The story of Spin The Black Circle, the song where Pearl Jam turned away from what was expected of them
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Spin The Black Circle was the sound of Pearl Jam drawing a line under the first part of their career. Ten and Vs. had made the Seattle quintet grunge-rock superstars but that single, released 30 years ago this week, is where they signalled an intent to go their own way. Previous singles had been thrilling, riff-heavy anthems with big choruses such as Animal, Alive, Even Flow and Dissident, with only the acoustic-led but also chorus-heavy Daughter breaking the formula. All of them were hooky enough to be played on the radio at any given time. Spin The Black Circle, a release that heralded their third album Vitalogy, did not fit that mould. Frantic and punky and DIY-sounding, it was a song that suggested the band had as much interest in commercial chart success as Eddie Vedder did in becoming an underwear model for Gap.
Of course, as we know now, it was Vedder who was frogmarching the band’s sound away from the mainstream, disillusioned with the huge success of their first two albums. Spin The Black Circle’s dizzying pace directly played into that, as he explained to Rolling Stone in 2003. “I was trying to make the music I wanted to be making,” he told David Fricke. “I remember wanting everything to be faster. For Spin The Black Circle, Stone [Gossard, guitarist] gave me a tape with this riff,” he explained, humming the song’s signature riff but at a much slower speed. “I had a speed control on my machine. I speeded it up, came back and said, ‘Can we do it this way?’.”
Vedder said it wasn’t an indication of any control freakery, more that he wanted to follow his own instincts. “What I might have been guilty of is feeling that I got more criticism that anyone else in the group, because I was the face put on it. I might've been more sensitive that the group be something I could be really proud of. The hype of that time, of Seattle music, it had tangible effects on everyone's lives, Kurt [Cobain] being the most extreme example. He was a fragile individual as well. But that was a lot to cope with. I was freaked out.”
Looking at the release now and its non-descript, white label-ish cover design, it seems to represent the start of Pearl Jam taking the long way round, becoming the band that’s still standing three decades later. The album it came from has its own tale – and there are a lot more wilfully odd moments from it than Spin The Black Circle (Bugs, anyone?) – but the fact they decided to kick it off with this punky, Dead Kennedys-ish tribute to vinyl and playing records speaks volumes. In keeping with their ethos at the time, there was no video. This is where Pearl Jam wanted the music to start doing the talking: