Steve Huey, All Music Guide

Nirvana's Nevermind may have been the album that broke grunge and alternative rock into the mainstream, but there's no underestimating the role that Pearl Jam's Ten played in keeping them there. Nirvana's appeal may have been huge, but it wasn't universal; rock radio still viewed them as too raw and punky, and some hard rock fans dismissed them as weird misfits. In retrospect, it's easy to see why Pearl Jam clicked with a mass audience — they weren't as metallic as Alice in Chains or Soundgarden, and of Seattle's Big Four, their sound owed the greatest debt to classic rock. With its intricately arranged guitar textures and expansive harmonic vocabulary, Ten especially recalled Jimi Hendrix and Led Zeppelin. But those touchstones might not have been immediately apparent, since — aside from Mike McCready's Clapton/Hendrix-style leads — every trace of blues influence has been completely stripped from the band's sound. Though they rock hard, Pearl Jam is too anti-star to swagger, too self-aware to puncture the album's air of gravity. Pearl Jam tackles weighty topics — abortion, homelessness, childhood traumas, gun violence, rigorous introspection — with an earnest zeal unmatched since mid-'80s U2, whose anthemic sound they frequently strive for. Similarly, Eddie Vedder's impressionistic lyrics often make their greatest impact through the passionate commitment of his delivery rather than concrete meaning. His voice had a highly distinctive timbre that perfectly fit the album's warm, rich sound, and that's part of the key — no matter how cathartic Ten's tersely titled songs got, they were never abrasive enough to affect the album's accessibility. Ten also benefited from a long gestation period, during which the band honed the material into this tightly focused form; the result is a flawlessly crafted hard rock masterpiece.

Beth Bessmer, Amazon.com

Part of the '90s Seattle grunge triumvirate completed by Nirvana and Soundgarden, Pearl Jam debuted with Ten, their most accessible, least self-conscious album. Over time, PJ's rep as a politically correct band just a little too above it all to prostitute its music on MTV has nearly superseded the music. But before that, they were a simply an in-your-face, in-your-head, loud, melodic rock band. And lead singer Eddie Vedder was known for his possessed stage presence and a primal growl that sounded like it required three vocal chords. The personal, narrative singles "Alive," "Jeremy," and "Even Flow" catapulted the reluctant band into the 10-million-plus-sales division. Subsequent albums are more intricate, subtle, thematically complex, and, in many ways, better than Ten. But the band may never repeat the stampede caused by this debut.

Musically, the distinctions between punk and metal, classic and contemporary rock were never as sharp as media pundits and marketing executives would have had us believe, but it took a gaggle of grungy bands from the Pacific Northwest to hammer the point home as they moshed their way to the top of the charts. 
Soundgarden, Alice in Chains, Nirvana, and Pearl Jam each offered its own potent blend of old and new, but what distinguished Pearl Jam was the unabashedly optimistic vibe that resonated through its songs, a combination of unabashed '60s-style idealism and post-punk grit. 
The quintet's music is as beefy as it is lyrical, a seamless blend of raw energy with impeccable musicianship and songwriting that draws as much on blues rock behemoths like Bad Company as the poetic punk of X. Pearl Jam's debut effortlessly encompasses a small universe of moods, from the poignant bite of "Black" to the surging anomie of "Jeremy" and the soaring affirmation of "Alive." 
The seeds of everything Pearl Jam would become were set down on Ten, but in retrospect what distinguishes this album is the unassuming manner in which the band goes about its business. Like U2 before it, Pearl Jam's ideals put it behind the pop culture pulpit, which led to an inevitable sense of self-consciousness. Yet in the end it's the conviction of the music, not its stance on Ticketmaster or any other issues that makes Pearl Jam a great band, and though it would go on to make higher profile albums and collaborate with such elder statesmen of rock as Neil Young, Pearl Jam would never sound as flat-out fresh as it does on Ten.

