Latest News, Music, Shopping - Wednesday, December 30, 2009 6:45 - 1 Comment

Have You Listened “Into the Wild” by Eddie Vedder?

Eddie Vedder (Pearl Jam) will be sued for changing a few words of Canadian musicians. But have you heard "Into the Wild" album?

For all those Pearl Jam fans out there, the release of what is essentially a solo acoustic album Eddie Vedder manna from heaven. Of course, most PJ fans are out there these days in their fourth or 5 Decade of life, and there are many young people who view PJ as obsolete, and other naysayers, from the rugged, Ed's baritone Mumbly have grown tired. But I belong to the first group, so I think this little album is quite large.

"Into the Wild" is a 30-minutish album that has Eddie in a variety of acoustic instruments over 11 short tracks. It's classic Vedder, but stripped down and bare, in the kind of ballad "No Code" or "Binaural" vein with more acoustic strumming and minimal accompaniment. The tunes were written as a movie soundtrack, and having seen the film, it's hard not to picture traipsing over hill and valley Emile Hirsch during the songs. On the other side, most of the numbers have to do lyrics, which is a little unusual for a soundtrack was, and sometimes disturbing to me in the theater. But this post is about the music …

buy "Eddie Vedder – Into the Wild" album NOW

Many of the tunes are upbeat, Rocky Mountain High, kind of anthems, as on "Setting Forth," "Far Behind" and the all-instrumental "Tuolumne." The other half are more introspective, ballad-like numbers (in line with the kind of celebration of freedom / wasteful tragedy duality of Chris McCandless' story), as the banjo-inflected "No Ceiling," "Rise" (which ukulele calls Ed's " would Soon Forget "from Binaural or" Goodbye "from A Broke Down Melody – I think all uke-vocal album by Ed pretty big)," Long Nights, "" Society "and" The End of the Road. "" Hard Sun " is a stand-out in a number of ways – clearly the number that can either get the radio play or appear as a B-side single. Moreover, it is by Robert Peterson (aka Indio) written and has some backing chorus sung by Sleater-Kinney frontwoman Corin Tucker (it would be awesome if Ed made a correct single from "Modern Girl" and published it with "Hard Sun"). It is definitely the big anthem of the album and the only song about four minutes long. "Society" is the other track not written by Ed – in this case, the author Jerry Hannan, who also sings, back-up underneath. inspired "The Wolf" features Ed doing his Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan vocal howling (reminiscent of "Arc" without the overdubs) over an organ drone. And then there are "guaranteed" a great tune that has truly embedded in two versions of the same song – first the vocal version that has Ed singing over acoustic guitar (this was during the end credits of the movie is played), and later, in a "Hidden Track", the "Humming Version", that round will start at 4:40 after one or two minutes of silence (who invented it tracks hid really why I should be two minutes of silence have to endure or press fast forward to For more music?). The sums which version opens the movie, and features Ed humming the sweet soulful melody over the same guitar Rhthym. So for me the outstanding tracks "Hard Sun", "Guaranteed", "Setting Forth," "Far Behind," "Rise" and "The Wolf" are. That's half of the album, so that you can see, I think it's all quite large and will leave fans itching for a real solo album someday.

This review would not be complete without some discussion about iTunes. iTunes has, for $ 2 more, the "Deluxe Version" of this album (not available at Amazon), which extends the original soundtrack with four more numbers – "No More" (a cover) and "Photographs" (a short instrumental) on the soundtrack to the documentary "Body of War", lifted a live version of "No More," and a live version of "Here's to the State", one of Ed's concert staples, which has him railing against various co-operatives in the Bush administration. iTunes also sells "Guaranteed (Humming Version)" as a separate track, but only the "hidden track" from the seven-minute "Guaranteed", which is not as a single downloadable songs available. Because the original soundtrack only about a half hour long, most fans will welcome the extra 12 minutes of music, but the truth is, the tunes do not completely with the rest of the album and some will no doubt find that fit the strong political messages of "No More" (War) and "Here's to the State," typical of Ed, tiring.

And so, "Into the Wild" is a short little album as a movie soundtrack, with little gems that is loaded by Eddie Vedder on vocals and acoustic strings written. If you like Ed and contact with the brevity of the songs themselves and the album as a whole, it is sure to please, and leave it want more. And it's a little more, only if you are interested you must get it from iTunes … or somewhere else;).

You can buy "Eddie Vedder – Into the Wild" album here …