194-497: Backspacer is the ninth studio album by the American rock band Pearl Jam , released on September 20, 2009. The band members started writing instrumental and demo tracks in 2007, and got together the following year to work on an album. It was recorded from February through April 2009 with producer Brendan O'Brien , who had worked on every Pearl Jam album except their 1991 debut Ten and 2006's self-titled record —although this
388-518: A grunge , alternative rock , and hard rock album. Several of the songs on the album started as instrumental compositions that Vedder added lyrics to after he joined the band. Regarding the lyrics, Vedder said, "All I really believe in is this fucking moment, like right now. And that, actually, is what the whole album talks about." Vedder's lyrics for Ten deal with subjects like depression, suicide, loneliness, and murder. The album also tackles social concerns such as homelessness ("Even Flow") and
582-413: A pepper shaker and a fire extinguisher as percussion on "Oceans". In subsequent years, band members have expressed dissatisfaction with the way the album's mixing turned out. In 2001, Ament said, "I'd love to remix Ten . Ed, for sure, would agree with me. It wouldn't be like changing performances; just pull some of the reverb off it." In 2002, Gossard said, "It was 'over-rocked', we were novices in
776-560: A "flawlessly crafted hard rock masterpiece" and felt that Vedder's "impressionistic lyrics" are more effective through his passionate vocal delivery rather than their "concrete meaning." Charles R. Cross wrote in The Rolling Stone Album Guide (2004) that Ten sounded less original and more self-important than Nirvana's Nevermind , but it also showcases the band's intricate guitar style and Vedder's distinctive singing. Defined by Kerrang! 's George Garner as "arguably
970-539: A "slew of Seattle albums" that "modulate the same misguided ethos", which he said was "hippie" rather than "punk". Christgau described it as "San Francisco ballroom music" whose "distinguishing characteristics" could only be discerned by listeners if they "take the right drugs". He later gave Ten a " two-star honorable mention ", citing "Once" and "Even Flow" as highlights, and quipped, "in life, abuse justifies melodrama; in music, riffs work better". Reviewing Ten in retrospect, AllMusic staff writer Steve Huey called it
1164-407: A 1992 re-recorded version of the song is on the " Go " single. Another version of "Alone", with re-recorded vocals, appears on Lost Dogs . According to McCready, "Alone" was cut from Ten because the band already had enough mid-tempo songs for the album. The song "Dirty Frank", which was released as a B-side on the " Even Flow " single and often thought to be a Ten outtake, was recorded after Ten
1358-763: A band, intoxicated by the noise they make." Ann Powers of the Los Angeles Times gave the album four out of four stars, describing it as "11 breakneck rockers and candidly emotional ballads, adding up to barely more than a half hour of optimally toned catharsis" and praising the "lightness and dexterity of the playing" and "Vedder's hard-driving, often playful vocals", and called its music "Accessible without sacrificing sophistication, aggressive without flailing". Rolling Stone staff writer Rob Sheffield gave Backspacer four out of five stars, saying that it contains "the shortest, tightest, punkiest tunes they've ever banged out," and that "Eddie Vedder's heart-on-fire vocals are
1552-509: A certain degree doesn't care if it's popular. — Bill Wyman in Vulture (2016) The sound of rock is traditionally centered on the amplified electric guitar, which emerged in its modern form in the 1950s with the popularity of rock and roll. It was also greatly influenced by the sounds of electric blues guitarists. The sound of an electric guitar in rock music is typically supported by an electric bass guitar, which pioneered jazz music in
1746-477: A collage of album covers pasted on the bathroom wall of the band's rehearsal space. Vedder noticed the album cover for Johnny "Guitar" Watson 's 1979 album, What the Hell Is This? , and imagined a man who becomes attracted to one of the various women on the cover and then wonders why this woman would rather be one of Watson's many girlfriends instead of his only one. Vedder described " Just Breathe " as "as close to
1940-649: A copy of the demo in September 1990, when it was given to him by former Red Hot Chili Peppers drummer Jack Irons . Vedder listened to the demo, went surfing, and wrote lyrics the next day for "Dollar Short", "Agytian Crave", and "Footsteps". "Dollar Short" and "Agytian Crave" were later retitled " Alive " and " Once ", respectively. Gossard and Ament heard the demo with Vedder's vocals and lyrics, and were impressed enough to fly Vedder out to Seattle for an audition. Meanwhile, Vedder had written lyrics for "E Ballad", retitled " Black ". Vedder arrived on October 13 and rehearsed with
2134-514: A fondness for a good beat, a meaningful lyric with some wit, and the theme of youth, which holds an "eternal attraction" so objective "that all youth music partakes of sociology and the field report ." Writing in Christgau's Record Guide: The '80s (1990), he said this sensibility is evident in the music of folk singer-songwriter Michelle Shocked , rapper LL Cool J , and synth-pop duo Pet Shop Boys —"all kids working out their identities"—as much as it
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#17328550987102328-477: A foundation of simple syncopated rhythms in a 4 meter , with a repetitive snare drum back beat on beats two and four. Melodies often originate from older musical modes such as the Dorian and Mixolydian , as well as major and minor modes. Harmonies range from the common triad to parallel perfect fourths and fifths and dissonant harmonic progressions. Since the late 1950s, and particularly from
2522-609: A frequent addition to the established rock format of guitars, bass, and drums in subsequent progressive rock. Instrumentals were common, while songs with lyrics were sometimes conceptual, abstract, or based in fantasy and science fiction. The Pretty Things ' SF Sorrow (1968), the Kinks' Arthur (Or the Decline and Fall of the British Empire) (1969), and the Who 's Tommy (1969) introduced
2716-472: A grid on the Pearl Jam website after clicking on them. After finding all of the images, users were rewarded with a demo version of the song "Speed of Sound". The bottom right image is based on Robert Wiles' photo of Evelyn McHale 's suicide. On the cover and spine of the limited edition gatefold sleeve version, the "Backspacer" keys glow in the dark. Pearl Jam did not re-sign its record deal with J Records , and
2910-482: A high-water mark of the early 1990s alternative rock sound, with Vedder's unusually deep and strong (and later much-imitated) voice alternating between solidity and vibrato against the unrestrained, guitar-heavy, hard rock sound that drew influence from Led Zeppelin and other rock bands of the 1970s. Ten 's musical style, influenced by classic rock , combined an "expansive harmonic vocabulary" with an anthemic sound. Stephen Thomas Erlewine of AllMusic stated that
3104-612: A key feature of psychedelia. Psychedelic rock reached its apogee in the last years of the decade. 1967 saw the Beatles release their definitive psychedelic statement in Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band , including the controversial track " Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds ", the Rolling Stones responded later that year with Their Satanic Majesties Request , and Pink Floyd debuted with The Piper at
3298-568: A loud amplified sound, often centered on the electric guitar, based on the Chicago blues , particularly after the tour of Britain by Muddy Waters in 1958, which prompted Cyril Davies and guitarist Alexis Korner to form the band Blues Incorporated . The band involved and inspired many of the figures of the subsequent British blues boom, including members of the Rolling Stones and Cream , combining blues standards and forms with rock instrumentation and emphasis. The other key focus for British blues
3492-452: A love song as we've ever gotten," and said that the subject of the song is the happiest times of people's lives when they should just take in the moment and "breathe for a minute." He also said that "Unthought Known" concerns the human psyche , and "Supersonic" is about the love for music. According to Vedder, "Speed of Sound" is taken from the perspective of a man still sitting in a bar after everyone else has left, but he added that even though
3686-572: A mainstream audience with hits including " Blowin' in the Wind " (1963) and " Masters of War " (1963), which brought " protest songs " to a wider public, but, although beginning to influence each other, rock and folk music had remained largely separate genres, often with mutually exclusive audiences. Early attempts to combine elements of folk and rock included the Animals' " House of the Rising Sun " (1964), which
3880-485: A major element of progressive rock. From about 1967 bands like Cream and the Jimi Hendrix Experience had moved away from purely blues-based music into psychedelia . By the 1970s, blues rock had become heavier and more riff-based, exemplified by the work of Led Zeppelin and Deep Purple , and the lines between blues rock and hard rock "were barely visible", as bands began recording rock-style albums. The genre
4074-429: A major influence on subsequent electronic rock . With the advent of punk rock and technological changes in the late 1970s, progressive rock was increasingly dismissed as pretentious and overblown. Many bands broke up, but some, including Genesis, ELP, Yes, and Pink Floyd, regularly scored top ten albums with successful accompanying worldwide tours. Some bands which emerged in the aftermath of punk, such as Siouxsie and
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#17328550987104268-410: A more basic form of rock and roll that incorporated its original influences, particularly blues, country and folk music, leading to the creation of country rock and Southern rock. In 1966 Bob Dylan went to Nashville to record the album Blonde on Blonde . This, and subsequent more clearly country-influenced albums, such as Nashville Skyline , have been seen as creating the genre of country folk ,
4462-423: A more positive outlook than the band's last few albums. Vedder credited the election of President Barack Obama as inspiration for the optimistic lyrics. Regarding the lyrics, Vedder said, "I've tried, over the years, to be hopeful in the lyrics, and I think that's going to be easier now." Gossard stated, "We've made a couple of political and pointed records, the last two in particular, and just to move away from that
4656-481: A multibillion-dollar industry and doubling its market while, as Christgau noted, suffering a significant "loss of cultural prestige". "Maybe the Bee Gees became more popular than the Beatles, but they were never more popular than Jesus ", he said. "Insofar as the music retained any mythic power, the myth was self-referential – there were lots of songs about the rock and roll life but very few about how rock could change
