This is one of my "5 Most Under-Rated Albums of the 90s". Further entries will follow.
With 1994's Vitalogy, it seemed that Pearl Jam was finally going to receive the critical respect to go along with their mass popularity among music fans. Don't believe what all the critics write now, most of them hated the band's debut, Ten. More of them liked Vs., but it was Vitalogy that truly broke through, garnering a best album Grammy nomination. In the midst of it all though, Pearl Jam was in a crisis. They had fired arguably the band's second most popular member, drummer Dave Abbrusseze, and replaced him with Jack Irons, the former Red Hot Chili Peppers skinsman who was not nearly as flashy or as starry eyed. In addition, Pearl Jam had stayed off the road for much of 1994 and 1995, as their public battle with Ticketmaster went nowhere. And lastly, in what had seemed to be a united "last straw" with fans, lead singer Eddie Vedder had been forced to drop out of a concert before 60,000 people in California after only 6 songs due to food poisoning. Neil Young replaced him and played for nearly 3 hours, but it didn't matter. Too many fans just saw Pearl Jam as too "fan unfriendly."
Early in 1995, Pearl Jam recorded an album with Young, titled Mirror Ball. It was during the sessions for that album that Pearl Jam began learning how to become a band again. Thanks to Young, a longtime idol of Vedder's, and the older, wiser approach that Irons brought to the band, Pearl Jam sat down and asked themselves a simple question: "Do we want to continue, or do we break up?"
No Code is the result of a very focused band with a renewed spirit. When I first heard the album, I admit, I just didn't get it. I was 16, confused, alone, depressed, sad. I wanted more of that classic Pearl Jam "angst." There wasn't really any of that here, and when it was there, it sounded well, bad. More than anything I wasn't mature enough to take this album and actually LISTEN to it. (Which is ironic because it was that same summer that I discovered Quadrophenia by the Who...one would think that if I was mature enough for that album I would be mature enough for this but I digress.)
Where the angst is missing, the inner reflection takes it's place. That begins right away on the opening track, Sometimes. Perhaps best looked at as the pre-cursor to 1998's Wishlist, the song is gentle, soft, a simple guitar melody over a simple backbeat and Vedder's voice. "Seek my part, devote myself...like a book amongst the many on a shelf" sings Vedder, and it's quite obvious he's looking for his place in the world, rather than tackling social issues or political ones.
The best rocker on the album is next, Hail Hail. The driving drums and guitar riff will make you think of older Pearl Jam, but at the same time, it's tight, restrained. It's here where you first realize how tight Jack Irons made things. I enjoy Matt Cameron's rather loose interpretations of Jack's material live, but to listen to this is to listen to a band that is completely in sync and tight.
The first single released from the album (and the song that many say was the final stake in Pearl Jam's mass popularity) was Who You Are. Here is where Irons' nickname of "master of the tom toms" comes into play. The song is very middle eastern like in a lot of ways, as Vedder's work with Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan on the Dead Man Walking soundtrack has obviously had an effect on him. The lyrics go back to the quiet reflection of Sometimes, although at times they're cryptic, and at others, they make no sense whatsoever. But the line "Trampled marks on your souls, Changes all you're a part, Seen it all, Not at all. is up there with Vedder's best lines ever.
The middle eastern tom tom feel continues on the next track, In My Tree. This song is as much a giant middle finger to the media's portrayal of the food poisoning incident ("newspapers matter not to me"). But once again, Vedder is looking more inward, looking for answers and liking what he finds.
Those of you who read me regularly know I despise the word "grunge." I've made it my mission to expel that word from this website by the end of 2002. But if there is one song where I could almost accept "grunge" being used as a label, it's Smile. I've always thought of this song as the song that best represents the new Pearl Jam, both moodwise and lyrically. It has a whimsful quality to it, and it does make you smile. The chorus is just a total sing along affair, and if this had been released as the first single, I think it would've been huge. If you are still stuck in 1992 and think Pearl Jam is p*ssed off, then you need to watch the collage on the Touring Band 2000 DVD set to this song.
Off He Goes represents the countryish ballad on this album, something that has been a mark of every Pearl Jam album. It was released as the third single, and I swear that was done intentionally to sink this album even further. Oddly enough, when I was 16, this was one of the songs I loved on this album. Maybe it was because I felt isolated and like a loner. I don't know. I just know that it doesn't do as much for me now as it once did, but it is a gorgeous song, a perfect showcase for Vedder's voice.
Two of the next three songs attempt to recapture the anger and the voracity of the old Pearl Jam, but both fail. Lukin, a song named after Mudhoney member Matt Lukin, is a 90 second punkish rave up that just well, sucks. And Habit while fine lyrically, does nothing for me music wise. This just sounds forced.
The song stuck in between those two songs, Red Mosquito, fits into this album so much better. The bluesy guitar lick that is used as an intro, and then throughout the song, is just plain awesome. The song is about Vedder's food poisoning incident ("Watched from the window with a red mosquito, I was not allowed to leave the room, I saw the sun go down and now it's coming up,
Somewhere in the time between I was bitten.") and by the end, as Mike McCreedy plays a variation of the blues riff that began the song, Vedder wails over and over the line "if I had known then, what I know now", a line I've always loved.
The absolute, no holds barred, no arguments necessary, best song on the album is next, and today it still stands among Pearl Jam die hards as quite possibly the greatest song Pearl Jam has ever written: Present Tense. For the most part, it's 3 or 4 guitar notes and Eddie's voice. I mean, if this were the only good song on this album, I would still give the album 3 stars based on this song alone. For five years, Vedder had become a rock star because of his lyrics, his observations on life that every angst ridden twentysomething related to. But his lyric here of "it makes much more sense to live in the present tense" is by far the best line I've heard in a song in the last 10 years. Sure, he builds up to it with a couple of great lines before it, but that line, it's had such an effect on people, such an effect on me personally, and it's just such a great song, everything about it is perfect. It's has a quiet reflective atmosphere to it, which it should. So many bands can't seem to find the right sound for some of their songs, but this song is just perfect.
Guitarist Stone Gossard takes a turn on lead vocals on the next track, the bouncy and fun Mankind. It's a bit of a driving rock track, and it has become a moment of comedy at many shows, since the band still hasn't figured out how to tell the audience that Eddie is leaving for a song and this tall goofy bastard named Stone is gonna sing one.
I'm Open is the spoken word pre-cursor to 1998's Push Me Pull Me. I really wish Vedder would make a spoken word album, he really is an incredible poet, besides being a great songwriter.
The album closes with the lullabye Around the Bend. Vedder's voice sounds warm and inviting, like a cup of hot tea on a cold day.
With No Code, Pearl Jam took an important step forward in their history. The album spawned no major radio hits (Hail Hail was a minor success), the band did no press, and they only did 13 tour dates in North America in support of the record, as they continued to try and fight Ticketmaster. Most importantly though, this album represents the band becoming a band again, and despite the two throw away tracks, it stands today as one of the two best albums thus far of Pearl Jam's career. It seems I go back and forth between this and it's follow up, 1998's Yield. Either way, sit down, grab a warm cup of tea, and just listen to this CD. Methinks you haven't actually listened to it if you knock it.
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