A song from WAY before he was born

Last night in DC, Pearl Jam brought a kid from the front row up on stage to play Ed's guitar on "All Along The Watchtower" (assumedly so Ed could be free to ricochet about the stage with his tambourines). I'd say that could be a fairly memorable moment in a kid's musical shaping -- and much cooler than anything I did at 13. Oh wait, or since.

No audio from last night's set, but this live version of Watchtower from San Francisco in 2006 is still one of my favorites ("And I'm not sure why but this feels like a San Francisco song, and uh, I think we're gonna play the shit out of it."):

All Along The Watchtower (live in SF 7-18-06) - Pearl Jam

The picture above was taken coincidentally by my pal Rob, who got in touch with me after I posted that Counting Crows live show in Boulder from 1993. After all those teenage years of mine listening to that boot on cassette, I find that Rob is the one who taped it. Small world. Thanks for the pic, Rob!

UPDATE: Rob is traveling to these shows with his friend Zack, who's writing a Pearl Jam tour blog for SPIN Magazine. Check out Off He Goes: On The Road With Pearl Jam.

Lucky stars in your eyes :: Eddie Vedder in Berkeley, 04/07/08

"Trying to remember, but my feelings can't know for sure
Try to reach out, but it's gone
Lucky stars in your eyes..."

With those lyrics, Eddie Vedder took the stage Monday night in Berkeley with a rare Daniel Johnston cover that I've heard only a handful of times since 1994. Sitting on a gorgeous set with actual decoration and design (old suitcases, projection machine, gold lamé wings, a backdrop facade with abstract buildings of wood, later lifted to reveal blue skies) Vedder strolled out, hung his coat up on a hook like he was entering his living room, and sat down with us for over two hours.

Thanks to the good people at the Ten Club, I was in Row C and felt intimately engaged in Berkeley's Zellerbach Hall (capacity 2089) with its pristine, warm acoustics. Given the amount of banter back from the crowd, maybe the acoustics were too good. Maybe we can work out the one-way directional acoustics somehow. More on that later.

Accompanied with an arsenal of guitars, ukuleles, a banjo, and an amplified footboard, Vedder's set was a far-reaching collection of solo tunes from the Into The Wild soundtrack, unreleased songs and covers, with only a handful of standard Pearl Jam tunes -- and many of those deep cuts from the back catalog. It was really a delight for this fan to see material I had never heard live, and Vedder's voice sounded rich and golden and pure.

There was little variation from the setlists of previous nights, so anyone who had read a review in the paper or trolled the boards online knew what was coming next. I would have liked to see a little bit more changeup from night to night, as there are so many great songs he could have explored, but I am not complaining.

The soaring "I Am Mine" is a favorite song, and it was gorgeous to hear early on in the night, as was the rare "Dead Man" from the Penn film soundtrack (Sean Penn was there both nights, I hear). Dead Man was the very first song I ever saw Vedder perform, in a solo pre-set at the San Jose show in 1995, so it was a somber treat to see it again. The rarely heard "I'm Open" from 1996's No Code was played as a modified version that left out the spoken word bit about a man lying in bed in a room with no door (good call there, Ed).

"Man of the Hour" did a phosphorescent slow-burn with its malleable melody and honey-rich vocals, while "Porch" was not something I was expecting, and completely rocked my face off. Ed's furiously strumming arm was a rapid-fire blur of heart and urgency, and I found myself (quietly!) singing along to every word and meaning it. That's my favorite song off Ten on most days, one of the few songs off that album that I could hear a good number more times live. It was nice to hear a rocker in with the acoustic stuff. And Lukin!! Acoustic performances of Lukin are something I never fail to get a kick out of.

The conversational tone of the evening led to some interesting storytelling on Ed's part between songs, filling in details that I hadn't known before. During the explanation of the West Memphis Three situation (tickets were auctioned off for each show to support their legal defense fund), Ed led into the extremely rare song "Satellite" that I had never even heard before Monday night, saying it was written for the wife of one of the West Memphis Three, Damien Echols. She was in attendance Monday night, and Ed performed the love song he wrote just for her and Damien.

Satellite - Eddie Vedder
(an especially nice live premiere from 2002)

Despite Ed's requests for mitigation of the constant barrage of comments from the small crowd, the living room feel proved too enticing for many who wanted a chance to converse with their idol in that quiet setting. Vedder first quoted Tom Waits in a gruff imitation, saying Waits had once revealed to him that "silence is like a blank piece of paper," then later telling the yellers a bit more blatantly to "shut the fuck up," to little avail. From song requests to comments about everything from presidential candidates (wait, he's supporting Obama?! Shocker) to general supportive "We love you" sentiments, I kept really wishing people would please just sit quietly and listen to the man I came to hear. I'm all for enthusiasm but it got a bit much after a thousand times.

