Vitalogy - Release and Reception

Release and Reception

Vitalogy was released first on vinyl on November 22, 1994, two weeks before the CD release. It debuted at number 55 on the Billboard 200 album chart. The album sold 35,000 copies in its first week of release. It was the first vinyl album to appear on the chart due to vinyl sales since the proliferation of compact discs. When Vitalogy was released on CD and cassette on December 6, 1994, it reached number one on the Billboard 200 album chart. The album sold more than 877,000 copies in its first week of release on CD and became the second-fastest-selling CD in history, behind only the band's previous release Vs. Vitalogy has been certified five times platinum by the RIAA, and, as of 2003, has sold 4.6 million copies in the United States according to Nielsen SoundScan.

Rolling Stone staff writer Al Weisel gave Vitalogy four out of five stars, describing the album as "a wildly uneven and difficult record, sometimes maddening, sometimes ridiculous, often powerful." While Weisel praised several songs as " the soaring anthems of Ten," he criticized some of the more experimental songs as "throwaways and strange experiments that don't always work." Jon Pareles of The New York Times praised the album's diversity compared to the band's previous records. He commented that the band incorporated "fast but brutal punk, fuzz-toned psychedelia and judicious folk-rock, all of it sounding more spontaneous than before." Pareles felt that the band continued to be "unremittingly glum", and described the majority of the songs as "tortured first-person proclamations." Pareles concluded, "Vedder sounds more alone than ever." Time reviewer Christopher John Farley singled out "Bugs" as one of the album's "share of stinkers." Farley added, "But that's one admirably experimental failure on a largely successful album." Despite writing negatively of the album's "shapeless high-energy riff-rockers", Newsday staff writer Ira Robbins lauded Vitalogy's sound and called it a "compelling triumph of surface over substance". In a mixed review of the album, Mark Jenkins of The Washington Post perceived a lack of subject matter and lyrical substance as Vitalogy's weakness.

Q magazine gave the album four out of five stars, stating "It speaks volumes for Pearl Jam's continuing creative acumen that they can respond so confidently to a new punk scene that has sprung up." Robert Christgau of The Village Voice gave the album an A- rating, writing that "Three or four of these songs are faster and riffier than anything else in P. Jam's book, token experiments like "Bugs" are genuinely weird, and in an era of compulsory irony sincerity is something like a relief—a Kurtlike relief at that." David Browne of Entertainment Weekly gave the album a B+. He said, "Vitalogy marks the first time it's possible to respect the band's music as much as its stance." He added that "despite its musical advances, Vitalogy leaves an odd, unsettling aftertaste. You walk away from it energized, but wondering what price Eddie Vedder, and Pearl Jam, will ultimately pay for it."> Chicago Sun-Times writer Jim DeRogatis gave it three out of four stars and commended Pearl Jam for their earnest songwriting. However, DeRogatis also wrote that the album "leaves you wishing that they'd just lighten up". USA Today's Edna Gundersen gave Vitalogy three and a half out of four stars and stated that it "delivers the band's most compelling, inventive and confident music to date", while calling it "the rebel yell of a band that is maturing without mellowing". Los Angeles Times critic Robert Hilburn gave Vitalogy four out of four stars and viewed its music as an improvement over Pearl Jam's previous work, writing "This isn't just the best Pearl Jam album but a better album than the band once even seemed capable of making". Allmusic staff writer Stephen Thomas Erlewine gave the album four and a half out of five stars, saying, "Pearl Jam are at their best when they're fighting, whether it's Ticketmaster, fame, or their own personal demons." According to The New Rolling Stone Album Guide (2004), "By Vitalogy PJ hit their apex … the band's creative zenith, finding them doing a Led Zeppelin III on acoustic tracks like 'Corduroy' and turning in a Tom Waits-like weird attack on 'Bugs'".

Three singles were released from Vitalogy. The lead single "Spin the Black Circle" (backed with B-side "Tremor Christ", also from the album), was the band's first to enter the Billboard Hot 100, reaching number 18. At the 1996 Grammy Awards, "Spin the Black Circle" won the band its first Grammy Award, receiving the award for Best Hard Rock Performance. Neither of the album's other commercially released singles, "Not for You" and "Immortality", charted on the Hot 100, but both placed on the Mainstream Rock and Modern Rock charts. Album tracks "Better Man" and "Corduroy" also charted. "Better Man" was the most successful song from Vitalogy on the rock charts, spending a total of eight weeks at number one on the Mainstream Rock charts and reaching number two on the Modern Rock charts. At the 1996 Grammy Awards, Vitalogy received nominations for Album of the Year and Best Rock Album. In 2003, the album was ranked number 492 on Rolling Stone magazine's list of the 500 greatest albums of all time. The album was listed at #485 on the magazine's revised list in 2012.

In 2011, Pearl Jam released a remastered Vitalogy, along with Vs., in three formats: an Expanded Version, a three-CD Deluxe Edition and a Limited Edition Collector's Boxed Set. The Expanded Version will feature three bonus tracks: the previously unreleased guitar/organ-only mix of "Better Man"; a previously unreleased alternate take of "Corduroy" from the Vitalogy session (recorded by Brendan O'Brien); and a previously unreleased demo version of "Nothingman", taken from the original DAT (recorded at John and Stu's in Seattle on October 14, 1993, featuring Richard Stuverud on drums). The three-CD Deluxe Edition will feature both the Legacy Versions of Vitalogy and Vs. with their bonus tracks and a copy of Live at the Orpheum Theater, Boston, April 12, 1994.