I remember going to go the record store to buy it. It was about 3pm. I couldn’t find the CD in the Pearl Jam section. I asked an employee and he realized they had not opened the delivery box yet and hadn’t put the albums on the shelves. At 3 pm. I love this album even more because of this. They didn’t promote it. Probably because of Roskilde. The last great Pearl Jam album.

I love these memories/stories.

My memory of Riot Act was this is the first album that I downloaded via a leak.

My other memory was in the 10c club newletter Ed was describing the energy/feeling in the studio and quoted lyrics from “Undone” as reference to the albums feel. I still wish Undone made the final cut

Undone would have been great on Riot Act.

Im alright with the RA we got. The b sides are great b sides too.

The Binaural/Riot Act era was definitely very productive for the band.

Been listening to Riot Act. Other than just loving the quality of the song-writing, two things jump out: the production is outstanding (maybe my favorite) and the sequencing is excellent.

I agree Riot Act sounds great but I'm personally not a fan of the sequencing. With the caveat that i'm not sure what i'd do differently, the back half of the album really starts to feel like a slog, and the effect lessens the impact of almost all the songs for me. Some of it is the fact that it's lengthy to begin with, and Eddie sings the album in a heavy, almost laborious style, which adds to the weight. So to be fair, maybe on an album that felt lighter and more dexterous the sequencing would work better.

First half works really well, for sure

I love Undone and Down but I’ve always struggled with whether I’d want them on Riot Act.

For me, the length is an issue, and I say that as someone who loves this record.

Riot Act is shorter than both Vitalogy and Gigaton. Is it the number of songs that is the problem?

It has never felt like an unwieldy album to me; I really like the way it flows and think it plays through really nicely for all the variety in it. To me, a record with more songs, but shorter ones, has a tendency to breeze by faster than something like Gigaton where the songs are longer and risk getting bogged down in themselves.

OH SNAP

fortunately Vitalogy has that optional final track to bring the length down.


Gigaton’s length always surprises me. It doesn’t carry its length (to me), even though a few songs do drag a tiny bit - 7oclock, river cross, comes then goes)

No way he was going to miss that opportunity.

Maybe it's the number of songs. Gigaton definitely feels like a shorter listen to me.

there was that old consensus around Riot Act that the album felt tired. With hindsight that's not the right word, but weary probably is - it's baked into the albums themes and aesthetics and is one of its strengths, but that also saps more from the listener. Gigaton, on the other hand is an album designed to feel like an alarm clock/wake up call, and so unsurprisingly the album has an energy that doesn't really flag.

I sometimes wonder if who you are when you first listened the album has more to do with how you hear it than the actual music.

I do think Riot Act is a world-weary album searching for hope (and not entirely finding it but carrying on regardless); I think one reason I love it is that it seems like a real, genuine continuation of the spirit of their early music; what would I imagine those kids as old(er) men would sound like? Riot Act

That's probably why I consider Binaural to be their "horniest" album.