One guy did yell after "Guaranteed" that Ed should've won an Academy Award, to which Ed humorously mused that he had been watching VH1 'I Love the 80s' special recently, and had seen that the Ghostbusters theme won an Oscar in 1985. "That song I just played you is not as good as Ghostbusters," he said with a smile, "but I'm going to keep trying." Ed also threw in some pretty horrifying song lyrics from a Bay Area punk band called the Yeastie Girls, during a conversation about Fugazi. The words yeast and girls should really never ever be used in a sentence together, much less a band name. Please and thank you.

After an amazing run of well-selected cover songs, Ed closed his first encore with the vocal loopings of the song "Arc" from 2002's Riot Act. The piece incorporates layers of wordless vocalizations, and was written for the 9 Pearl Jam fans killed in the crowd during the tragic happenings of the 2000 Roskilde festival. In 2003, Pearl Jam played this song at 9 shows, one show for each of the victims. It is rarely-played, a raw and haunting piece that echoed on after the blue velvet curtain closed and Ed left the stage.

After lengthy applause, Ed brought back out opener Liam Finn and accompaniment from Eliza-Jane Barnes, along with Marin County songwriter Jerry Hannan (who had joined him earlier to help perform his song "Society") for a rousing version of "Hard Sun." The security guards were being prison-guard-tough for the whole set on photos or video, patrolling the aisles every three minutes, giving sharp looks and pointed finger threats to fans who dared desire to capture the moment for posterity or for their music blog. But during Hard Sun, the crowd overflowed down to fill the aisles and I was able to capture a bit of that joyous closer for you, complete with Eddie-the-Pearl-Jam-frontman air jump on the final guitar chord:



EDDIE VEDDER SOLO SETLIST
BERKELEY 4/7/08
Walking The Cow (Daniel Johnston)
Around The Bend
I Am Mine
Dead Man
I'm Open
Man of the Hour
Setting Forth
Guaranteed
No Ceiling
Far Behind
Rise
Millworker (James Taylor)
Goodbye
Satellite
Drifting
You've Got To Hide Your Love Away (Lennon, McCartney)
Here's To The State (Phil Ochs)
Trouble (Cat Stevens)
If You Want To Sing Out, Sing Out (Cat Stevens)
Parting Ways
Forever Young (Bob Dylan)
Porch
Society, with Jerry Hannan
Growin Up (Bruce Springsteen)
Lukin
No More
Arc
Hard Sun, with Liam Finn, Eliza-Jane Barnes and Jerry Hannan (Gordon Peterson)

(AUDIO FILES REMOVED BY REQUEST OF THE TEN CLUB)

Other notes:
**I didn't arrive early enough to snag a limited edition poster, but there were some very cool playbills being given out at the door with details on the show, artwork, and all the relevant causes and musicians. But PJ fans got greedy and took more than one apiece. After some Robin-Hood-like thievery from those with plenty, I went home a happy girl with my own ill-gotten souvenir. I didn't do the swiping but I can't say I turned down the gains.

**24-year old New Zealander opener Liam Finn was energetic (almost spastic, in a wonderfully unbridled and enthusiastic way) as he worked through material from his solo debut album I'll Be Lightning. His music has strong melodic sensibilities (not unlike his dad Neil Finn) but he also really had an edge on the rhythms, with the proclivity to lapse into some rock and roll shrieks. He was out signing things after his set, and I told him I enjoyed watching him on the drums. A reader compared him to Animal from the Muppets, all flailing limbs and furry faced. I would see him again.

**One of my faithful readers is an Iraq veteran named Josh who recently wrote me an immensely moving and humbling email to tell me how much my words and music had meant to him while he was in the desert, flying Blackhawk medic missions and trying to save kids' lives. Josh and his wife flew out from where he is currently stationed in Hawaii specifically for the Berkeley shows, as an anniversary gift to each other, and a vacation before he undergoes surgery for a broken back sustained in Iraq. Josh was in row 2 with his back brace, and one of the most moving moments of the night for me was when he and his wife stood silently together for the entire performance of "No More." I felt overwhelmed.

