"Even Flow
" is a song by the American rock band Pearl Jam. Featuring lyrics written by vocalist Eddie Vedder and music written by guitarist Stone Gossard, "Even Flow" was released in 1992 as the second single from the band's debut album, Ten
(1991). The song peaked at number three on the Billboard
Mainstream Rock Tracks chart. The song was included on Pearl Jam's 2004 greatest hits album, rearviewmirror (Greatest Hits 1991–2003)
. A remixed version of the song was included on the 2009 Ten
reissue.
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EVENFLOW TICKETS
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Origin and recording
"Even Flow" features lyrics written by vocalist
Eddie Vedder and music written by guitarist
Stone Gossard. Bassist
Jeff Ament said, "I know it was a great song all along, and I felt that it was the best song that we got the worst take of on the first record. There were a hundred takes on that song, and we just never nailed it."
[1] Drummer
Dave Krusen said, "I was pretty green back then and "Even Flow" suffered from too much fluctuation." He added that "it was really tough for me. I don't know why. Not sure why we didn't use that one from the demo as well, but I know it felt better."
[2] Guitarist
Mike McCready stated, "We did "Even Flow" about 50, 70 times. I swear to God it was a nightmare. We played that thing over and over until we hated each other. I still don't think Stone is satisfied with how it came out."
[3]
An alternate version of the song was recorded with drummer
Dave Abbruzzese in 1992 while the band was recording songs for the
soundtrack for the 1992 film,
Singles
.
[4] This version was used for the music video,
[5] and was used in single releases in the
United Kingdom. This version can also be readily found on Pearl Jam's 2004 greatest hits album,
rearviewmirror (Greatest Hits 1991–2003)
.
Composition
"Even Flow" features a funky riff by Gossard. The vocal line that appears in the main verse begins with a very prominent
tritone interval. The song was performed in
open D tuning.
[6] It was written in the key of
D major and regularly alternates between the time signatures of 4/4 and 5/2.
McCready on the song:
That's me pretending to be Stevie Ray Vaughan, and a feeble attempt at that. Stone (Gossard, Pearl Jam guitarist) wrote the riff and song; I think it's a D tuning. I just followed him in a regular pattern. I tried to steal everything I know from Stevie Ray Vaughan and put it into that song. A blatant rip-off. A tribute rip-off, if you will! [7]
Lyrics
The stark lyrics by Vedder for "Even Flow" describe the experience of being a homeless man.
[8] The subject sleeps "on a pillow made of concrete" and panhandles passersby for spare change. In addition to being illiterate, he may also be mentally ill, as he "looks insane" when he smiles and struggles to keep coherent thoughts ("Even flow, thoughts arrive like butterflies/Oh, he don't know, so he chases them away").
At Pearl Jam's March 28, 1994 concert in
Miami,
Florida at the
Bayfront Amphitheater, Vedder introduced the song by saying, "I thought I'd throw in a bit of street education while you still have an open mind...Right across the street there's a little homeless community that lives under the bridge. You should just know that those people ain't all crazy and sometimes it's not their fault. This song is called 'Even Flow'."
[9]
Release and reception
While the "Even Flow" single was released commercially to international markets in 1992, the commercial single was not released in the
United States until June 27, 1995 and was only available as a more expensive import version beforehand. The alternate studio recording of "Even Flow", which was recorded in 1992 with Abbruzzese, was released as a
CD single and 12-inch white
vinyl in the United Kingdom. The original version was used in single releases in the United States. The song was released as a single in 1992 with a previously unreleased
B-side titled "Dirty Frank", which can also be found as an extra track on European releases of
Ten
and as an alternate version on the compilation album,
Lost Dogs
(2003).
The song peaked at number three on the
Billboard
Mainstream Rock Tracks chart and number 21 on the
Billboard
Modern Rock Tracks chart. Outside the United States, the single was released commercially in
Australia,
Austria,
Brazil,
Germany, the
Netherlands, and the
United Kingdom. In
Canada, the song reached the top 80 on the Canadian
Singles Chart. "Even Flow" peaked at number 27 in the UK and number 22 on the Australian Singles Chart. It was a moderate top 20 success in
New Zealand.
