Professional ratings
Aggregate scores
Source	Rating
Metacritic	73/100
Review scores
Source	Rating
The A.V. Club	B+
AllMusic
Chicago Tribune
Entertainment Weekly	B+
New York Daily News
PopMatters	8/10
Rolling Stone
The Guardian
Slant Magazine
Spin	6/10

Lightning Bolt is the tenth studio album by the American rock band Pearl Jam. Produced by long-time Pearl Jam collaborator Brendan O'Brien, the album was released in the United States on October 15, 2013, through the band's own Monkeywrench Records, with Republic Records handling the international release.

The band began composing new songs in 2011, and had the album's first recording sessions in early 2012 before the musicians decided to take a break. As all the band members got into side projects afterwards, work on Lightning Bolt only resumed in March 2013. The music for Lightning Bolt has a harder rock sound with longer songs to contrast predecessor Backspacer (2009), and the lyrics convey singer Eddie Vedder's feelings on aging and mortality.

Preceded by a promotional campaign focusing on Pearl Jam's website and social network profiles and two moderately successful singles, "Mind Your Manners" and "Sirens", Lightning Bolt was well received by critics, who considered the album an effective return to the band's old sound, and topped the charts in the United States, Canada, and Australia.

Soon after completing Backspacer in 2009, Pearl Jam and producer Brendan O'Brien intended to soon repeat the experience given that according to O'Brien "we had a really good time doing it.". In 2011, amidst preparations for the documentary Pearl Jam Twenty and its accompanying tour, the band recorded some tracks with O'Brien at Los Angeles' Henson Recording Studios, with the song "Olé" being issued as a free download. O'Brien considered that the studio helped the band get to a "submarine mentality, and everybody going into the ship together", and bassist Jeff Ament added that working outside the band's hometown Seattle led the musicians to work more efficiently.

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