1992 was the year grunge really took off.  Granted, it was already a thing, but it became a phenomenon the moment “Smells Like Teen Spirit” crossed over into the mainstream, with Nevermind dethroning Michael Jackson’s Dangerous as the biggest album in America.  But for all that has been said about Nirvana changing the world, it was their biggest rivals that were the most successful grunge band on the rock charts in 1992: Pearl Jam.

Pearl Jam scored three year-end hits on the Mainstream Rock chart, more than the other three “big four” grunge acts of 1992 combined.  Thanks Billboard, for screwing Soundgarden and Alice In Chains this year.  I hope you’re happy for deciding that “Addams Groove” and “Wildside” were more worthy of chart success than “Outshined.”  But anyways, Pearl Jam broke through early in 1992 with “Alive,” a dark tale about Vedder finding out that his father was not his biological father, to put it mildly.  “Alive” is a very good song, with more great guitar work from Mike McCready and brooding but impassioned vocals from Eddie Vedder.  But I didn’t end up including the song in the top 20 of my year-end rankings because I decided I’d had enough Pearl Jam to handle.  If you wanted to know what other Pearl Jam there was in 1992…

“Even Flow” – Pearl Jam

Pop
#108 peak

Modern Rock
#21 peak (June 6, 1992), 6 weeks on chart

Mainstream Rock
#3 peak (July 18-August 1, 1992)
#18 year-end, 24 weeks on chart

“Even Flow” does everything.  It provided us with arguably the most distinctive vocal performance of the year.  The song was the source of one of the greatest grunge guitar riffs of all time, quite possibly the greatest riff Stone Gossard ever put out.  The song also provided a surprising amount of meaning for what is supposed to be a stupid song to rock out to.  And finally, it inspired an Adam Sandler comedy routine that wasn’t excruciating.  Now that is an accomplishment.

Let’s just get into the part you were all wanting to hear about: that riff.  Pearl Jam never had another greater riff than this.  Not even “Alive” or the other songs on Ten could knock it down.  I mean, it’s like a locomotive, the way it just maintains momentum throughout the song.   The riff could go on forever with its slides between F and G and it would still be a good song, but Pearl Jam add plenty of tricks up their sleeves to prevent this from being boring.  For one, the standard guitar slide then ascension to the next octave isn’t the only way the song is played.  In the bridge and outro, we get the ascension being quickly followed by those chunky eighth notes before we go back up the octave.  And all that comes before Mike McCready’s freakout of a solo.  To all the people who claimed that grunge killed the guitar solo, I present to you… this.  Who wouldn’t be able to rock out to a solo where McCready just blisters through his pentatonic scale before playing triplets with machine gun precision?  Grunge still provided plenty of great air guitar moments, and McCready’s solo is one of them.  Few were better than Gossard in the riff department.  When discussing the song, McCready claimed that they had to do the song in 70 takes because Gossard was never satisfied with the guitar takes for the song.  They were being too hard on themselves.  They were close enough.

“Even Flow” is probably one of those songs that likely doesn’t inspire a lot of thought when it comes to the lyrical content.  But then it turns out that Eddie Vedder wrote the lyrics to “Even Flow” about a homeless man and you find out the song has more meaning than you think.  Vedder wrote the song about a man he met, also named Eddie, during the band’s early days.  The other Eddie had fallen on hard times after serving in Vietnam and was now living under the Seattle Viaduct.  The two became acquaintances until Vedder came back from an early tour and found out that the homeless man had died.  With that in mind, “Even Flow” is a tribute to the other Eddie and his daily struggles.

Freezin’
Rests his head on a pillow made of concrete again
Oh, feelin’
Maybe he’ll see a little betters, any days

Now that I know what the song’s about, I don’t know how that opening line escaped me so many times.  He has “a pillow made of concrete?”  What else could this song be about?  It probably just escaped me because I haven’t heard many songs before about homeless people.  Um, there’s… “In The Ghetto,” “Joe” by Inspiral Carpets… can’t think of many more.  I was probably thinking too much about this song being about Pearl Jam making the cover of Time magazine and mocking Nirvana.  Someone shoot me for mentioning Adam Sandler again.

But the lyric works because it demonstrates a sense of desperation.  As discussed in the chorus, the man wants more than anything another opportunity, but his circumstances prevent him from doing so.  It’s a song about the devastation others may face in life: wake up, face poverty and struggles, only to go to bed and repeat the same cycle again.  And it demonstrates, in its tale of the homeless man, how we need to appreciate our own lives and move forward.  The sense of desperation for poor Eddie on this track is on par with the other Eddie’s stage antics with climbing walls at concert venues.  It just adds to the triumph of “Even Flow,” as a song that adds deeper meaning to its epic riff.

UP NEXT: Probably the most surprising pick on this countdown at #5.

SOURCES

Quinn, Bryan. “Q&A Session With Pearl Jam.” Daily Record 9 March 2009. Web. 27 August 2022 https://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/entertainment/music/music-news/qa-session-with-pearl-jam-1013177.

Rietmulder, Michael. “Review: Pearl Jam, Seattle Fall In Love All Over Again At Joyous Home Shows On Night One At Safeco Field.” Seattle Times 8 August 2018. Web. 27 August 2022 https://www.seattletimes.com/entertainment/music/photos-pearl-jams-home-shows-rock-for-a-cause-on-night-one-at-seattles-safeco-field/.

IMAGE SOURCES

Single cover from eBay

Photo of homeless man from Medium