**Finally . . . near midnight on Tuesday night, I was on the train heading back from an awesome Giants game (man I've missed that ballpark) and I get a frantic breathless call from my friend Sam, telling me that Pearl Jam guitarist Mike McCready had just showed up at night two. Apparently during the encore, Vedder started musing, "I've got Jeff Ament's rug, Stone Gossard's guitar, Matt's drum... but I didn't have anything from Mike McCready . . . so I Fedex'd him out." Then they rolled Mike out on a cart, and the two went on to play All Along The Watchtower and Yellow Ledbetter together. Ha! Sean Penn also joined in on the jubilee, a bit oddly (does he sing?).


More than anything, I'd say these shows are great because of the sense of fun and experimentation, a chance to explore some musical ground that we haven't seen. I'm heartened and glad to see Ed in such a good place.



[Vedder stills credit SFGate]

Vedder plays $5 secret shows in West Seattle

One of the things I am most looking forward to about seeing Ed Vedder solo next Monday in Berkeley is the variety of rare and semi-rare tunes I'm hoping he'll play. I've seen Pearl Jam so many times that they'd have to dig quite deep to throw something I'd never seen, but within the framework of a solo setting there are many songs that I'd love to see live for the first time.

Judging from the setlists at the two secret shows Vedder played to fewer than 150 people this past Monday and Tuesday night at Kenyon Hall in West Seattle (tickets for an "Into The Wild event" were sold for $5 at indie record store Easy Street), I could be in for some pretty rad selections.

Here are (other live versions of) a few tunes he played at the shows this week:

THE "SOLO VEDDER HYPOTHETICAL SETLIST 2008" MIX
Walkin' The Cow (Daniel Johnston cover, Bridge School 1994)
Around The Bend (live Bridge School 2006)
I Am Mine (live Bridge School 2004)
Dead Man (live, Not In Our Name Benefit 1998)
Broken Hearted (live at the Wiltern Theatre 2002)
You're True (live at the Wiltern Theatre 2002)
Goodbye (live at UCLA 2002)
Trouble (Cat Stevens cover, live)
Picture In A Frame (Tom Waits cover, Bridge School 2006)
Won't Back Down (Tom Petty cover, live in 93-ish)
Forever Young (Dylan cover, 5.24.06)
I Used To Work In Chicago (Bridge School 06)
Millworker (James Taylor cover, live in 2004)
Drifting (live in Mansfield, MA, 2003)
You've Got To Hide Your Love Away (Chicago 5.16.06)
Growin' Up (Springsteen cover, live in 2003)

ZIP: "SOLO VEDDER HYPOTHETICAL SETLIST 2008" MIX


[Late addition/not in the zip] - Patriot!! Thanks to the comments, I'm gonna post up a few versions here of one of my favorite covers that Pearl Jam does, and add my voice to the small chorus suggesting this for the solo shows. Such a fantastic song.

Patriot (punked out version, Tibetan Freedom Concert 6/13/99)
Patriot (acoustic, Madison Square Garden 10/13/00)
Patriot (all reworked, live in 2003)

Pearl Jam announce East Coast summer tour dates

Nerdy superfans have been awaiting a big announcement of some sort from Pearl Jam today, crashing the message boards in the process somehow. Once the site got up and running again, there were some new tour dates announced for this summer!

The face-meltingly rad Kings of Leon will be opening the first four dates, and Ted Leo & The Pharmacists the others. I would travel to see Kings of Leon with PJ; South Carolina anyone? I've always wanted to go.

We're also hoping that this might be the first leg only of a larger nationwide tour.


PEARL JAM TOUR 2008
June 11 - West Palm, FL Cruzan Amphitheatre
June 12 - Tampa, FL St Pete Times Forum
June 13-15 - Manchester, TN Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival
June 16 - Columbia, SC Colonial Center
June 17 - Virginia Beach, VA Verizon Amphitheater
June 19 - Camden, NJ Susquehanna Bank Center
June 22 - Washington, DC Verizon Center
June 24 - New York, NY Madison Square Garden
June 25 - New York, NY Madison Square Garden
June 27 - Hartford, CT Dodge Amphitheater
June 30 - Mansfield, MA Tweeter Center

Let's See Action (live) - Eddie Vedder & Pete Townshend

Ed Vedder's solo jaunt down the West Coast

The Ten Club wasn't lying when they promised an exciting 2008 for members. Just a few weeks after announcing that Pearl Jam will headline Bonnaroo, we members were notified yesterday afternoon that Eddie Vedder will be doing a solo tour down the West Coast in April. The venues are small, the tickets are unfortunately not cheap, and members will have a stab at presale on Monday. A friend of mine is combining the tour with some baseball park visits; the season is right, and dang that sounds like a lovely idea to me.

