hits a crescendo in title track Lightning Bolt, an ode to Vedder’s love for surfing, before moving onto the much calmer Infallible and brooding Pendulum. From there the album falls into a period of sincerity, starting with the excellent Swallowed Whole, where Vedder’s singing is at its most earnest,followedby the bluesy stomp of Let the Records Play and Sleeping By Myself, a carryover from Vedder’s 2011 solo record Ukulele Songs that the band manages to make its own here. The album comes to an end with Yellow Moon and Future Days, the former a contemplative and (for want of a better term) “breathable” song which, much like Sirens, showcases the band getting comfortable within their defined roles and is undeniably the highlight of the record, while the latter is a four minute acoustic track that sees producer Brendan O’Brien join in on the piano, deeply personal and uplifting while being somewhat melancholic at the same time. The songs provide an appropriately poignant finale to an album that starts off sounding like it’s ready to take on the world.
Pearl Jam is now considered to be the elder statesmen of rock and roll, a fact hinted at by the serenity and joy of Backspacer and now cemented by the appropriately titled Lightning Bolt. As a songwriter and musician Eddie Vedder is wiser and more battle-hardened than he was ten of twenty years ago and the rest of the band has adapted to that, no more apparent is that than in drummer Matt Cameron’s chameleon-like playing, who is fresh from the calculated odd-time beats of Soundgarden’s excellent King Animal from last year. Lightning Bolt is Pearl Jam’s most complete record since 1995’s No Code, it lacks the focus of either of their last two albums but it affords them a more varied sonic palette that the band doesn’t waste.
