Let's talk Pearl Jam's "Gigaton". First, it was produced by my friend Josh Evans - and he nails it. I'm so fucking proud of him. That out of the way (BUT MY FRIEND PRODUCED IT, AND I'M SO STOKED FOR HIM!) - lets talk about the record.

I'm one of those people for whom Pearl Jam dropped off my must listen to list after Vitalogy. I listened to the singles? But my first ever crowd surfing moment was at a small venue at the very beginning of the album cycle for Ten, so the feels remain high.

That said, I've listened to all the new albums since Avocado, and found something to like about all of them. Gigaton is the strongest of that group (Avocado, Backspacer, Lightning bolt, Gigaton). A big part of it is the consistency - track by track, none of these songs miss.

They're not all perfectly memorable - but when you plug headphones in and play the album, there is never a moment where you're like: "eh, I could skip this". The opposite happens, actually - it just flows, and the more you listen, the more small detail you hear.

Example: on opener "Who Ever Said", around 3:30 a build starts, and around 3:40 there is a little warbly guitar deep in the mix. It gives the building intensity this great moment of anxiety, which then releases at ~4:30 with that melodic section. It's great, and very them.

Every track has stuff like that. Small things that feel like the Pearl Jam that lives in your head, that's soaked into your unconscious mind from decades of listening. That guitar solo on Superblood Wolfmoon. The harmonics on Alright. Springsteen-y warble on Seven O'Clock.

Two big standouts for me. Dance of the Clairvoyants first. That song is clearly just musicians who love the shit out of their craft having a really, really good time together. The lyrics are great, the Talking Heads-ness is undeniable - but that guitar *still sounds like them*.

What would Talking Heads sound like if it was passed through the moldy filter of grunge? Dance of the Clairvoyants, and I'm in for it. What a fucking good song.

Take the Long Way is the other. This one calls back to those classic 90s records, not just of Pearl Jam, but Soundgarden and the rest. But then it gives you these lush background vocals, and suddenly the Long Way we're leading back to is stompy Seattle alt-rock.

It gives me all the feels, because it takes an era of music that, lets be frank, was fucking depressing. I *love* that music, but it was clearly music that was *after* the party ended, and we're all dealing with the left overs and our messy ass house. And it returns with clarity!

It makes it the kind of settled, confident, content thing that it is for me now. Which is really what this whole record feels like. It feels like masters just being comfortable in their own skin. It's a very good album. You should 100% listen to it more than once. Pays off.