4850-570: A national phenomenon. It is often argued that the surf music craze and the careers of almost all surf acts was effectively ended by the arrival of the British Invasion from 1964, because most surf music hits were recorded and released between 1960 and 1965. By the end of 1962, what would become the British rock scene had started with beat groups like the Beatles , Gerry & the Pacemakers and
5044-456: A preacher, prosecutions of Jerry Lee Lewis and Chuck Berry and the breaking of the payola scandal (which implicated major figures, including Alan Freed, in bribery and corruption in promoting individual acts or songs), gave a sense that the rock and roll era established at that point had come to an end. Rock quickly spread out from its origins in the US, associated with the rapid Americanization that
5238-444: A prog rock influence and while ranking among the most commercially successful acts of the 1970s, heralding the era of pomp or arena rock , which would last until the costs of complex shows (often with theatrical staging and special effects), would be replaced by more economical rock festivals as major live venues in the 1990s. The instrumental strand of the genre resulted in albums like Mike Oldfield 's Tubular Bells (1973),
5432-694: A relentless touring schedule for Ten . Drummer Dave Abbruzzese joined the band for Pearl Jam's live shows supporting the album. Halfway through its own planned North American tour, Pearl Jam cancelled the remaining dates in order to take a slot opening for the Red Hot Chili Peppers on the band's Blood Sugar Sex Magik tour in the fall of 1991 in North America. The spot was arranged by Jack Irons, who had called his former band asking for them to get an opportunity to his friend Vedder. The Smashing Pumpkins and Nirvana were also supporting acts. Nirvana
5626-402: A review for AllMusic , Steve Huey asserted that the band's "intricately arranged guitar textures and expansive harmonic vocabulary... especially recalled Jimi Hendrix and Led Zeppelin " and characterizes the album as having an "anthemic" and "warm, rich sound". Huey also praised Vedder for the "highly distinctive timbre" of his vocals and for the "passionate commitment of his delivery". Ten
5820-446: A rigidly delineated musical definition." In the opinion of music journalist Robert Christgau , "the best rock jolts folk-art virtues—directness, utility, natural audience—into the present with shots of modern technology and modernist dissociation ". Rock and roll was conceived as an outlet for adolescent yearnings ... To make rock and roll is also an ideal way to explore intersections of sex, love, violence, and fun, to broadcast
6014-625: A rock-informed album era in the music industry for the next several decades. By the late 1960s " classic rock " period, a few distinct rock music subgenres had emerged, including hybrids like blues rock , folk rock , country rock , Southern rock , raga rock , and jazz rock , which contributed to the development of psychedelic rock , influenced by the countercultural psychedelic and hippie scene . New genres that emerged included progressive rock , which extended artistic elements, heavy metal , which emphasized an aggressive thick sound, and glam rock , which highlighted showmanship and visual style. In
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6208-695: A route pursued by a number of largely acoustic folk musicians. Other acts that followed the back-to-basics trend were the Canadian group the Band and the California-based Creedence Clearwater Revival , both of which mixed basic rock and roll with folk, country and blues, to be among the most successful and influential bands of the late 1960s. The same movement saw the beginning of the recording careers of Californian solo artists like Ry Cooder , Bonnie Raitt and Lowell George , and influenced
6402-478: A slogan one only began to hear in 1972 or so, mobilized all those eager to believe that idealism had become passe, and once they were mobilized, it had. In popular music, embracing the '70s meant both an elitist withdrawal from the messy concert and counterculture scene and a profiteering pursuit of the lowest common denominator in FM radio and album rock . Rock saw greater commodification during this decade, turning into
6596-571: A total of 264 weeks on the Billboard charts, making it one of the top 15 charting albums ever. By February 1993, American sales of Ten surpassed those of Nevermind , the breakthrough album by fellow grunge band Nirvana . Ten continued to sell well two years after its release; in 1993 it was the eighth best-selling album in the United States, outselling Pearl Jam's second album, Vs. As of February 2013, Ten has sold 13 million copies in
6790-431: A two-week session at Henson. It was the first time the band spent a considerable amount of time recording outside of Seattle since 1996's No Code . McCready said, "[When] we got together with Ed and it really started getting more cohesive, we took that momentum down to Los Angeles with Brendan... It was a great idea to get us out of Seattle. You've got to get out [of] your comfort zone, and we've talked about doing that for
6984-441: A uniquely compelling focus". In Q , Dave Henderson called it "raucous modern rock, spiked with infectious guitar motifs and powered with driving bass and drums," and said it "may well be the face of the 90's metal ." Stereo Review ' s Ron Givens said that the band "sounds larger than life, producing a towering inferno of roaring guitars, monumental bass and drums, and from-the-gut vocals." Don Kaye of Kerrang! defined
7178-460: A variety of directions, including Dylan and the Byrds, who began to develop country rock . However, the hybridization of folk and rock has been seen as having a major influence on the development of rock music, bringing in elements of psychedelia, and helping to develop the ideas of the singer-songwriter, the protest song, and concepts of "authenticity". Psychedelic music's LSD -inspired vibe began in
7372-522: A variety of sources such as the Tin Pan Alley pop tradition, folk music , and rhythm and blues . Christgau characterizes rock lyrics as a "cool medium" with simple diction and repeated refrains, and asserts that rock's primary "function" "pertains to music, or, more generally, noise ." The predominance of white, male, and often middle class musicians in rock music has often been noted, and rock has been seen as an appropriation of Black musical forms for
7566-511: A year later in 1992. The versions from the Ten sessions appear on the 2009 Ten reissue. Other songs rejected from the album but included on the 2009 Ten reissue are "Just a Girl", "2,000 Mile Blues", and "Evil Little Goat". The album's cover art features the members of the band at the time of recording in a group pose and standing in front of a wood cut-out of the name "Pearl Jam", with their hands risen high and holding one another's. The wood cut-out
7760-501: A young, white and largely male audience. As a result, it has also been seen to articulate the concerns of this group in both style and lyrics. Christgau, writing in 1972, said in spite of some exceptions, "rock and roll usually implies an identification of male sexuality and aggression". Since the term "rock" started being used in preference to "rock and roll" from the late-1960s, it has usually been contrasted with pop music, with which it has shared many characteristics, but from which it
7954-605: Is a broad genre of popular music that originated as " rock and roll " in the United States in the late 1940s and early 1950s, developing into a range of different styles from the mid-1960s, particularly in the United States and the United Kingdom. It has its roots in rock and roll, a style that drew directly from the genres of blues , rhythm and blues , and country music . Rock also drew strongly from genres such as electric blues and folk , and incorporated influences from jazz and other musical styles. For instrumentation, rock
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8148-408: Is actually his stepfather (his real father having died long ago), while his mother's grief turns her to sadly embrace her son, who strongly resembles the biological father. "Alive" and "Once" formed part of a song cycle in what Vedder later described as a "mini-opera" entitled Momma-Son (the third song, "Footsteps", appeared as a B-side on the "Jeremy" single). Vedder explained that the lyrics told
8342-416: Is also the first album since 1996's No Code for which all lyrics for the album were written solely by Vedder. At 36 minutes and 38 seconds, Backspacer has the shortest running time of any Pearl Jam studio album. The band released the album through its own label Monkeywrench Records with worldwide distribution by Universal Music Group via a licensing agreement with Island Records . Physical copies of
8536-423: Is centered on the electric guitar , usually as part of a rock group with electric bass guitar , drums , and one or more singers. Usually, rock is song-based music with a 4 time signature using a verse–chorus form , but the genre has become extremely diverse. Like pop music , lyrics often stress romantic love but also address a wide variety of other themes that are frequently social or political. Rock
8730-536: Is credited with first using the phrase "rock and roll" to describe the music. Four years later, Bill Haley 's " Rock Around the Clock " (1954) became the first rock and roll song to top Billboard magazine's main sales and airplay charts, and opened the door worldwide for this new wave of popular culture. Other artists with early rock and roll hits included Chuck Berry , Bo Diddley , Fats Domino , Little Richard , Jerry Lee Lewis , and Gene Vincent . Soon rock and roll
8924-464: Is generally agreed that garage rock peaked both commercially and artistically around 1966. By 1968 the style largely disappeared from the national charts and at the local level as amateur musicians faced college, work or the draft . New styles had evolved to replace garage rock. Although the first impact of the British Invasion on American popular music was through beat and R&B based acts,
9118-446: Is going to happen quick, and is going to hit you like a lightning bolt." Vedder called "Gonna See My Friend" a "drug song," but elaborated that the song is about going to see a friend to stay off drugs, and he stated that "Got Some" is about a "drug dealer," but added what the drug the dealer is selling is actually a great rock song. The lyrics to "Johnny Guitar," described by Vedder as "almost an Elvis Costello homage," were inspired by
