Matt and Andrew's CD a Day project

Ever since Pearl Jam took a left turn in 1996 with No Code and started to suck (although there were signs with Vitalogy), there have been rumors in college dorms, on the Internet, and in music mags that they were doing it intentionally, that any songs they wrote that sounded like the good stuff from Vs. or Ten were shelved, that they no longer wanted to be the biggest rock stars in the world. Honestly, the rumor explains a lot to a college freshman that doesn't want to hear his favorite band dip into ballads or pseudo-Eastern mysticism (like a guy who lived next door to me freshman year), which is probably why it stuck around for a couple of years. Think about it: if they're your favorite band, they can't suck! They have to be trying to suck!
Three progressively worse albums after No Code and I'd forgotten about the rumor, just like I'd forgotten about Pearl Jam. Then they released this two-disc B-sides and rarities compilation right before Christmas, and a bunch of the reviews mentioned the rumors, and said that Lost Dogs was the great lost Pearl Jam album.

Well, after disc 1, I'm not convinced that's true. You get "Yellow Ledbetter," of course, a song from the Ten era that radio programmers started playing in the mid-'90s because kids wanted to hear Pearl Jam but not new Pearl Jam, two weird covers of songs by the Silly Surfers and the Sonics that were put out on benefit albums, three halfway decent power-pop songs (two outtakes from Riot Act and one from Yield), a song cut from Ten and a song cut from Vs. that are both grunge-tastic, and eight songs that pretty well suck, one of which is called "Black, Red, Yellow" and is about Dennis Rodman. Seriously.