Pearl Jam: Dark Matter (5/4/2024)

Pearl Jam: Dark Matter [Monkeywrench/Republic, 2024] It's hard to explain the ever-so-slight downward trajectory of Pearl Jam in the 21st century without disregarding the great music they have made in this millennium, but, as they have outlived all of their peers (Alice In Chains, Nirvana, Soundgarden), it is a part of their story nonetheless. This started with 2000's Binaural, the followup to their 1998 masterpiece Yield. Disregarding the great songs intended for the album in favor of meandering, abrasive art-rock, the result was evenly split between dull and ponderous music. It was a disappointing album, needless to say. The following albums weren't much better: 2002's Riot Act mostly favored experimentation over memorable songs, 2006's self-titled album aimed too often for a spot on modern rock radio, 2009's Backspacer was an awkward attempt at new wave, and 2013's Lightning Bolt stands as their worst album to date.

However, on 2020's Gigaton, they were able to revive the intensity of their 20th-century works while still maintaining experimentation and authenticity. It set a new standard for 21st-century Pearl Jam albums, that they could really and truly still make interesting music. Dark Matter is the followup to that album, and if not as cohesive, it's certainly interesting. Unlike any Pearl Jam album before it, its songs are codependent rather than a cohesive whole. This makes it the more entertaining album, but it also makes it a little uneven. It is codependent in the fact that its bad-to-mediocre songs rely on the great songs to balance the album. For instance, any damage done by the grating, poorly produced title track is undone by the following song, the anthemic power ballad "Won't Tell," which yields successful results from PJ's frequent '80s music experiments, exploring the sounds of The Cure rather than Devo. This makes for a much better song. If the slightly meandering "Upper Hand" is a bit underwhelming, the heavy rock of "Waiting For Stevie" adds some energy. Written while singer Eddie Vedder and producer Andrew Watt (Dua Lipa, Post Malone) were waiting for Stevie Wonder to show up to the studio, its metallic tones make it one of the heaviest and most commanding songs they have made in a long time. Like Wonder's "Sir Duke" before it, it explores music's impact on the soul, this time in the context of its resonance in hard times. Vedder has said that The Who's 1973 rock opera Quadrophenia "saved his life" in his teenage years, and this song represents this ideal. And the emotional opening song "Scared Of Fear" makes the weak lyrics and overly-corporate rock sound of "React, Respond' a bit tolerable. Even that one has a great riff.

In the end, Dark Matter is an emotional album, less of the mission statement the band described it as and more of a question for the listener, one about Pearl Jam's future as their career draws near its end. Penultimate song and masterpiece "Got To Give" exemplifies this closing theme of survival, as it details a relationship falling apart. "Something's got to give," Vedder yells at the song's climax over a deluge of noisy guitars and pianos. It is the most intense and moving song Pearl Jam have made since Vitalogy, their most intense and moving album. It then transitions into closer "Setting Sun," which starts off with a world-music strum and ascends into and unfolding guitar solo. "We could become one last setting sun," Vedder screams as the solo blasts through the speaker. And as the final chords are strummed at the end of the song, you're left to reflect on this confusing album, simultaneously disappointing and, in ways, their best since the 1990s. A truly unique catalogue entry. [8.2/10]