9312-417: Is great, because it allows you to go back to that when you need to and it refreshes everybody, and it comes down to a beat and a melody and your friends and a lyric and a poem and something that's important to you." Vedder stated he did not spend "more than half hour" writing the lyrics to each song: "If it's not going to happen quick then I don't want to do it, because it means there's another one out there that
9506-544: Is in the music of Chuck Berry , the Ramones , and the Replacements . The foundations of rock music are in rock and roll, which originated in the United States during the late 1940s and early 1950s, and quickly spread to much of the rest of the world. Its immediate origins lay in a melding of various black musical genres of the time, including rhythm and blues and gospel music , with country and western . Debate surrounds
9700-411: Is often distanced by an emphasis on musicianship, live performance, and a focus on serious and progressive themes as part of an ideology of authenticity that is frequently combined with an awareness of the genre's history and development. According to Simon Frith , rock was "something more than pop, something more than rock and roll" and "[r]ock musicians combined an emphasis on skill and technique with
9894-433: Is taken from a 1992 appearance on the radio show Rockline . This version of "Footsteps" is also featured on Lost Dogs , however a harmonica intro has been overdubbed on to the recording. Other songs rejected from the album but later included on Lost Dogs are "Hold On" and "Brother", the latter of which was turned into an instrumental for Lost Dogs . "Brother" was cut because Gossard was no longer interested in playing
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#173285509871010088-399: Is termed as a rock band or a rock group. Furthermore, it typically consists of between three (the power trio ) and five members. Classically, a rock band takes the form of a quartet whose members cover one or more roles, including vocalist, lead guitarist, rhythm guitarist, bass guitarist, drummer, and often keyboard player or another instrumentalist. Rock music is traditionally built on
10282-462: Is that with fewer outside targets or frustrations to rail against, it risks turning sanctimonious... Pearl Jam's music doesn't align well with satisfaction." Joshua Love of Pitchfork said that the album "seems to suggest in its tossed-off 37 minutes that Pearl Jam have no greater concern and regard for what they do than the rest of the world can muster," and he added that "with the spotlights long since extinguished, Pearl Jam seem content to do things by
10476-478: Is the Band." Ten (Pearl Jam album) Ten is the debut studio album by the American rock band Pearl Jam , released on August 27, 1991, through Epic Records . Following the dissolution of their previous band Mother Love Bone in 1990, bassist Jeff Ament and guitarist Stone Gossard began rehearsing with new guitarist Mike McCready . The group recorded a five-song instrumental demo tape that included contributions from Matt Cameron on drums. Copies of
10670-405: Is the band's best reviewed studio album of the 2000s according to Metacritic , where it received a score of 79 out of 100 based on reviews from 24 professional critics. With 18 critics, the editors of AnyDecentMusic? rated Backspacer a 7.1 out of 10. AllMusic staff writer Stephen Thomas Erlewine gave the album four and a half out of five stars, saying that "it sounds as if they enjoy being in
10864-452: Is what millions of people bought, dug and loved, so I was initially hesitant to mess around with that. After years of persistent nudging from the band, I was able to wrap my head around the idea of offering it as a companion piece to the original—giving a fresh take on it, a more direct sound." The Ten reissue sold 60,000 copies in its first week, the second biggest selling week for the album since Christmas 1993. Since Billboard considers
11058-528: The Billboard Hot 100 . The British Invasion greatly influenced garage bands, providing them with a national audience, leading many (often surf or hot rod groups) to adopt a British influence, and encouraging many more groups to form. Thousands of garage bands were extant in the United States and Canada during the era and hundreds produced regional hits. Despite scores of bands being signed to major or large regional labels, most were commercial failures. It
11252-528: The Reign Over Me soundtrack, they opted to call long-time collaborator Brendan O'Brien to produce their cover. During the experience, O'Brien and Pearl Jam decided it was a good time for them to work again on a studio album. This ninth album would mark O'Brien's first production credit with Pearl Jam since 1998's Yield . The band allowed O'Brien greater latitude in determining the sound of Backspacer . "At this point, I think we're willing to let somebody cut
11446-507: The 1993 MTV Video Music Awards , including Video of the Year and Best Group Video . Beyond its role in consolidating the mainstream success of grunge rock in the early 1990s, Ten is generally considered to have been instrumental in the rise and dominance of alternative rock throughout the decade . The album has since been ranked by several publications as one of the greatest albums of all time. By February 2013, it had sold 13 million copies in
11640-519: The American folk music revival had grown to a major movement, using traditional music and new compositions in a traditional style, usually on acoustic instruments. In America the genre was pioneered by figures such as Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger and often identified with progressive or labor politics . In the early sixties figures such as Joan Baez and Bob Dylan had come to the fore in this movement as singer-songwriters. Dylan had begun to reach
11834-780: The Billboard 200 dated May 22, 2010, Backspacer logged its 32nd week on the chart, making the album Pearl Jam's longest-charting album since 1998's Yield . Backspacer was certified Gold by the RIAA on January 28, 2010 and has sold 635,000 copies as of July 2013, according to Soundscan. It also topped the charts in Canada , where it was certified Platinum; Australia , also going Platinum; and New Zealand , being certified Gold. All lyrics are written by Eddie Vedder Pearl Jam Additional musicians Production Sales figures based on certification alone. Shipments figures based on certification alone. Rock music Rock
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#173285509871012028-705: The Munich , Germany show at Nachtwerk, Pearl Jam played Ten in its entirety in order midway through its set. The band would only do this again in 2016 at Philadelphia 's Wells Fargo Center , as the arena management homaged the band's tenth straight sellout concert in the city. Following the European leg, Pearl Jam did another tour of North America. Goldstone noted that the band's audience expanded, saying that unlike before, "everyone came." The band's manager, Kelly Curtis, stated, "Once people came and saw them live, this lightbulb would go on. During their first tour, you kind of knew it
12222-435: The Ten recording sessions which were not included on the album, "Wash" and " Yellow Ledbetter ". The former was a B-side on the "Alive" single while the latter was featured on the "Jeremy" single and eventually became a radio hit in 1994. Both songs were included on the 2003 Lost Dogs collection of rarities, although the included version of "Wash" is an alternate take. The song "Alone" was also originally recorded for Ten ;
12416-610: The Ten reissue a catalog item, Ten did not appear on the Billboard 200, Top Modern Rock/Alternative, or Top Rock Albums, since those charts do not include catalog items. Had it been included on the Billboard 200, the 60,000 copies sold of the Ten reissue would have placed it at number five. The reissue also re-entered the Australian Albums Chart at number 11, giving it a new peak chart position in Australia and its highest chart placing since June 14, 1992. Tying in with
12610-478: The compact disc or iTunes version of the album can access a "virtual 'vault'" which features eleven concerts that span from 2005 to 2008, of which up to two can be chosen to download for free; the iTunes edition was also released as an iTunes LP . Tying in with the release of the album, the entire album has been made available as downloadable content for the Rock Band series of video games. A deal with Verizon made
12804-422: The garage rock / post-punk revival in the 2000s. Since the 2010s, rock has lost its position as the pre-eminent popular music genre in world culture, but remains commercially successful. The increased influence of hip-hop and electronic dance music can be seen in rock music, notably in the techno-pop scene of the early 2010s and the pop-punk-hip-hop revival of the 2020s. Rock has also embodied and served as
12998-417: The protest song , rock music has been associated with political activism , as well as changes in social attitudes to race, sex, and drug use, and is often seen as an expression of youth revolt against adult consumerism and conformity . At the same time, it has been commercially highly successful, leading to accusations of selling out . A good definition of rock, in fact, is that it's popular music that to
13192-449: The 100 greatest albums of rock and roll. In 2006, British Hit Singles & Albums and NME organised a poll of which, 40,000 people worldwide voted for the 100 best albums ever and Ten was placed at number 66 on the list. It was also ranked number 15 in the October 2006 issue of Guitar World on the magazine's list of the 100 greatest guitar albums of all time. In 2007, the album
13386-454: The 1950s saw the growth in popularity of the electric guitar, and the development of a specifically rock and roll style of playing through such exponents as Chuck Berry, Link Wray , and Scotty Moore . The use of distortion , pioneered by Western swing guitarists such as Junior Barnard and Eldon Shamblin was popularized by Chuck Berry in the mid-1950s. The use of power chords , pioneered by Francisco Tárrega and Heitor Villa-Lobos in
13580-415: The 1992 Lollapalooza tour with the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Soundgarden, Ministry and Ice Cube , among others. On March 24, 2009, Ten was reissued in four editions (Legacy, Deluxe, Vinyl, and Super Deluxe). It was the first reissue in a planned re-release of Pearl Jam's entire catalogue that led up to the band's 20th anniversary in 2011. The extras on the four editions include a remastering and remix of
13774-461: The 19th century and later on by Willie Johnson and Pat Hare in the early 1950s, was popularized by Link Wray in the late 1950s. Commentators have traditionally perceived a decline of rock and roll in the late 1950s and early 1960s. By 1959, the death of Buddy Holly, the Big Bopper and Ritchie Valens in a plane crash, the departure of Elvis for the army, the retirement of Little Richard to become