Liam Finn opens these shows.

EDDIE VEDDER SOLO TOUR
Apr-02 The Centre, Vancouver, BC
Apr-05 Civic Auditorium, Santa Cruz, CA
Apr-07 Zellerbach Theatre, Berkeley, CA
Apr-10 Arlington Theatre, Santa Barbara, CA
Apr-12 Wiltern Theatre, Los Angeles, CA
Apr-13 Wiltern Theatre, Los Angeles, CA
Apr-15 Spreckels Theater, San Diego, CA

Five special ticket packages per show will be auctioned off for the legal defense fund of the West Memphis Three. On-sale to the general public is Friday through (yes) Ticketmaster.

Bruce Springsteen will also be tracing a somewhat parallel journey to Vedder, notably with his Vancouver show March 31 and the Sacramento show April 4th. Following the reliable old adage that starting a rumor on the internet is obviously likely to yield actual results, maybe there will be some collaboration like these:

No Surrender (with Vedder, Meadowlands 10-13-04) - Bruce Springsteen
Betterman (with Vedder, Meadowlands 10-13-04) - Bruce Springsteen
My Hometown (with Vedder, Chicago 9-26-02) - Bruce Springsteen


For good measure we'll throw these in too:

Growin' Up (Springsteen cover, 7-14-03 New Jersey) - Pearl Jam
Atlantic City (Springsteen cover, 10-01-05, Borgata Casino) - Pearl Jam**
No Surrender (Springsteen cover, 09-30-05, Borgata Casino) - Pearl Jam**

**The encoding on those last two tracks is too low to stream right (Chipmunks!) but if you download them they do sound fine, and that recording No Surrender is one of my all-time favorite covers. If anyone has better quality mp3s, please send em my way.

[top photo credit Kerensa Wight]
[Vedder/Springsteen photo 10-13-04, taken by Paul Hawthorne]

Had to be good for Santa Claus: Pearl Jam 2007 Christmas single

In all my years of collecting the Pearl Jam Christmas singles, I can tell you for a fact that the annual 7" has never arrived on Christmas Eve, in the purple twilight, with snow dancing all around me.

I stopped by my mailbox a few hours ago on the way back from last minute grocery shopping for the Christmas dinner I am making tomorrow. As I stood there shivering, fumbling the key with my frozen-in-two-seconds fingers, I got a fantastic Christmas present in plain brown wrapping, stamped "Ten Club" in the corner. As every year, my heart began to thump as I savored the slow unwrapping. Most years we use the term Christmas single loosely because it turns out to be a Presidents Day present or an Easter gift. But for 2007, Ten Club -- your timing was impeccable.

Merry Christmas, guys.

Santa God - Pearl Jam
Jingle Bells - Pearl Jam


Thanks to DropTheLeash for the audio rip and SYM

Sooner or later your legs give way, you hit the ground

The original "Save It For Later" (by whom we call The English Beat over in these here parts, but were truly just called "The Beat") hit the charts in 1982 and is part of the musical periphery of my childhood. As many times as I've heard it, it still strikes me from those opening notes as such a fantastic song.

Save It For Later - The (English) Beat

The Beat played Denver a few weeks ago, and while I was not in attendance, I did get updates from a friend who is a fellow Pearl Jam fan and knows that PJ does a wistful, spontaneous-feeling cover version of this song; I love the way it builds from a tentative start to a rocking, thrumming end. Ed clearly took his cues here from his hero, his idol, Pete Townshend and his version of the same song in Brixton in 1985.

A few years later, Townshend was on stage at a charity gig in Brixton, and performed "Save it For Later," a recent hit from the Beat. Townshend sheared the song down to its skeleton, hanging the lyric on one repeated guitar figure. Singing in a harrowed but calm voice, Townshend lingers on the lyric's odd phrases . . . infusing the line "your legs give way/you hit the ground" with weary resignation, and taking the lyric's silly sex joke and turning it into a vulnerable plea.
[credit]

Save It For Later (live in Chicago 5/17/06) - Pearl Jam
Save It For Later (live in Brixton) - Pete Townshend

I also really dig the Harvey Danger cover that plays over the ending credits of the 1999 movie 200 Cigarettes . . . just listen to that rejuvenated beat, all cleaned up and sharpened and rad. And instead of bringing the string section in towards the end as the original does, it wends its way throughout:

Save It For Later - Harvey Danger

Fools rush in (where angels fear to tread)

During the hellishness of living in a war zone, what can music possibly bring to the equation? Through its primal power, can it be a hand to reach out and pull us away?