Chris True of
Allmusic called "Even Flow" "the somewhat less ballady more swaggering follow up to the breakout single 'Alive'." True said that the song "doesn’t even really have an intro—it just starts and keeps going—and the band seems more in the groove than on the overly earnest 'Alive'." True said that the song "confirmed that Pearl Jam were more than just one hit grunge rock wonders."
[10] The song was placed at number 77 on a list of "The 100 Greatest Guitar Songs of All Time" by
Rolling Stone
.
[11] It was also included on
VH1's countdown of the "100 Greatest Hard Rock Songs" at number 30.
[12]
"Even Flow" is featured in the 2007 video game,
Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock
, as a master track.
[13] In March 2009, the song was also made available as downloadable content for the
Rock Band
series as a master track as part of the album
Ten
.
[14]
Music video
Original video
Pearl Jam originally hired director
Rocky Schenck to film a
music video for "Even Flow". On January 31, 1992, on their way to
England to begin a
European tour, the band members came to
Los Angeles,
California to film the video. The concept for the video was based on an idea by Gossard.
[15] Schenck filmed Pearl Jam in a
zoo setting. He had arranged a nighttime shoot at an old, closed facility, brought in different
wildlife, and set up his lights among the cages and in the trees. Along with the animal footage, the members of Pearl Jam were filmed individually and as a band, standing on the side of a cliff and air jamming. The shoot took hours, and the band was not pleased with the end result. Schenck's shoot was considered a waste of time and money by the band; it also damaged Abbruzzese's wrists significantly. After shooting had finished, he was taken to the emergency room where he was advised not to put strain on his wrists. Abbruzzese would drum on the band's European tour with a splint attached to his hands.
Official video
The original music video for "Even Flow" was ultimately replaced by a performance clip directed by
Josh Taft, who had previously directed the "
Alive" music video for the band, and who would later direct the music video for "
Oceans".
[16] The video consists of performance footage of the band filmed during a January 17, 1992 show at the
Moore Theatre in
Seattle,
Washington.
Taft was filming that night not in his capacity as a director, but as a friend of Gossard's. (At one point during the show, Vedder had even stopped the proceedings, clearly of the opinion that Taft's presence was intrusive. "This is not a TV studio, Josh" he'd yelled indignantly, in an interlude that Taft left in his final cut but that
MTV clipped out of most versions it aired. "Turn those lights out, it's a fucking rock concert!") The video shows Vedder climbing the theatre, and then jumping down between fans at the concert.
The footage used in the video is actually spliced from different songs: for instance Gossard and McCready each play two different guitars, Vedder wears a hat at some point and the theatre climb actually occurred during "Porch".
[17] Taft's presence at the Moore Theatre show, and the fact that he had filmed sufficient footage to compile into a music video, proved to be a break for the band. Otherwise with Epic ready to provide MTV with an "Even Flow" video and Schenck's version already completed, Pearl Jam would have had little choice but to go with it, and the band members unanimously despised Schenck's version when they saw the final edit. The alternate studio recording of "Even Flow", which was recorded in 1992 with Abbruzzese, was used for the video as the band felt it synched up well with the live footage.
The video was released in April 1992.
[18]
Live performances
"Even Flow" was first performed live at the band's October 22, 1990 concert in
Seattle,
Washington at the Off Ramp Café.
[19] Pearl Jam performed the song for its appearance on
MTV Unplugged
in 1992. "Even Flow" has gone on to become the band's most performed live song, having been played over 620 times (the next most played song, "Alive", is at over 540 performances).
Over the years, the tempo of the song has become slightly faster in live performances. Live performances of "Even Flow" can be found on the "
Dissident" single, the live album
Live on Two Legs
, the compilation album
Wild and Wooly: The Northwest Rock Collection
, various
official bootlegs, the live album
Live in NYC 12/31/92
, the
Live at the Gorge 05/06
box set, the live album
Live at Lollapalooza 2007
, and the
Drop in the Park
LP included in the Super Deluxe edition of the
Ten
reissue. Performances of the song are also included on the DVDs
Touring Band 2000
,
Live at the Garden
,
Immagine in Cornice
, and the
MTV Unplugged
DVD included in the
Ten
reissue. On
Live at the Garden
, McCready performs an improv within "Even Flow" that goes on for nearly five minutes.