13968-514: The 35th spot. The album debuted at number one on the Billboard 200 with 189,000 copies sold in its first week of release, the only independent release to top the Billboard 200 that year. It is the first Pearl Jam album to reach number one in the United States since No Code debuted at number one in 1996. 7,000 of those copies were on vinyl , the highest first week total for LPs in 2009. On
14162-472: The Banshees , Ultravox , and Simple Minds , showed the influence of progressive rock, as well as their more usually recognized punk influences. In the late 1960s, jazz-rock emerged as a distinct subgenre out of the blues-rock, psychedelic, and progressive rock scenes, mixing the power of rock with the musical complexity and improvisational elements of jazz. AllMusic states that the term jazz-rock "may refer to
14356-609: The Beatles, demonstrating "to the rock generation in general that an album could be a major standalone statement without hit singles", such as on The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan (1963). Folk rock particularly took off in California, where it led acts like the Mamas & the Papas and Crosby, Stills, and Nash to move to electric instrumentation, and in New York, where it spawned performers including
14550-596: The Byrds ' shift from folk to folk rock from 1965. The psychedelic lifestyle, which revolved around hallucinogenic drugs, had already developed in San Francisco and particularly prominent products of the scene were Big Brother and the Holding Company , the Grateful Dead and Jefferson Airplane . The Jimi Hendrix Experience 's lead guitarist, Jimi Hendrix did extended distorted, feedback-filled jams which became
14744-431: The Byrds adopted rock instrumentation, including drums and 12-string Rickenbacker guitars, which became a major element in the sound of the genre. Later that year Dylan adopted electric instruments, much to the outrage of many folk purists, with his " Like a Rolling Stone " becoming a US hit single. According to Ritchie Unterberger , Dylan (even before his adoption of electric instruments) influenced rock musicians like
14938-530: The Dog , Stone and Ament asked him to co-produce and engineer Ten . Parashar also contributed piano, Fender Rhodes, organ, percussion, co-wrote vocal harmonies and co-wrote the intro/outro of the album. A few tracks were previously recorded at London Bridge in January, but only "Alive" was carried over from that session. The album sessions were quick and lasted only a month, mainly due to the band having already written most of
15132-578: The Dominos , followed by an extensive solo career that helped bring blues rock into the mainstream. Green, along with the Bluesbreaker's rhythm section Mick Fleetwood and John McVie , formed Peter Green's Fleetwood Mac , who enjoyed some of the greatest commercial success in the genre. In the late 1960s Jeff Beck , also an alumnus of the Yardbirds, moved blues rock in the direction of heavy rock with his band,
15326-499: The Gates of Dawn . Key recordings included Jefferson Airplane's Surrealistic Pillow and the Doors ' self-titled debut album . These trends peaked in the 1969 Woodstock festival , which saw performances by most of the major psychedelic acts. Sgt. Pepper was later regarded as the greatest album of all time and a starting point for the album era , during which rock music transitioned from
15520-464: The Jeff Beck Group . The last Yardbirds guitarist was Jimmy Page , who went on to form The New Yardbirds which rapidly became Led Zeppelin . Many of the songs on their first three albums, and occasionally later in their careers, were expansions on traditional blues songs. In America, blues rock had been pioneered in the early 1960s by guitarist Lonnie Mack , but the genre began to take off in
15714-498: The Joint " (1949), also covered by Bill Haley & His Comets in 1952; and " Rocket 88 " by Jackie Brenston and his Delta Cats (in fact, Ike Turner and his band the Kings of Rhythm ), recorded by Sam Phillips for Chess Records in 1951. In 1951, Cleveland, Ohio disc jockey Alan Freed began playing rhythm and blues music (then termed " race music ") for a multi-racial audience, and
15908-499: The Lovin' Spoonful and Simon and Garfunkel , with the latter's acoustic " The Sounds of Silence " (1965) being remixed with rock instruments to be the first of many hits. These acts directly influenced British performers like Donovan and Fairport Convention . In 1969 Fairport Convention abandoned their mixture of American covers and Dylan-influenced songs to play traditional English folk music on electric instruments. This British folk-rock
16102-557: The Mainstream Rock chart, despite never being released as a single. The video for "Alive" was nominated for the MTV Video Music Award for Best Alternative Video in 1992. "Jeremy" became one of Pearl Jam's best-known songs, and received nominations for Best Rock Song and Best Hard Rock Performance at the 1993 Grammy awards . The video for "Jeremy", directed by Mark Pellington , was put into heavy rotation by MTV and became
16296-476: The Rolling Stones and the Yardbirds , were much more directly influenced by rhythm and blues and later blues music. Soon these groups were composing their own material, combining US forms of music and infusing it with a high energy beat. Beat bands tended towards "bouncy, irresistible melodies", while early British blues acts tended towards less sexually innocent, more aggressive songs, often adopting an anti-establishment stance. There was, however, particularly in
16490-573: The Searchers from Liverpool and Freddie and the Dreamers , Herman's Hermits and the Hollies from Manchester. They drew on a wide range of American influences including 1950s rock and roll, soul, rhythm and blues, and surf music, initially reinterpreting standard American tunes and playing for dancers. Bands like the Animals from Newcastle and Them from Belfast , and particularly those from London like
16684-650: The Seeds ) to near-studio musician quality (including the Knickerbockers , the Remains , and the Fifth Estate ). There were also regional variations in many parts of the country with flourishing scenes particularly in California and Texas. The Pacific Northwest states of Washington and Oregon had perhaps the most defined regional sound. The style had been evolving from regional scenes as early as 1958. "Tall Cool One" (1959) by
16878-607: The Sony art department at that time. The version that everybody got to know as the Ten album cover was pink and it was originally intended to be more of a burgundy color and the picture of the band was supposed to be black and white." Pearl Jam's original name was taken from the professional basketball player Mookie Blaylock . It was changed after the band signed to Epic Records, as record executives were concerned about intellectual property and naming rights following Blaylock's inking of an endorsement deal with Nike . In commemoration of
17072-676: The US was becoming dominated by lightweight pop and ballads, British rock groups at clubs and local dances were developing a style more strongly influenced by blues-rock pioneers, and were starting to play with an intensity and drive seldom found in white American acts; this influence would go on to shape the future of rock music through the British Invasion . The first four years of the 1960s has traditionally been seen as an era of hiatus for rock and roll. More recently some authors have emphasised important innovations and trends in this period without which future developments would not have been possible. While early rock and roll, particularly through
17266-649: The US, becoming the 22nd record to do so in the Nielsen SoundScan era, and has been certified 13× Platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). Ten remains Pearl Jam's most commercially successful album. Guitarist Stone Gossard and bassist Jeff Ament had played together in the pioneering grunge band Green River . Following Green River's dissolution in 1987, Ament and Gossard played together in Mother Love Bone during
17460-604: The USSR and South Africa from 1955 to 1957, influencing the globalisation of rock. Johnny O'Keefe 's 1958 record " Wild One " was one of the earliest Australian rock and roll hits. By the late 1950s, as well as in the American-influenced Western world, rock was popular in communist states such as Yugoslavia, and the USSR, as well as in regions such as South America. In the late 1950s and early 1960s, American blues music and blues rock artists, who had been surpassed by
17654-463: The United States according to Nielsen SoundScan , and has been certified 13× platinum by the RIAA . Ten produced three hit singles, " Alive ", " Even Flow ", and " Jeremy ", all of which had accompanying music videos (The " Oceans " video was released only outside of the U.S.). The singles all placed on the Mainstream Rock and Modern Rock charts. The song " Black " reached number three on
17848-572: The United States for a final American leg in May 2010, and a European leg in June 2010. The lead single " The Fixer " (backed with B-side "Supersonic," also from the album), was made available through the band's official website. "The Fixer" entered the Billboard Hot 100 at number 56 and reached number three on the Alternative Rock Tracks charts. A music video was made for "The Fixer." Footage from
18042-722: The Wailers and " Louie Louie " by the Kingsmen (1963) are mainstream examples of the genre in its formative stages. By 1963, garage band singles were creeping into the national charts in greater numbers, including Paul Revere and the Raiders (Boise), the Trashmen (Minneapolis) and the Rivieras (South Bend, Indiana). Other influential garage bands, such as the Sonics (Tacoma, Washington), never reached
18236-527: The advent of rockabilly, saw the greatest commercial success for male and white performers, in this era, the genre was dominated by black and female artists. Rock and roll had not disappeared entirely from music at the end of the 1950s and some of its energy can be seen in the various dance crazes of the early 1960s, started by Chubby Checker 's record " The Twist " (1960). Some music historians have also pointed to important and innovative technical developments that built on rock and roll in this period, including
18430-488: The album a B, saying that Backspacer is "the sort of sweaty rock & roll that belongs in a bar with cracked-leather booths and $ 2 beers," and that it "grows same-y, but tracks like the surfing-as-life-metaphor anthem ' Amongst the Waves ' do indeed make something old feel, if not new, good again." The New York Times said that "Pearl Jam... [refuses]—mostly—to equate maturity with slowing down," but added, "Pearl Jam's quandary
18624-575: The album as "introspective and charged with a quiet emotional force". Greg Kot wrote in the Chicago Tribune , "Occasionally overwrought and unrelentingly humorless, the music nonetheless exerts a hypnotic power at its best." David Browne was less enthusiastic in Entertainment Weekly ; he found Pearl Jam to be derivative of "fellow Northwestern rockers like Soundgarden, Alice in Chains , and
