Riding the Wave

Collection Contents: 2 Films, 3 Stories, 1 Gatefold

Pearl Jam - Live in Philadelphia April 29, 2016

Pearl Jam in performance from Philadelphia in 2016. The blistering three-hour concert kicks off with the band playing its multi-platinum-selling debut album “Ten” from beginning to end. A Coda Cornerstone Collection.

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About This Collection

Pearl Jam’s debut album has taken on deeper meanings since its release in ‘91
“Ten” springs from a complex, multi-band history that dates back to 1984
The band’s engaging performances straddle improvisation and contemplation

Story

‘Ten’ in Concert: ‘We’re still alive’

Pearl Jam’s 1991 debut, “Ten,” really isn’t a concept album or a rock opera in the mold of singer Eddie Vedder’s rite-of-passage record, The Who’s “Quadrophenia.” But it’s got a theme all the same in that many of the songs are about outcasts who have had decisions made for them, who have been given little or no voice in their destiny. The final song, “Release,” amounts to a slow-burn prayer for deliverance.

Story

Not a Perfect Ten, But Still Unstoppable

I think of Pearl Jam’s 1991 debut album, “Ten,” as the equivalent of the 19th-century writer Mary Shelley’s most famous novel, “Frankenstein.” Shelley wrote a number of books, but it’s hard to imagine that any of her other novels will ever outsell or outshine “Frankenstein,” which is pretty much what can be said for Pearl Jam’s musical output after “Ten.”

Timeline

A Pearl Jam Timeline, 1984-1992

Before Pearl Jam, there was Green River, Mother Love Bone and Mookie Blaylock, and the gas-pumping surfer dude that would connect them. Here’s a year-by-year look at the road to Pearl Jam’s debut album, “Ten,” and its immediate aftermath, when the Seattle sound went global.

Film

The Kids Are Twenty

Two hours of full-length performances, stemming from footage shot for the "Pearl Jam Twenty" film.

Story

Say It Ain’t So, Lemmy

No less an authority than Motorhead’s Lemmy Kilmister once advised a bandmate that there were very few hard, fast rules in rock, but one of them was “don’t wear shorts on stage.”