Nevermind that Pearl Jam had only been known to the mainstream for a short time when STP released its first album, Core.Īlthough “Plush” obviously got the most attention, the album itself is a brilliant mesh of sounds and styles, ranging from the hard-core, punk-influenced, date-rape-in-the-first-person shocker of “Sex Type Thing” to the mystic “Where the River Flows” to the wounded ballad “Creep.” The latest disc, Purple, could be Core II: just substitute “Vasoline” for “Creep,” “Big Empty” for “Plush,” and “Interstate Love Song” for “Crackerman.” They aren’t exact copies of the songs, mind you, but updates of the sound and theme and general flow.Įven so, the labels “poseurs” and “‘copycats” have followed STP through both their albums and their live shows.
But rather than get credit for this perfect song, STP was charged with plagiarizing a movement. “Plush” was the song Pearl Jam would have written if they’d been able to.
Despite the reality–that STP’s sound combines grunge, acoustic guitars, heavy percussion, a punkish lead singer, and the kind of moody lyrics that sound like a pot smoker’s crank calls–the band has been dissed from day one for one reason: it sounds too much like commercially successful, critically acceptable Pearl Jam.įrom the beginning–which for STP was a big hit called “Plush”–the group has been called “the poor man’s Pearl Jam.” Indeed, on “Plush” that famous grunge sound was evident: guitars that echoed Alice in Chains, the soft verse/hard chorus/soft verse method made famous by Nirvana, the emotional but rather senseless Vedder-esque lyrics, and, more than anything else, STP vocalist Scott Weiland’s soulful, heavy voice, almost indistinguishable from Eddie’s. With the exception of Michael Bolton, Stone Temple Pilots are perhaps the most commercially successful critically reviled pop act of the new decade.
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