18818-466: The album four out of five stars. He said, "For the first time in years, Pearl Jam are seizing the moment rather than wallowing in it." Time reviewer Josh Tyrangiel said, "The songs here are built on hooks, covered with guitar fuzz, and then trimmed back a bit so the melody abides." Tyrangiel added, "Nothing revolutionary, but Backspacer provides an adrenaline jolt that shouldn't be underestimated either." Leah Greenblatt of Entertainment Weekly gave
19012-490: The album's closer "Release" as a hidden track , but both count as one track on the CD. The song is entirely instrumental (except for random unintelligible words Vedder utters throughout) with a dominant fretless bass line making up the core of the song (which Ament referred to in a 1994 Bass Player magazine interview as "my tribute to (fretless bass instrumentalist) Mick Karn "), along with some guitar and sounds that seem to come from
19206-411: The album's sound: "At one of our gigs, without flashpots and electricity, there's only so much room for those difficult listening songs. That's one reason we kept the arrangements lean." The singer cited Guided by Voices as a reference in creating the shorter and faster songs of Backspacer . Gossard said that Backspacer is "what we could have done for the last five records, in terms of re-engaging with
19400-573: The album, an LP of the band's September 20, 1992 concert at Magnuson Park in Seattle (also known as Drop in the Park ), a replica of the original Momma-Son demo cassette, and a replica of Vedder's composition notebook containing personal notes and mementos. Regarding his remix of the album, O'Brien stated, "The band loved the original mix of Ten , but were also interested in what it would sound like if I were to deconstruct and remix it...The original Ten sound
19594-421: The artwork as "dreams and memories," while Gossard referred to the artwork as a "bizarro otherworldy dreamscape." The album's cover art features nine images created by Perkins, and was revealed through a contest on the band's official website. The nine images were hidden on various websites, and the contest asked Internet users to search for the websites containing the images, whereby the images would be placed on
19788-429: The artwork. In 2009, Village Voice Media , publishers of 16 alternative weeklies, suspended all syndicated cartoons across their entire chain, including Perkins' strip This Modern World . Perkins lost twelve client papers in cities including Los Angeles, Minneapolis , New York City and Seattle, prompting his friend Vedder to post an open letter on the Pearl Jam website in support of the cartoonist. Perkins referred to
19982-554: The band (now joined by drummer Dave Krusen ) for a week, writing eleven songs in the process. Vedder was soon hired as the band's singer, and the group signed to Epic Records shortly thereafter. The band, then named Mookie Blaylock (after the basketball player of that name ), entered London Bridge Studios in Seattle , Washington in March 1991 with producer Rick Parashar to record its debut album. After working with Parashar on Temple of
20176-515: The band joined Tim Palmer in England for mixing . Palmer decided to mix the album at Ridge Farm Studios in Dorking , a converted farm that according to Palmer was "about as far away from an L.A. or New York studio as you can get." Palmer made a few additions to the already-recorded songs, including having McCready finish up the guitar solo on "Alive" and tweaking the intro to " Black ". Palmer overdubbed
20370-419: The band once the sessions were completed, checking himself into rehab. According to Krusen, he was suffering from personal problems at the time. Krusen said, "It was a great experience. I felt from the beginning of that band that it was something special," and added, "They had to let me go. I couldn't stop drinking, and it was causing problems. They gave me many chances, but I couldn't get it together." In June,
20564-455: The band released the album through its own label Monkeywrench Records in conjunction with Universal Music Group in the United States and through Universal's Island Records internationally. Pearl Jam reached a deal with Target to be the exclusive big-box store retailer for the album in the United States. The album also saw release through the band's official website, independent record stores, online retailers, and iTunes . Those who purchase
20758-417: The band's September 20 concert. In a contemporary review for Rolling Stone , music critic David Fricke praised Ten , saying that Pearl Jam "hurtles into the mystic at warp speed." He also added that Pearl Jam "wring a lot of drama out of a few declarative power chords swimming in echo." Allan Jones of Melody Maker suggested in his review of Ten that it is Vedder who provides Pearl Jam "with such
20952-445: The band's original name, the band titled Ten after Blaylock's jersey number. In some versions (mainly CD and cassette releases), the cover is in gatefold form, folded in such a way that only the band members' hands are visible. Ament stated that "essentially Ten was just an excuse to tour", adding, "We told the record company, 'We know we can be a great band, so let's just get the opportunity to get out and play.'" Pearl Jam faced
21146-478: The best of the lot." Evan Sawdey of PopMatters gave the album a rating of 7/10 and wrote that Pearl Jam "have finally re-discovered who they are, and sound stronger than ever because of it". Paul Brannigan of Q gave the album four out of five stars. He said the album is "largely characterised by joyous new wave-influenced rock'n'roll, and for the first time in their 19-year career, Pearl Jam actually sound—whisper it—fun. No, honestly." Josh Modell of Spin gave
21340-575: The biggest selling rock band of all time and they were followed into the US charts by numerous British bands. During the next two years British acts dominated their own and the US charts with Peter and Gordon , the Animals, Manfred Mann , Petula Clark , Freddie and the Dreamers, Wayne Fontana and the Mindbenders , Herman's Hermits, the Rolling Stones, the Troggs , and Donovan all having one or more number one singles. Other major acts that were part of
21534-445: The book." At the 53rd Grammy Awards , Backspacer was nominated for Grammy Award for Best Rock Album , losing to Muse 's The Resistance . Several year-end lists included the album amongst the best releases of 2009. AllMusic listed it on their Favorite Rock Albums of 2009, Billboard ranked it eighth on their Top 10 Albums of 2009, while Rolling Stone put Backspacer at 11th on their list, Popmatters had it as 31st, and Q on
21728-405: The chart. Their first appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show on 9 February 1964, drawing an estimated 73 million viewers (at the time a record for an American television program) is considered a milestone in American pop culture. During the week of 4 April 1964, the Beatles held 12 positions on the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart, including the entire top five. The Beatles went on to become
21922-501: The charts in Canada, Australia and New Zealand. In 2007, after Pearl Jam's 2006 tour had ended, the band members began recording demo material on their own while staying in occasional contact via e-mail. Guitarist Mike McCready revealed at the time that he'd tested out some ideas with guitarist Stone Gossard and drummer Matt Cameron in separate sessions as well. After the band was invited to record The Who 's " Love, Reign o'er Me " for
22116-470: The defunct Mother Love Bone", and felt that it "goes to show that just about anything can be harnessed and packaged." NME accused Pearl Jam of "trying to steal money from young alternative kids' pockets", with reviewer Angela Lewis deeming the band unworthy of comparisons to Nirvana and Soundgarden. Robert Christgau , writing in The Village Voice , gave the album a "B−" and viewed it as another in
22310-424: The delights and limitations of the regional , and to deal with the depredations and benefits of mass culture itself. — Robert Christgau in Christgau's Record Guide (1981) Unlike many earlier styles of popular music, rock lyrics have dealt with a wide range of themes, including romantic love, sex, rebellion against " The Establishment ", social concerns, and life styles. These themes were inherited from
22504-444: The demo were eventually given to drummer Dave Krusen and vocalist Eddie Vedder , both of whom were invited to audition for the band in Seattle. Many of the songs on Ten were instrumental jams or reworked Mother Love Bone songs for which Vedder provided lyrics. Despite its reputation as a quintessential grunge album, Ten is often noted for displaying a stronger classic rock influence than other contemporary grunge releases. In
22698-526: The drums. Producer Rick Parashar stated in 2002, "As I recall, I think Jeff had, like, a bass line...I heard the bass line and then we kind of were collaborating on that in the control room, and then I just started programming on the keyboard all this stuff; he was jamming with it and it just kind of came about like that." In a 2021 interview with Kyle Meredith, Ament also revealed that he took inspiration from Cheap Trick 's bass sounds for songs "Why Go" and "Jeremy". The album's singles featured two B-sides from
22892-451: The early 1970s among existing blues-rock and psychedelic bands, as well as newly formed acts. The vibrant Canterbury scene saw acts following Soft Machine from psychedelia, through jazz influences, toward more expansive hard rock, including Caravan , Hatfield and the North , Gong , and National Health . The French group Magma around drummer Christian Vander almost single-handedly created
23086-455: The early 1970s, Robert Christgau wrote in Christgau's Record Guide: Rock Albums of the Seventies (1981): The decade is, of course, an arbitrary schema itself—time doesn't just execute a neat turn toward the future every ten years. But like a lot of artificial concepts—money, say—the category does take on a reality of its own once people figure out how to put it to work. "The '60s are over,"
23280-457: The early stages, considerable musical crossover between the two tendencies. By 1963, led by the Beatles, beat groups had begun to achieve national success in Britain, soon to be followed into the charts by the more rhythm and blues focused acts. " I Want to Hold Your Hand " was the Beatles' first number one hit on the Billboard Hot 100 , spending seven weeks at the top and a total of 15 weeks on
23474-510: The electronic treatment of sound by such innovators as Joe Meek , and the elaborate production methods of the Wall of Sound pursued by Phil Spector . The instrumental rock and roll of performers such as Duane Eddy , Link Wray and the Ventures was further developed by Dick Dale , who added distinctive "wet" reverb , rapid alternate picking, and Middle Eastern and Mexican influences. He produced