Cover versions
An instrumental version of "Even Flow" by
The Moog Cookbook appears on the band's 1995 debut album,
The Moog Cookbook
, performed entirely using vintage
analog synthesizers. The defunct
professional wrestling company
World Championship Wrestling used a generic instrumental version of the song called "One Crazed Anarchist" as the
entrance theme for wrestler
Chris Jericho.
Track listing
;CD (US, Australia, Austria, Brazil, and Germany) and Cassette (Australia)
#"Even Flow" (
Eddie Vedder,
Stone Gossard) – 4:54
#"Dirty Frank" (
Dave Abbruzzese,
Jeff Ament, Gossard,
Mike McCready, Vedder) – 5:32
#"
Oceans" (remix) (Vedder, Gossard, Ament) – 2:32
;CD (UK) and 12" Vinyl (UK)
#"Even Flow" (new version) (Vedder, Gossard) – 4:58
#"Dirty Frank" (Abbruzzese, Ament, Gossard, McCready, Vedder) – 5:32
#"Oceans" (remix) (Vedder, Gossard, Ament) – 2:32
;7" Vinyl (UK) and Cassette (UK)
#"Even Flow" (new version) (Vedder, Gossard) – 5:04
#"Oceans" (remix) (Vedder, Gossard, Ament) – 2:32
;7" Vinyl (The Netherlands) and Cassette (New Zealand)
#"Even Flow" (Vedder, Gossard) – 4:54
#"Dirty Frank" (Abbruzzese, Ament, Gossard, McCready, Vedder) – 5:32
Chart positions
Chart (1992)
| Position
|
US Mainstream Rock Tracks [20]
| 3
|
New Zealand Singles Chart [21]
| 20
|
US Modern Rock Tracks
| 21
|
Australian Singles Chart [22]
| 22
|
UK Singles Chart [23]
| 27
|
Canadian Singles Chart [24]
| 74
|
Chart (2009)
| Position
|
US Hot Digital Songs
| 62
|
Accolades
Publication
| Country
| Accolade
| Year
| Rank
|
Rolling Stone
| United States
| "The 100 Greatest Guitar Songs of All Time"
| 2008
| 77
|
VH1
| United States
| "100 Greatest Hard Rock Songs"
| 2008
| 30
|
References
- Marsh, Dave. "Pearl Jam: Art and Economy". ''Musician''. April 1998.
- Brandolini, Chad. "Dave Krusen" Looking Back at Pearl Jam's ''Ten''". Vater.com.
- Quinn, Bryan. "Q+A session with Pearl Jam". ''Daily Record''. March 9, 2009.
- Dave Abbruzzese of Pearl Jam
- Pearl Jam - Even Flow
- DiPerna, Alan. "Alternate Tunings Climb the Alternative Charts". ''Musician''. July 1992.
- Gilbert, Jeff. "Prime Cuts: Mike McCready - The Best of Pearl Jam!". ''Guitar School''. May 1995.
- Life After Love Bone
- "Live Song Quotes". PearlJam10YearsAgo.no.sapo.pt. April 7, 2002.
- True, Chris. "Even Flow > Review". Allmusic. Retrieved on May 16, 2008.
- "The 100 Greatest Guitar Songs of All Time". ''Rolling Stone''. June 12, 2008.
- "100 Greatest Hard Rock Songs". VH1.
- Brudvig, Erik. "Guitar Hero III Song Update". IGN. May 31, 2007.
- Rock Band Getting Full Pearl Jam Album
- Weisbard, Eric, et al. "Ten Past Ten". Spin
. August 2001.
- Pearl Jam: Timeline
- "Pearl Jam Concert Chronology: 1992". TwoFeetThick.com.
- Pearl Jam music videos
- "Pearl Jam Songs: "Even Flow"". pearljam.com.
- Pearl Jam Artist Chart History
- Scapolo, Dean. (2007) ''The Complete New Zealand Music Charts''. ISBN 9781877443008.
- PEARL JAM - EVEN FLOW (SINGLE) (74324)
- EveryHit.com
- Canadian Charts - "Even Flow"