The core of any great Pearl Jam song revolves around Eddie Vedder's vocals. The singer's crooning growl has become one of the most recognisable sounds of the 1990s grunge revolution. With that, he became a continual figure in the world of alternative rock music.
Ever since he opened his mouth to sing on the opening notes of 'Once' on their debut, Ten, that baritone voice became the signature style for a legion of alternative singers, adopting the yowl as a part of their musical vocabulary for the next decade of rock history. Although Pearl Jam had a secret weapon with Vedder, there is one song that hardly features the frontman at all.
Forming out of the ashes of Mother Love Bone, one of the biggest strengths in Stone Gossard's eyes was Vedder joining on vocals. Originally working as a gas station attendant in San Diego, Vedder received a tape from Gossard through Red Hot Chili Peppers drummer Jack Irons, where he laid down vocals for what would become tracks like 'Alive'.
As the band started to become famous, though, Vedder insisted on having more creative control than Gossard was willing to give. When talking about Vedder steering the ship in Pearl Jam Twenty, Gossard recalled feeling uncomfortable with Vedder asserting himself, "It was so strange that my vision for what I wanted the band to be immediately was taken over by Ed".
Being the de facto face of the group across every magazine, Vedder wanted to steer the band away from conventional rock music, experimenting with where their sound could go on their album Vitalogy. While tension in the band was high during the recording of their third outing, No Code saw the band's morale at an all-time low.
Recorded on the fly, none of the band members were communicating correctly, with Jeff Ament threatening to quit the band after everyone started recording the album without him. Regardless of the hectic production, No Code did feature a handful of tracks that stretched the boundaries of where Pearl Jam had been before. While the tribal drumming on lead single 'Who You Are' may have been too artsy for fans to take in, the band still had a knack for their signature brand of alternative rock, from the stomp of 'Hail Hail' to Vedder's latest ballad, 'Off He Goes'.
Although the tense sessions may have been a slog to get through, it did result in one of the boldest experiments in their career: handing the mic off to someone else. For the song 'Mankind', Gossard takes lead vocal duties, playing a standard rock and roll rave-up tune that fits somewhere between the edgy side of REM and the ramshackle feeling of The Replacements.
It reeks of the kind of energy that would allow Gossard to turbo charge Pearl Jam, but also the tenderness that set the band apart form the rest of the Seattle grunge scene.
Since Gossard had already been making waves with his side project, Brad, around this time, this feels like a natural extension of where he had already been, down to using similar chord sequences that he used in his other band. Compared to Vedder's usual growl, Gossard's vocals have a nervy punk rock energy, fitting somewhere between the subdued sound of Iggy Pop and the manic energy of David Byrne.
Despite the experiment, Gossard wouldn't step behind the mic again with Pearl Jam, only lending an occasional backing vocal to songs like 'Better Man' whenever the group played live. Although Gossard would have many different side projects to express himself, it's easy for him to let his guitar talk when tearing through tracks like 'Even Flow' and 'Daughter'.