23668-489: The entire album by producer Brendan O'Brien , re-designed packaging, six bonus tracks (" Brother ", "Just a Girl", " Breath and a Scream ", " State of Love and Trust ", "2,000 Mile Blues", and "Evil Little Goat"), a DVD of the band's 1992 appearance on MTV Unplugged (including a bonus performance of "Oceans", which along with " Rockin' in the Free World " was originally excluded from the broadcast version), vinyl versions of
23862-512: The example set by the Beatles ' 1965 LP Rubber Soul in particular, other British rock acts released rock albums intended as artistic statements in 1966, including the Rolling Stones ' Aftermath , the Beatles' own Revolver , and the Who 's A Quick One , as well as American acts in the Beach Boys ( Pet Sounds ) and Bob Dylan ( Blonde on Blonde ). Garage rock was a raw form of rock music, particularly prevalent in North America in
24056-500: The few people outside of the band that we trust with our music, and we're really, really looking forward to making this record." The band began working on the album in May 2008, making demos in Seattle , Washington before recording sessions at Henson Recording Studios in Los Angeles , California , where O'Brien usually works. Ament said it was "the first time since the first record that we've really rehearsed instead of just going to
24250-491: The first record, and worldwide hit, for the Virgin Records label, which became a mainstay of the genre. Instrumental rock was particularly significant in continental Europe, allowing bands like Kraftwerk , Tangerine Dream , Can , Focus (band) and Faust to circumvent the language barrier. Their synthesiser-heavy " krautrock ", along with the work of Brian Eno (for a time the keyboard player with Roxy Music ), would be
24444-451: The folk scene. The first group to advertise themselves as psychedelic rock were the 13th Floor Elevators from Texas. The Beatles introduced many of the major elements of the psychedelic sound to audiences in this period, such as guitar feedback , the Indian sitar and backmasking sound effects . Psychedelic rock particularly took off in California's emerging music scene as groups followed
24638-503: The format of rock operas and opened the door to concept albums , often telling an epic story or tackling a grand overarching theme. King Crimson 's 1969 début album, In the Court of the Crimson King , which mixed powerful guitar riffs and mellotron , with jazz and symphonic music , is often taken as the key recording in progressive rock, helping the widespread adoption of the genre in
24832-476: The greatest rock debut record of all time", Ten, in 2003, was ranked number 207 on Rolling Stone ' s list of the 500 greatest albums of all time , and 209 in a 2012 revised list. In 2020 it was raised to the 160th position on the list, which was carried over for the 2023 edition. Readers of Q voted Ten as the 42nd greatest album ever; however, three years later the album was listed lower at 59th. In 2003, VH1 placed it at number 83 on their list of
25026-461: The historical name of the backspace key on typewriters that went out of use in the 1950s and also as a reference to looking back on one's life. Vedder is known to use typewriters when writing lyrics and letters. Vedder said, " Backspacer [means] actually you kind of have to go back and look at your mistake." Gossard said, "There are some retrospective moods on this record, where Ed is looking at both his past and his future." The album title Backspacer
25220-453: The impetus was soon taken up by a second wave of bands that drew their inspiration more directly from American blues , including the Rolling Stones and the Yardbirds . British blues musicians of the late 1950s and early 1960s had been inspired by the acoustic playing of figures such as Lead Belly , who was a major influence on the Skiffle craze, and Robert Johnson . Increasingly they adopted
25414-460: The invasion included the Kinks and the Dave Clark Five . The British Invasion helped internationalize the production of rock and roll, opening the door for subsequent British (and Irish) performers to achieve international success. In America it arguably spelled the end of instrumental surf music, vocal girl groups and (for a time) the teen idols , that had dominated the American charts in
25608-511: The label were R&B oriented white rock bands that made use of jazzy horn sections, like Electric Flag , Blood, Sweat & Tears and Chicago , to become some of the most commercially successful acts of the later 1960s and the early 1970s. British acts to emerge in the same period from the blues scene, to make use of the tonal and improvisational aspects of jazz, included Nucleus and the Graham Bond and John Mayall spin-off Colosseum . From
25802-446: The late 1950s and 1960s. It dented the careers of established R&B acts like Fats Domino and Chubby Checker and even temporarily derailed the chart success of surviving rock and roll acts, including Elvis. The British Invasion also played a major part in the rise of a distinct genre of rock music, and cemented the primacy of the rock group, based on guitars and drums and producing their own material as singer-songwriters. Following
25996-593: The late 1980s. Mother Love Bone's career was cut short when vocalist Andrew Wood died of a drug overdose in 1990, shortly before the release of the group's debut album, Apple . Devastated, it took months before Gossard and Ament agreed to play together again. Gossard spent his time afterwards writing material that was harder-edged than what he had been doing previously. After a few months, Gossard started practicing with fellow Seattle guitarist Mike McCready , whose band Shadow had broken up; McCready in turn encouraged Gossard to reconnect with Ament. The three then went into
26190-410: The loudest, wildest, most electrified fusion bands from the jazz camp, but most often it describes performers coming from the rock side of the equation." Jazz-rock "...generally grew out of the most artistically ambitious rock subgenres of the late '60s and early '70s", including the singer-songwriter movement. Many early US rock and roll musicians had begun in jazz and carried some of these elements into
26384-590: The main attraction, as always." He added, "After toughing out the Bush years, Pearl Jam aren't in the mood for brooding; at long last, surf's up." Dave Simpson of The Guardian also gave the album four out of five stars. In the review he stated that "the Seattle quartet have rarely sounded this energised." Simpson observed that "this is a record made by mature men with perspective: full of reflection and eclecticism, finding space for both U2 guitar motifs and Buzzcocks solos." He added that "the ninth Pearl Jam album may even be
26578-476: The many recordings which have been suggested as "the first rock and roll record ". Contenders include " Strange Things Happening Every Day " by Sister Rosetta Tharpe (1944); " That's All Right " by Arthur Crudup (1946), which was later covered by Elvis Presley in 1954; " The House of Blue Lights " by Ella Mae Morse and Freddie Slack (1946); Wynonie Harris ' " Good Rocking Tonight " (1948); Goree Carter 's "Rock Awhile" (1949); Jimmy Preston 's " Rock
26772-465: The material for the record. "Porch", "Deep", "Why Go", and "Garden" were first recorded during the album sessions; everything else had been previously recorded during demo sessions at some point. McCready said that " Ten was mostly Stone and Jeff; me and Eddie were along for the ride at that time." Ament stated, "We knew we were still a long way from being a real band at that point." The recording sessions for Ten were completed in May 1991. Krusen left
26966-669: The mid-1950s by white singers such as Carl Perkins , Jerry Lee Lewis, Buddy Holly and with the greatest commercial success, Elvis Presley . Hispanic and Latino American movements in rock and roll, which would eventually lead to the success of Latin rock and Chicano rock within the US, began to rise in the Southwest ; with rock and roll standard musician Ritchie Valens and even those within other heritage genres, such as Al Hurricane along with his brothers Tiny Morrie and Baby Gaby as they began combining rock and roll with country- western within traditional New Mexico music . In addition,
27160-603: The mid-1960s the Left Banke , the Beatles, the Rolling Stones and the Beach Boys, had pioneered the inclusion of harpsichords , wind , and string sections on their recordings to produce a form of Baroque rock and can be heard in singles like Procol Harum 's " A Whiter Shade of Pale " (1967), with its Bach -inspired introduction. The Moody Blues used a full orchestra on their album Days of Future Passed (1967) and subsequently created orchestral sounds with synthesizers. Classical orchestration, keyboards, and synthesizers were
27354-479: The mid-1960s and so called because of the perception that it was rehearsed in the suburban family garage. Garage rock songs often revolved around the traumas of high school life, with songs about "lying girls" and unfair social circumstances being particularly common. The lyrics and delivery tended to be more aggressive than was common at the time, often with growled or shouted vocals that dissolved into incoherent screaming. They ranged from crude one-chord music (like
27548-435: The mid-1960s as acts developed a sound similar to British blues musicians. Key acts included Paul Butterfield (whose band acted like Mayall's Bluesbreakers in Britain as a starting point for many successful musicians), Canned Heat , the early Jefferson Airplane , Janis Joplin , Johnny Winter , the J. Geils Band and Jimi Hendrix with his power trios , the Jimi Hendrix Experience (which included two British members, and
27742-401: The mid-1960s onwards, rock music often used the verse–chorus structure derived from blues and folk music, but there has been considerable variation from this model. Critics have stressed the eclecticism and stylistic diversity of rock. Because of its complex history and its tendency to borrow from other musical and cultural forms, it has been argued that "it is impossible to bind rock music to
27936-461: The new music genre zeuhl with their first albums in the early 1970s. Greater commercial success was enjoyed by Pink Floyd, who also moved away from psychedelia after the departure of Syd Barrett in 1968, with The Dark Side of the Moon (1973), seen as a masterpiece of the genre, becoming one of the best-selling albums of all time. There was an emphasis on instrumental virtuosity, with Yes showcasing
28130-591: The new music. In Britain the subgenre of blues rock, and many of its leading figures, like Ginger Baker and Jack Bruce of the Eric Clapton -fronted band Cream , had emerged from the British jazz scene. Often highlighted as the first true jazz-rock recording is the only album by the relatively obscure New York–based the Free Spirits with Out of Sight and Sound (1966). The first group of bands to self-consciously use