When the Bosnian War and the siege of the city of Sarajevo was unfolding in the early Nineties, I never could wrap my mind around the ethnic cleansing, the infighting, the murders of civilians under the auspices of war. It all seemed so very far removed from my world (despite my grandmother being full-blooded Yugoslavian).

After just finishing Bill Carter's book Fools Rush In, it still doesn't make full sense to me what was causing the bombing and sniping and destruction between neighbors Serbs, Croatians, Bosnians, Bosnian-Serbs, Bosnian-Croats, Bosnian Muslims - like one of those spin-the-wheels color combination games -- how many combos can we come up with that can kill each other? Then again I don't know how much sense it made to anyone involved, inside the city or outside looking in (or outside ignoring it).

Bill Carter is a twenty-something from the West Coast who begins his journey into the Bosnia region as a man unmoored. From his earliest memories of abuse at the hands of a terrifying, nauseating, damaged father, he begins his book by telling of his lifelong gravitational pull to places half a world away. He remembers getting a map of the world in National Geographic magazine as a child growing up in California's Central Valley:

"I stuck the world, measuring three feet by five, on the wall next to my bed with a few strips of tape. At night, on the top bunk, I would secretly stretch out across the world. If I extended fully I could put my toes in the jungles of Sumatra, my navel at the tip of Argentina and my head in the Indian Ocean. Most nights I would place an ear against the the map, my hot flushed cheek touching the imaginary cool deep waters of the Pacific Ocean. I think I was listening for the sound of breaking waves. Instead most nights sounded the same."

When he reaches his early twenties, he finds a temporary harbor of amazing intensity in Santa Cruz in the arms of a girl named Corrina who fills exactly one year of his life with fervor and heat, understanding and laughter. His writing about his relationship with her held my nerve endings up against a white-hot flame, reminiscent of how Rob Sheffield wrote about Renee in Love Is A Mix Tape only with more grit and sexual honesty.

After losing Corrina, Carter's trajectory spins him to a war zone on a humanitarian mission. I felt like he was searching to numb the pain inside of him by immersing himself in even greater pain around him. Life in the seven-mile-by-one-mile oval of land in the heart of Sarajevo is under siege -- a killing zone from snipers in the hills and in the tall buildings, shooting at anything that dares to move. But Carter finds that people do dare to move; they dare to play blues music and rock 'n' roll in clubs where you have to duck your head and run from the incoming shrapnel to get in the dusty side door. They dare to hold art gallery openings and go dancing. They share meals in their homes (away from the vulnerability of the glass windows), they laugh, they make love -- and live in the moment because tomorrow may actually never come.

As Carter says in an interview on Dutch television, "When I got there, it didn't take very long for me to realize that this place was ... timeless. When you entered Sarajevo, in that war, you entered a time zone. There was no past, no future. The past is gone, it's obliterated. The future is how much longer I have to sit here with you before a bomb comes in the window. So what we have is right now. I was living right in the moment, which was a huge relief for me."

Carter fills his days with distributing food through a French group called The Serious Road Trip, lives in a bombed-out office tower in the center of Sarajevo, and they occupy many nights sitting around drinking cheap Eastern European vodka mixed with powdered lemonade, trying to make some sense of what is going on all around them. Carter's journey in this book is honest, and reeling, and confessional. All the foreigners in this story seem, to some degree, to be trying to find a home and a purpose and a community on the other side of the world.

Carter's hesitation mixes with the brashness that we are so prone to in our twenties; the hubris pressed hot against the earnestness, with the passions all bleeding red into our uncertainty. One other Serious Road Trip member remarks to Carter one night, "I am beginning to believe the worst part of being here is knowing this might be the best thing I ever do in my life. I mean I'm only twenty-six. What am I supposed to do for the rest of it?"

Dealing with the death all around them, Carter appraises his own pale flesh in the mirror one night and writes, "Sometimes I think it is easy to forget we have blood in us until it starts to leak out." He loses friends and acquaintances to the war, and in between his humanitarian work he photographs the people he meets and the horrors (and joys) that he sees each day.

Then one night he arrives upon a whim that can only be described as ludicrous, but that plays out into a surreal reality. Carter wants the world to know what is going on in this strip of land that seems to have been forgotten by the international community, rendered invisible by the political double-speak and the obscurity of another war, another country. Not my problem. For some reason he thinks of U2. He thinks that U2 might understand and sympathize with what is happening in Sarajevo because of the parallels between their own Irish history and their passion for social justice. And amazingly enough, Carter calls it right.

