But when he did arrive, he turned up with Smile, a Neil Young-inspired song that the band built into a tumbling, harmonica-laden, campfire special. “It really leant itself to stuff like Who You Are.”Īgain Irons’ drumming takes centre stage as the next track, In My Tree, kicks off with Vedder’s vocals accompanying his circular tribal rhythm as the band builds the song from this unusual, ‘world music’-inspired beginning into a recognisable Pearl Jam rocker.īassist Jeff Ament had originally been unaware that Gossard and Vedder had begun working on No Code in Seattle at Gossard’s Studio Litho, a point of considerable tension in the band that led one of the group’s founder members to consider his future. “Jack’s drumming was funky, very rhythmic and unlike anything we’d experienced,” remembered lead guitarist Mike McCready. Credited musically to Gossard and Irons, the track is built out of a jam in which Irons groovy drumbeat (“I’d been playing that pattern since I was eight”, he has said) is built upon by Gossard’s unusually dissonant guitar part and Vedder’s electric sitar. The third track, and first single, Who You Are is the point at which the listener has to make a decision about this record. The first Pearl Jam album to open without a blast of fury, Sometimes is a contemplative, chiming lullaby of a song that floats the listener gently towards the furious waterfall that is Hail, Hail, built around a classic Stone Gossard riff that acts as a musical bridge to Pearl Jam’s recent past. But if the drums are the starting point of the No Code journey, then the guitars still do plenty of the driving. With former Red Hot Chili Peppers drummer Jack Irons (the man who had introduced Eddie Vedder to Stone Gossard and Jeff Ament in 1990) replacing Dave Abbruzzese on drums, the rest of the band appear to find room to breathe in the space created by his more laid-back style.
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