28324-479: The past 10 years and kind of haven't, so we trusted Brendan's judgment." In April 2009, the band went for a two-week session to finish the album with O'Brien at his mixing facility at Southern Tracks in Atlanta , Georgia . The album took a total of thirty days in the studio to get finished, and O'Brien stated "we had 90% of the record cut in the first nine days". The album title was chosen in part because of nostalgia for
28518-465: The psychedelic rock and the Canterbury scenes came Soft Machine, who, it has been suggested, produced one of the artistically successfully fusions of the two genres. Perhaps the most critically acclaimed fusion came from the jazz side of the equation, with Miles Davis , particularly influenced by the work of Hendrix, incorporating rock instrumentation into his sound for the album Bitches Brew (1970). It
28712-451: The re-release of the album in March 2009, the entire album was made available as downloadable content for the Rock Band series of video games. In addition, three Ten -era bonus tracks were made available for the Rock Band video game for those who purchased the Ten re-release through Best Buy : "Brother", "Alive", and "State of Love and Trust", the latter two as live versions taken from
28906-400: The record were sold through Target in North America, and promotion included a deal with Verizon , a world tour , and moderately successful singles " The Fixer " and "Got Some"/" Just Breathe ". Reviews for Backspacer were largely positive, praising the sound and composition, and the album became Pearl Jam's first chart topper in the U.S. Billboard 200 since No Code , while also topping
29100-628: The regional hit " Let's Go Trippin ' " in 1961 and launched the surf music craze, following up with songs like " Misirlou " (1962). Like Dale and his Del-Tones , most early surf bands were formed in Southern California, including the Bel-Airs , the Challengers , and Eddie & the Showmen . The Chantays scored a top ten national hit with " Pipeline " in 1963 and probably the best-known surf tune
29294-445: The rise of rock and roll in the US, found new popularity in the UK, visiting with successful tours. Lonnie Donegan 's 1955 hit " Rock Island Line " was a major influence and helped to develop the trend of skiffle music groups throughout the country, many of which, including John Lennon 's Quarrymen (later the Beatles ), moved on to play rock and roll. While former rock and roll market in
29488-475: The romantic concept of art as artistic expression, original and sincere". In the new millennium, the term rock has occasionally been used as a blanket term including forms like pop music, reggae music , soul music , and even hip hop , which it has been influenced with but often contrasted through much of its history. Christgau has used the term broadly to refer to popular and semipopular music that caters to his sensibility as "a rock-and-roller", including
29682-511: The roots of why this band works," and that "there are plenty of ballads, too... and there are some shifts in how Jeff and Matt and I are all relating—I think this record's got a chance to sound significantly different." Ament said, "There are a couple of great things that Ed brought in that could be real departures for us. Whatever wave Ed caught with [his soundtrack for] Into the Wild has taken him to different places." Lyrically, Backspacer displays
29876-517: The same era, and by percussion produced from a drum kit that combines drums and cymbals. This trio of instruments has often been complemented by the inclusion of other instruments, particularly keyboards such as the piano, the Hammond organ , and the synthesizer. The basic rock instrumentation was derived from the basic blues band instrumentation (prominent lead guitar, second chordal instrument, bass, and drums). A group of musicians performing rock music
30070-461: The second half of 1992 it became a breakthrough success, attaining an RIAA gold certification. Almost a year after its release, the album finally broke into the top ten of the Billboard 200 album chart on May 30, 1992, reaching number eight. Ten would eventually peak at number two for four weeks. It was held off the top spot by the Billy Ray Cyrus album, Some Gave All . The album spent
30264-555: The second half of the 1970s, punk rock reacted by producing stripped-down, energetic social and political critiques. Punk was an influence in the 1980s on new wave , post-punk and eventually alternative rock . From the 1990s, alternative rock began to dominate rock music and break into the mainstream in the form of grunge , Britpop , and indie rock . Further fusion subgenres have since emerged, including pop-punk , electronic rock , rap rock , and rap metal . Some movements were conscious attempts to revisit rock's history, including
30458-543: The singles format to albums and achieved cultural legitimacy in the mainstream. Led by the Beatles in the mid-1960s, rock musicians advanced the LP as the dominant form of recorded music expression and consumption, initiating a rock-informed album era in the music industry for the next several decades. Progressive rock, a term sometimes used interchangeably with art rock , moved beyond established musical formulas by experimenting with different instruments, song types, and forms. From
30652-413: The skills of both guitarist Steve Howe and keyboard player Rick Wakeman , while Emerson, Lake & Palmer were a supergroup who produced some of the genre's most technically demanding work. Jethro Tull and Genesis both pursued very different, but distinctly English, brands of music. Renaissance , formed in 1969 by ex-Yardbirds Jim McCarty and Keith Relf, evolved into a high-concept band featuring
30846-428: The song is sad it became more "confident" when played with the whole band. He said "Force of Nature" is "about the strength of one person in the relationship, when they can withstand some of the faults in another." "The End" has been described as an "aching love song." The artwork for the album was handled by editorial cartoonist Dan Perkins, who goes by the pen name Tom Tomorrow . Perkins spent six months working on
31040-402: The song, a decision which Ament objected to and almost caused him to quit the band. The version of "Brother" with vocals appears on the 2009 Ten reissue and became a radio hit that same year. Both "Breath" and "State of Love and Trust" were recorded with the intention of the two songs possibly appearing in the film Singles . The versions heard in the film and on its soundtrack were recorded
31234-950: The songs from the album available as both ringtone and ringback . Pearl Jam promoted the album with tours in North America and Oceania in 2009. On October 4, 2009, the band headlined the Austin City Limits Music Festival . The appearance took place amidst a fourteen-date North American leg of the tour. Afterward, the band continued to tour in Oceania . In November 2009, they appeared in Australia, with their first performance in Perth, and after, gigs in Adelaide, Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane. Their next concert performances followed in New Zealand. After their last date there, Pearl Jam returned to
31428-405: The songs on the album fused "the riff-heavy stadium rock of the 1970s with the grit and anger of '80s post-punk , without ever neglecting hooks and choruses." Ten features a two-part track entitled "Master/Slave" that both opens and closes the album. The first part begins the album, before " Once " starts, and the second part closes the album, after "Release". It begins about ten seconds after
31622-514: The songs up a little bit," said lead vocalist Eddie Vedder . "In the past, Brendan would say, 'It's a great song, but I think you should do it in a different key,' and we'd say no. But now that we've heard Bruce [Springsteen] has listened to his suggestions, I think we will too." Bassist Jeff Ament said, "He brings a brutally honest approach to what he thinks is working and what isn't, and it really moves things along... We don't get weighted down with ideas that maybe aren't even that good. He's one of
31816-427: The story of a young man whose father dies ("Alive"), causing him to go on a killing spree ("Once") which leads to his capture and execution ("Footsteps"). It was later revealed that Vedder's lyrics were inspired by his long-held hurt in discovering at age 17 that the man he thought was his father was not, and that his real father had already died. While Ten deals with dark subject matter, it has generally been seen as
32010-673: The studio and spent too long recording, doing different takes, and killing the vibe and overdubbing tons of guitar. There's a lot of reverb on the record." In 2006, Vedder said, "I can listen to the early records [except] the first record...it's just the sound of the record. It was kind of mixed in a way that was...it was kind of produced." According to Guitar World , Mike McCready’s undisguised Stevie Ray Vaughan passion saw him bring Strats back into vogue. The guitarist described his playing on "Black" and "Even Flow" as an SRV “rip off”. Both guitarists used Marshall JCM800s for dirty tones and Fenders for clean parts. Ten has been described as
32204-437: The studio for separate sessions with Soundgarden drummer Matt Cameron and former Shadow drummer Chris Friel to record some instrumental demos. Five of the songs recorded—"Dollar Short", "Agytian Crave", "Footsteps", "Richard's E", and "E Ballad"—were compiled onto a tape called Stone Gossard Demos '91 that was circulated in the hopes of finding a singer and drummer for the trio. San Diego musician Eddie Vedder acquired
32398-459: The studio with a handful of ideas." In May the band had "about five ideas that have been worked on," which were given some instrumental beds later in the summer. Additional demos were put to tape in December, following a trip by all bandmembers but Vedder to Ament's home in Montana . The singer later proceeded to put rough vocals on those tracks, and also brought in his own material for the band members to work on. In February 2009, Pearl Jam went for
32592-439: The summer of 1992 after the Roskilde Festival due to a confrontation with security at that event as well as exhaustion from touring. Ament said, "We'd been on the road over 10 months. I think there just came a point about half way through that tour it was just starting to get pretty intense. I mean just being away from home, being on the road all the time and being lonely or being depressed or whatever." The band would go on to play
32786-558: The three-octave voice of Annie Haslam . Most British bands depended on a relatively small cult following, but a handful, including Pink Floyd, Genesis, and Jethro Tull, managed to produce top ten singles at home and break the American market. The American brand of progressive rock varied from the eclectic and innovative Frank Zappa , Captain Beefheart and Blood, Sweat & Tears , to more pop rock orientated bands like Boston , Foreigner , Kansas , Journey , and Styx . These, beside British bands Supertramp and ELO , all demonstrated
32980-431: The use of psychiatric hospitals ("Why Go"). The song "Jeremy" and its accompanying video were inspired by a true story in which a high school student shot himself in front of his classmates. Many listeners interpreted "Alive" as an inspirational anthem due to its decidedly uplifting instrumentals and chorus. Vedder has since revealed that the song tells the semi-autobiographical tale of a son discovering that his father
33174-409: The vehicle for cultural and social movements, leading to major subcultures including mods and rockers in the U.K., the hippie movement and the wider Western counterculture movement that spread out from San Francisco in the U.S. in the 1960s, the latter of which continues to this day. Similarly, 1970s punk culture spawned the goth , punk, and emo subcultures. Inheriting the folk tradition of
33368-434: The video, directed by Cameron Crowe , was used for a commercial for Target advertising Backspacer which features "The Fixer." The song was also nominated for Best Rock Song at the 52nd Grammy Awards . The band also released the double a-side single " Got Some "/" Just Breathe " a month after Backspacer and " Amongst the Waves " the following summer. Backspacer received mainly positive reviews from music critics, and
33562-430: The way that Brendan pulled us together and made us play as good as we could." Stephen Thomas Erlewine of Allmusic said that "prior to Backspacer , Pearl Jam wouldn't or couldn't have made music this unfettered, unapologetically assured, casual, and, yes, fun." Vedder stated, "The new record feels good so far—really strong and uptempo, stuff we can sink our teeth into", and added that the band's live performances inspired
33756-418: The work of the Beach Boys , formed in 1961 in Southern California. Their early albums included both instrumental surf rock (among them covers of music by Dick Dale) and vocal songs, drawing on rock and roll and doo wop and the close harmonies of vocal pop acts like the Four Freshmen . The Beach Boys first chart hit, " Surfin ' " in 1961 reached the Billboard top 100 and helped make the surf music craze
33950-533: The work of established performers such as the Rolling Stones' Beggar's Banquet (1968) and the Beatles' Let It Be (1970). Reflecting on this change of trends in rock music over the past few years, Christgau wrote in his June 1970 "Consumer Guide" column that this "new orthodoxy" and "cultural lag" abandoned improvisatory, studio-ornamented productions in favor of an emphasis on "tight, spare instrumentation" and song composition: "Its referents are '50s rock, country music, and rhythm-and-blues, and its key inspiration
34144-404: The world, except as a new brand of painkiller ... In the '70s the powerful took over, as rock industrialists capitalized on the national mood to reduce potent music to an often reactionary species of entertainment—and to transmute rock's popular base from the audience to market." Roots rock is the term now used to describe a move away from what some saw as the excesses of the psychedelic scene, to
34338-462: Was John Mayall ; his band, the Bluesbreakers , included Eric Clapton (after Clapton's departure from the Yardbirds) and later Peter Green . Particularly significant was the release of Blues Breakers with Eric Clapton (Beano) album (1966), considered one of the seminal British blues recordings and the sound of which was much emulated in both Britain and the United States. Eric Clapton went on to form supergroups Cream, Blind Faith , and Derek and
34532-474: Was 1963's " Wipe Out ", by the Surfaris , which hit number 2 and number 10 on the Billboard charts in 1965. Surf rock was also popular in Europe during this time, with the British group the Shadows scoring hits in the early 1960s with instrumentals such as " Apache " (1960) and " Kon-Tiki " (1961), while Swedish surf group the Spotnicks saw success in both Sweden and Britain. Surf music achieved its greatest commercial success as vocal pop music, particularly
34726-473: Was a major influence on subsequent rock-influenced jazz artists, including Herbie Hancock , Chick Corea and Weather Report . The genre began to fade in the late 1970s, as a mellower form of fusion began to take its audience, but acts like Steely Dan , Frank Zappa and Joni Mitchell recorded significant jazz-influenced albums in this period, and it has continued to be a major influence on rock music. Reflecting on developments that occurred in rock music in
34920-403: Was also used for the name of a leatherback turtle that was sponsored by Pearl Jam for Conservation International and National Geographic 's Great Turtle Race. McCready said, "I'd sum it up as kind of a tight, concise, rock 'n' roll record with kind of pop or maybe new wave elements to it... It's a really quick record, but I like that element to it. I like the sparseness of the songs and
35114-431: Was constructed by Jeff Ament . Ament said, "The original concept was about really being together as a group and entering into the world of music as a true band...a sort of all-for-one deal." Ament is credited for the album's artwork and art direction, Lance Mercer receives credit for photography, and both Lisa Sparagano and Risa Zaitschek are credited for design. Ament stated, "There was a bit of headbutting going on with
35308-424: Was continued in the 1970s by figures such as George Thorogood and Pat Travers , but, particularly on the British scene (except perhaps for the advent of groups such as Status Quo and Foghat who moved towards a form of high energy and repetitive boogie rock ), bands became focused on heavy metal innovation, and blues rock began to slip out of the mainstream. By the 1960s, the scene that had developed out of
35502-449: Was founded in Britain), and Band of Gypsys , whose guitar virtuosity and showmanship would be among the most emulated of the decade. Blues rock bands from the southern states, like the Allman Brothers Band , Lynyrd Skynyrd , and ZZ Top , incorporated country elements into their style to produce the distinctive genre Southern rock . Early blues rock bands often emulated jazz, playing long, involved improvisations, which would later be
35696-470: Was happening and there was no stopping it. To play in the Midwest and be selling out these 500 seat clubs. Eddie could say he wanted to talk to Brett, the sound guy, and they'd carry him out there on their hands. You hadn't really seen that reaction from a crowd before..." When Pearl Jam came back for a second go-around in Europe the band appeared at the Pinkpop Festival and the Roskilde Festival in June 1992. The band cancelled its remaining European dates in
35890-421: Was his first production credit since 1998's Yield . Material was recorded at Henson Recording Studios in Los Angeles , California , and O'Brien's own Southern Tracks Recording in Atlanta , Georgia . The album features lyrics with a more optimistic look than the politically infused predecessors Riot Act and Pearl Jam , something frontman Eddie Vedder attributed to the election of Barack Obama . This
36084-417: Was included at number 11 on the list of the "Definitive 200" albums of all time developed by the National Association of Recording Merchandisers . The album was also included in the book 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die . In December 2020, the album was announced as one of many inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame as part of the 2021 class. Ten initially sold slowly upon its release, but by
36278-441: Was initially brought in because the tour promoters decided that Pearl Jam should be replaced with a more successful act, but the departure of the Smashing Pumpkins still kept the group in the concert bill. Epic executive Michael Goldstone observed that "the band did such an amazing job opening the Chili Peppers tour that it opened doors at radio." In 1992, the band embarked on its first ever European tour. On March 13, 1992, at
36472-433: Was not an immediate commercial success, but by late 1992, it had reached number two on the Billboard 200 . The album produced three hit singles: " Alive ", " Even Flow ", and " Jeremy ". "Jeremy" became one of Pearl Jam's best-known songs, and received nominations for Best Rock Song and Best Hard Rock Performance at the 35th Grammy Awards . MTV put the video for "Jeremy" into heavy rotation; it received four awards at
36666-425: Was released. Thus, "Dirty Frank" is not from the Ten recording sessions. The song "Footsteps" began as an instrumental demo and was compiled onto the Stone Gossard Demos '91 tape. Vedder added vocals to this version after he received the demo tape. The music for "Footsteps" was also used for Temple of the Dog 's "Times of Trouble". "Footsteps" was featured as a B-side on the "Jeremy" single, however this version
36860-411: Was taken up by bands including Pentangle , Steeleye Span and the Albion Band , which in turn prompted Irish groups like Horslips and Scottish acts like the JSD Band , Spencer's Feat and later Five Hand Reel , to use their traditional music to create a brand of Celtic rock in the early 1970s. Folk-rock reached its peak of commercial popularity in the period 1967–68, before many acts moved off in
37054-548: Was taking place globally in the aftermath of the Second World War . Cliff Richard is credited with one of the first rock and roll hits outside of North America with " Move It " (1959), effectively ushering in the sound of British rock . Several artists, most prominently Tommy Steele from the UK, found success with covers of major American rock and roll hits before the recordings could spread internationally, often translating them into local languages where appropriate. Steele in particular toured Britain, Scandinavia, Australia,
37248-439: Was the first commercially successful folk song to be recorded with rock and roll instrumentation and the Beatles " I'm a Loser " (1964), arguably the first Beatles song to be influenced directly by Dylan. The folk rock movement is usually thought to have taken off with the Byrds ' recording of Dylan's " Mr. Tambourine Man " which topped the charts in 1965. With members who had been part of the café-based folk scene in Los Angeles,
37442-430: Was the major force in American record sales and crooners , such as Eddie Fisher , Perry Como , and Patti Page , who had dominated the previous decade of popular music, found their access to the pop charts significantly curtailed. Rock and roll has been seen as leading to a number of distinct subgenres, including rockabilly, combining rock and roll with "hillbilly" country music, which was usually played and recorded in
37636-400: Was the most popular genre of music in the U.S. and much of the Western world from the 1950s to the 2010s. Rock musicians in the mid-1960s began to advance the album ahead of the single as the dominant form of recorded music expression and consumption, with the Beatles at the forefront of this development. Their contributions lent the genre a cultural legitimacy in the mainstream and initiated
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