A big part of this story then also becomes the relationship he forms with U2 from the center of this bombed-out city, and the way he is ultimately able to connect the Sarajevans and their stories with hundreds of thousands of European concertgoers attending the ZooTV Tour in 1993 via live satellite. The Edge and then Bono relate with what Carter is experiencing and filming, and the result becomes the award-winning documentary Miss Sarajevo, for which U2 pens a song by the same name. The double-edged sword of pop celebrity here becomes an asset through which people begin to take notice of the slaughter, setting into motion a chain of awareness and events that seem to ultimately help quell the horror in Sarajevo through NATO action.

Carter's book is about a quest for redemption; for a people, for a city, for himself. It's a riveting read on so many levels, saturated with feelings and uncertainties that I could absolutely relate to even though I've never lived in something like he describes. I was encouraged how one confused, passionate, grieving, flawed twenty-something started a rumble about an injustice in this world, even as he struggled with so many things. He captures a rare joy in this story. And plus, the book mentions Pearl Jam two times, so you know, it's clearly worth it for that alone. Pick it up here and read a U2-related excerpt here.

Sunday Bloody Sunday (live in Sarajevo) - U2
The Sarajevans invite U2 to play Sarajevo and Bono seems ready to go in immediately, but is reined in through the obvious security concerns. It takes four years, but they eventually come to Sarajevo in 1997 on the PopMart tour

Miss Sarajevo (live in Milano) - U2
Bono sings the Italian lyrics here instead of Pavarotti; a gorgeous song with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights read over the ending

Angel - Pearl Jam
This is just a Heather-addition, a song not mentioned anywhere in the book but one that fits this story as perfectly as if it were part of the official soundtrack, on so many levels. Listen to it as accompaniment to reading, and tell me I'm not crazy


[all photos credit Bill Carter]

11/12/1997 :: The Honking Seals play the Catalyst

November is a good month for all my uberdork Pearl Jam anniversary celebrating. Ten years ago tonight, I was in my own personal upper echelon of sublime, unbelievable, kept-pinching-myself heaven:

Pearl Jam was in the Bay Area to open for the Rolling Stones and decided to play a secret show at the garden-lovely Catalyst Club (capacity 600) in Santa Cruz, billing themselves as The Honking Seals. In the Fall of 1997, I had just started my freshman year of college. In those early days of the internet, I was on a PJ listserv called Long Road and first heard about the show upon returning back to my Graham Hall dorm room after my 11:45am Wednesday class. I clearly remember feeling my heart splash up into my throat as I read the posting about the rumored show taking place that night. I immediately grabbed my keys, cleared $200 from my meager savings account, and drove over Highway 17 to the club. There was already a day-old line outside when I got there in early afternoon, and it was sheer mayhem with media (I'm so mentioned here) and everyone drawn like moths to the flame of excitement in this fairly laid-back beach town.

I don't think I have to specify that it was a fantastic show. Seriously - 600 people? How could it not be. I remember feeling shock and disbelief when I actually convinced some apathetic girl that she wanted to part with her ticket. Until that point, I had always felt with certainty that since I was pretty young when the band first formed that I would never get a chance to see them in a small club setting. I really did have to keep pinching myself all night.

The performance was crackling with energy from the band, radiating up from the audience. It was the first PJ show in almost a year, and three tunes from the yet-unreleased Yield were played for the first time that night. "Do The Evolution" peeled the crud off my soul with those blistering guitar riffs while Ed danced this little modster dance. I remember "Wishlist" as being so plaintive and wistful (with different lyrics in that early incarnation), but simple almost like a lullaby, and unlike any other song in their catalog. "Given To Fly" was nothing short of a religious experience when that line "a wave came crashing like a fist to the jaw . . ." broke for the first time, soaring over that tiny hot club.

Plus, November 12 is Neil Young's birthday, so Ed called "Uncle Neil" on a big cell phone that he had up on stage, and we all sang happy birthday to him. At the end of the night, as I leaned forward from the front of the balcony, Ed wandered over to the side of the stage. He looked up directly at me, and in a moment of what can only be described as sheer suavity, I waved at him. He smiled at me, and waved back.

That was a good night.

Given To Fly (11/12/97 premiere)
Wishlist (11/12/97 premiere)
Do The Evolution (11/12/97 premiere)
Happy Birthday to Neil Young (11/12/97)

[this audio is okay, minus the a-hole talking about 5th grade over Wishlist, etc]

So by the way, tonight I am pretty much the antithesis of my devil-may-care "get me to the show" rockergirl personality from ten years ago; instead of heading up to the Hold Steady in Denver, I am trying to stop a nascent sore throat in its tracks by drowning it in Airborne, orange juice, tea, and those little mini probiotic yogurt shakes. Yeah. Rock on.

Don't mean to push, but I'm being shoved :: Twelve years of live Pearl Jam

So it's not like I light a candle or get a tear in my eye, but I do always smile when I write the date on November 4th because the dork in my brain will always remember that as the first time I saw Pearl Jam live in concert.

Nov 4th 1995 was the rescheduled make-up Bay Area date for the aborted Golden Gate Park show five months earlier where Vedder bailed after seven songs due to food poisoning and the remaining members played a scorching set with Neil Young, dubbed "Neil Jam." As you can see above, this was their alternate ticketing tour using non-Ticketmaster venues. This translated into really cool [Ames Bros] ticket art.

It was my junior year of high school and I had been waiting for almost two years to see Pearl Jam live. The show was held at San Jose State's Spartan Stadium, an outdoor amphitheater. I remember joining the front end of a snaking line around the venue with my friends early in the day for the 2pm show, after purchasing a Mr. Point t-shirt (that I still wear on rare occasion).

In the late morning, the garbled but powerful melody of a soundcheck chorus and thundering drums rose through the autumn air. Hence I'll always remember that the first song I ever heard Pearl Jam do live was "I Got Id" during the soundcheck.

[photo credit]

We had arrived early enough to wedge ourselves right up in the front section, and settled in for some hours of waiting. Ed came on for the pre-show before The Fastbacks and Ben Harper, playing a hushed acoustic version of the then-unreleased song "Dead Man." He wore a fedora and smiled at all of us wryly, remarking, "So these are the faces I would have seen if I could have lifted my head up in San Francisco."

As for the show itself, I hung on for as long as I could in the roiling masses of circa-1995 PJ fans -- as it turned out, my capacity was about six songs. Once "Not For You" kicked in, I thought I was going to die and had to get pulled out in favor of a spot a bit further back.

I know.


SELECTED TUNES, SAN JOSE 11/4/95

Release (live 11/4/95) - Pearl Jam
unexpectedly languid opening song for the main set, but hearing this even tonight I get little tingles and can feel the electric excitement in the air and the whole sea of people ebbing and churning against me

Corduroy (live 11/4/95) - Pearl Jam
I remember facing the cooling dusk air and singing along with my full lung capacity, especially for the opening lines, "The waiting drove me mad . . ."

I Got Id/Shit (live 11/4/95) - Pearl Jam
After hearing it a few hours before at soundcheck, I got the full treatment of this almost eerie, soaring song with some of those great visceral screams

Leaving Here (live 11/4/95) - Pearl Jam
still one of my favorite covers they do, a feisty feministic anthem with kick and (dare I say) sass. A Holland-Dozier-Holland tune from 1963, the PJ studio version was released two months after this performance, on the Home Alive benefit album

Porch (live 11/4/95) - Pearl Jam
memorable because this is an excoriating version, and Ed returned to 1992 form and climbed an enormous tower of scaffolding, hanging in a way to make me hold my breath a bit. There's also a "Three Little Birds" tag thrown in here as well - every little things gonna be alright indeed

Indifference (live 11/4/95) - Pearl Jam
from the opening tambourine shakes and the near-mystic melody, this was the perfect final song in an exhilarating concert. My first of many PJ-induced exhausted/euphoric-bliss moments. When everyone chorused "I'll swallow poison until I grow immune, I will scream my lungs out 'til it fills this room. . ." I was right there in the thick of that. As I walked out, I remember feeling urgently within my 16-year-old self that everything was going to be okay if that kind of connection existed in the world.


Looks like the whole show is available here
[and thanks jake for loaning me the CD!]

In other Pearl Jam news --

A new hardcover book was announced last week on the fantastic topic of Pearl Jam artwork: Pearl Jam vs. Ames Bros. PJ's been blessed as a band to have longstanding partnerships with artists Ames Brothers (Jeff's brother Barry Ament, and Coby Schultz -- they actually designed the Mr. Point shirt & ticket stub above) and since 1999 with Denver-bred artist Brad Klausen. Collectively these guys have produced some of the most unique and energetic original posters of any other band I know.

The new book is 264 pages, and features commentary on individual posters from all five members of Pearl Jam and from the poster designers -- offering insight into the inspiration, concepts and process of poster creation. There was a little excerpt of the new book in the most recent PJ magazine Deep, and it was fascinating even to me (a very-very-non-artist) to see the way that the poster concept develops and emerges, and reflects something of the music and the mood of the city. Your coffee table will be 86% cooler.

