Pearl Jam's Backspacer (J. Moore)

I was wandering through Target the other day and came across a display for Pearl Jam’s new album, Backspacer, which was released a week ago on the 20th of September. This is the ninth album from the band, which formed in 1990; they are considered by some to be one of the most influential bands of the 90s (despite having been criticized in their early days for cashing in on the grunge movement and the wave of alternative rock that was so popular at that time). They have sold roughly sixty million records in the past two decades, worldwide.

The display was rather large for a single title; the entire endcap display was row after row of nothing but this CD, facing the customer as he or she steps off the escalator and approaches the electronics section, and where there were no CDs there were giant cardboard replicas of the album jacket. Having worked in retail before, I knew this kind of display as a “power” display-- a visual wall built from one title, irresistible to the customers’ eyes because of its size and repetition. Target is pushing this product, and pushing it hard. Even the music section of their website features this disc very prominently and is the first thing you see. The reason for this may be that Target, as well as the iTunes online store, are the only two major retailers that carry the album at this time-- all other major retailers will release it in the first half of October. It is very interesting that the band would agree to such a business deal, considering their history of scaling back commercial efforts (regarding publicity), releasing newer albums on their own record label, and boycotting Ticketmaster for questionable service charge practices. Some fans were upset by the Target/iTunes deal, calling Pearl Jam “sell-outs,” but it should be noted that independent record stores, as well as the Pearl Jam website, were included in the September 20th release date.

If there was any gender being targeted by this product and its presentation in the store, it wasn’t apparent. The CD cover is colorful and somewhat strange, featuring illustrations of both scientific and science fiction elements; while it most certainly isn’t packaged for the stereotypical female, and though sci-fi is often thought of as appealing more to men, I wouldn’t say the cover is strictly masculine, either. It represents the band and their music, and if the music just so happens to draw more male fans than female, so be it. It is what it is. It isn’t necessarily targeting one gender or another. Pearl Jam is such a big part of contemporary music history that I think the search for a fan base is well past relevancy. That’s what drew me to this product: the cultural significance of not the album, but of the band in general. No wonder Target is so eager to push this product-- it doesn’t matter if the disc is great or not, because people will buy it.