Pearl Jam: Eddie Vedder (vocals); Mike McCreedy, Stone Gossard (guitar); Jeff Ament (bass); Dave Krusen (drums).
Additional personnel: Walter Gray (cello); Rick Parashar (piano, organ, percussion).
Engineers: Dave Hills, Don Gilmore, Adrian Moore.
Recorded at London Bridge Studios, Seattle, Washington from March to April, 1991.
TEN, Pearl Jam's debut album, was released less than a month before Nirvana's NEVERMIND, and although it took longer to climb the pop charts it also hung around longer, eventually outselling its Seattle rival. Together, the two albums reinvigorated rock and roll, whose share of the pop marketplace had been slipping through the late 1980s. But while Nirvana's bruising punk rock was an all-out assault on the classic-rock dinosaur, Pearl Jam's accomplished hard rock was an attack from within the system.
The drawn-out, bluesy guitar riffing and anthemic choruses that dominated TEN instantly gave away roots in the same popular hard rock and heavy metal that Nirvana was intent on crushing. Indeed, before forming Pearl Jam, guitarist Stone Gossard and bassist Jeff Ament (who between them wrote most of the music on TEN) were the core of two '70s-influenced metal bands, Green River and Mother Love Bone. But in place of the self-aggrandizing, larger-than-life singers that led most such bands, Gossard and Ament found Eddie Vedder, a ravage-voiced vocalist more apt to identify with the abused and misunderstood children he was singing about than with any other rock stars. When he exploded into one of TEN's many memorable choruses, Vedder offered transcendence for the people who needed it most.
The storyline of the album's breakthrough single, "Jeremy," was typically vague and elusive (despite a highly suggestive video), but the message was not. The meek and the misunderstood, Pearl Jam seemed to be saying, would rise and inherit the world, even if it was only a world of their own invention.

CMJ New Music Report, issue 252, September 13, 1991

At the rate they're going, Stone Gossard and Jeff Ament will be in the Guiness Book Of World Records for "Greatest number of bands in the shortest amount of time": Green River, Mother Love Bone, Temple Of The Dog and now Pearl Jam in a mere three and a half years! Without sounding apologist, there are some things that have to be considered before judging Ten: the band has only been together for eight months, and this album was recorded three months after four of the five band members worked extensively on the Temple Of The Dog LP...not to mention the fact that three of them were acting in the film Singles (as Matt Dillon's backing band!) while this album was being recorded. Anyway, obviously there are traces of MLB and the Temple (thankfully, not much Matt Dillon) in this album, but Pearl Jam is well on its way to carving its own niche: the level of musicianship on the album is staggering, and although vocalist Eddy Vedder is sometimes too "earnest' and "yearning"-sounding, when his unusual style is in synch with the band's towering 70s-style power-rock, the results are devastating. Ten sounds a bit rushed, and not all of the songs are fully realized (just like MLWs debut EP), but the following tracks find Pearl Jam showing all the promise of a major new talent: "Why Go," "Alive" (even tho' it lifts the riff from Kiss' "Theme"!), "Release,' the bizarre "Jeremy" and especially "Once" and "Even Flow."

Dave Henderson, Q Magazine, 1992

Already a best seller in the States, Pearl Jam's debut finally gets a UK release and all the hoo-hah has been no word of a lie. From Seattle, Pearl Jam feature Stone Gossard and Jeff Ament, former members of Green River (grunge rockers who influenced Nirvana), Mother Love Bone (guitar strummers from the Soundgarden and Alice In Chains school) and Temple Of The Dog (a much-praised one-off project last year). As Pearl Jam, they mix and match their roots to make a raucous modern rock, spiked with infectious guitar motifs and powered with driving bass and drums. Creamed with the guttural howl of vocalist Eddie Vedder, the quintet may well be the face of '90s metal and Ten has already featured as one of the Top 10 albums in Spin and Rolling Stone magazines. Pearl Jam are a socially aware, riff-heavy monster re-designing the embarrassment of metal decades gone, while still cranking it up to 11.

RollingStone, issue 619-620

On "Ten," Pearl Jam - descended from the late, lamented Mother Love Bone - hurtles into the mystic at warp speed. Singer-lyricist Eddie Vedder sometimes lets his words get way ahead of his good intentions: "I don't question/Our existence/I just question/Our modern needs" ("Garden"). Focus instead on his voice - a ragged, enraged mongrel blend of Robert Plant and James Hetfield - and the Pearls' surprising, and refreshing, melodic restraint. They wring a lot of drama out of a few declarative power chords swimming in echo.

© Frank Steven Groen