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With latest album Pearl Jam refuses to 'Yield'

Jeremy, of Ten, Pearl Jam's debut album, is really dead.

The teenage antihero who blew his brains out "in class today" and all of his representative adolescent angst is strangely absent from the band's latest effort. Whereas its earlier albums tackled alienation, love and loss with melodramatic crashing layers of guitar, Pearl Jam's latest LP, Yield, strays from the commercial norm it established with lyrical ease and musical diversity.

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Pearl Jam has come a long way. Initially branded a clone of Nirvana when it stormed the Seattle music scene of the early 90s, the group was quickly pigeonholed as a poster child of a disaffected Generation X. Its anti-glamour grunge rebellion against star status only reinforced Pearl Jam's standing among the alterna-rock elite.

And then came Ticketmaster. The band's controversial battle against the concert booking monolith coupled with disappointing sales of its last album No Code could have impelled it to return to the musical roots of its success. Instead, Pearl Jam continues an apparent disregard of commercial expectations in its music. The more varied and introspective tracks on Yield give the impression that the musicians are most concerned with pleasing themselves.

Like the endless highway on Yield's album cover, the songs evoke themes of journey, evolution and freedom, with a new focus on the internal struggles of the individual rather than those of society. This is evident in the record's most memorable song, "No Way." It hauntingly proclaims, "I'll stop trying to make a difference."

The track highlights Pearl Jam's capacity to create subdued drama with killer riffs and exquisite instrumentation. In an intense moment of "In Hiding," Eddie Vedder sings: "I swallowed my words to keep from lying/ I swallowed my face to keep from pining."

Yield is most successful when the band combines its previous musical athleticism with newfound poetic grace and moderation. The first single, "Given to Fly" relates a man's metamorphosis and salvation. Though it achieves new levels of intimacy, it also contains relics of the band's harder-rocking days – intense, swelling crescendos and Vedder's rich, passionate tenor.

"Do the Evolution" mocks the arrogance and hypocrisy of humanity with Vedder's characteristic anger and a surprising dose of humor: "I am the first mammal to wear pants/ It's evolution, baby."

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Strangely, some moments on the album are downright quaint. In "Wishlist," Vedder croons, "Your Christmas tree. . . I wish I was the star that went on top." The song borders on sappiness, but Pearl Jam pulls it off with refreshing sincerity and a haunting melody.

In "Faithfull," Vedder implies that personal connections are the only true redemption: "What's a boy to do/ just be, darling, and I will be too/ faithful to you." The journey towards and search for meaning in life are woven throughout the album.

Yield is not without its problems. Although the band's experimentation with new sounds and tempos is generally successful, Vedder's Lou Reed-esque musings on "Push me, Pull me" are neither effective nor coherent. The instrumental section at the end of track 13 will leave listeners wondering why what sounds like Indian-inspired Bar Mitzvah music is on a Pearl Jam album. Though "Do the Evolution" is overall effective, its chorale-like midsection directly following the line "there's my church, I sing in the choir" seems calculated and overdone.

The admirable innovations made on Yield do come with a price –the hooks and epic poetry that were so prevalent on Ten, Versus and Vitology (remember the anthem "I'm still alive?") are gone. With Yield, Pearl Jam does not attempt to make universal and statements; the band is fully entrenched in the intimate and personal. Yet this change takes the band to an equally successful and perhaps more complex level.

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Without this grandiosity – Ten's novelty or Versus' anger – Yield will certainly not be Pearl Jam's magnum opus. Its subtlety achieves something much more significant – a reconciliation of hard-rock/alternative early traditions with new, gentler sonic creations. Though Pearl Jam has always written ballads, Yield is their first album in which the slow-tempo pieces are fully integrated, forming a flowing progression of song.

The album's title and cover art are not incidental. Pearl Jam invites the listener to witness the path of their musical maturation. And like the road depicted on the cover, their path appears to be endless. It's their evolution, baby.