PREORDER:
PEARL JAM VS. AMES BROS

Odds & ends

On this lovely slow Saturday I am making up a big pot of Dill Turkey Chowder (recipe pretty much like this except I use garlic pepper) and the simmering smells are already fantastic. It's been a week like that -- a lot of interesting thoughts simmering in the back of my mind with no real time to write about them or enjoy. So since it's Saturday, here's what I've been noticing lately:

۞ Nil Lara. I still get more comments on this guy, on the single post I wrote back for a previous World Music Wednesday, than almost any other ongoing topic. People across the world love this guy, miss his music, and wonder what he's been up to. He's been playing a series of monthly shows down in Florida, much to the joy of many fans, but the great news is that the Yanks get 2 doses of him next month!

Nil Lara has just announced two shows in New York City at The Bitter End in Greenwich Village, Nov 17th @ 8pm and Nov 19th @ 7:30pm. I'd love to see this guy; I'll be in NYC a few weeks before that for the last weekend in October to see some best girlfriends, but I'll miss this show unfortunately.


۞ There's a new audio interview with Pearl Jam guitarist Mike McCready from Tacoma, Washington's News Tribune.

Listen to Mike talk about his reaction to the AT&T censoring of the Lollapalooza webcast, Italian fans and the new DVD, director Danny Clinch, and even some on The Scorpions & Iron Maiden. Rock on.



۞ The Onion made me laugh with this fantastic "news brief":

Google Launches 'The Google' For Older Adults
September 26, 2007
MOUNTAIN VIEW, CA—The popular search engine Google announced plans Friday to launch a new site, TheGoogle.com, to appeal to older adults not able to navigate the original website's single text field and two clearly marked buttons.

Read the rest


۞ The new Counting Crows album, Saturday Nights & Sunday Mornings, will be delayed in its release until 2008. According to Adam Duritz's blog:

Update 9/27/07 - "Town Hall, Old Memories, and New Delays"
Greenwich Village, New York City, 10am

. . . This will frustrate some of you I'm sure, and I apologize for that, but we've gone to Geffen and asked to push back the release date of Saturday Nights & Sunday Mornings until sometime after the New Year.

It was just a crazy busy summer. Between all the touring and the traveling and the mixing and mastering of the new album and putting the together the package and writing all the essays for the August… reissue, we just let some little things fall through the cracks. The record itself is finished but we just did the photo shoot a few weeks ago, the art and packaging deadlines were last week, and, even putting in 20 hr days, it was just impossible to get it all done. There are videos and singles and so many things to decide on and finish and it's just not the time in our career to be rushing important decisions. Actually, in my opinion, it's never the right time to rush important decisions. We really try to make records that last forever. I don't see the point in putting all the work in to do that and then not having the right cover or picking the wrong single or making the wrong video. They're small things, I guess, but they matter to me and they're just a few of many.

It's a tough pill for our record company to swallow. Especially in this day and age, it's not easy to ask them to postpone a Counting Crows album that would have been on sale for fall and through the Xmas season. Someone somewhere will not be happy with them. Luckily for us, the people we deal with at our label ARE music people and they know that our partnership with Geffen has been a marathon, not a sprint. We haven't been around together all these years because we were worried about a few months.

Anyway, that's THAT bit of news. I know it's a bit of a disappointment but, like I said to all of you the other day, "Remind me never to put out two albums at the same time again."

I recommend streaming the song that Adam has posted on his MySpace, called "Bleed." Best as I can tell, it is a song written by Stew/The Negro Problem, and this is a live collaboration with Adam. The lyrics are pretty rich. I'd post it here, but . . . well, you know.


۞ Finally, the Ike Reilly Assassination show was as mindblowing as I had hoped on Thursday night at the Larimer Lounge.

I voraciously dig the blistering rock songs with a punkish-retro edge, with some of the finest attention to lyrical detail and "flow" of any modern songwriter today. Johnny Hickman (founding member of Cracker) joined Ike for the gig, as Johnny is a local Coloradan now, and they were clearly enjoying themselves. I was particularly riveted by the performance of "The Mixture" (off 2005's Junkie Faithful) -- an incredible, soulful, brutal, unflinchingly introspective, raw tune that I am listening to on repeat these last two days. It goes deeper each time I hear it.

"Girl don't like the mixture in me,
the liquid in me, the fiction it frees
the liquor in me, the Mick in me,
the fried-out lies for eyes she sees

...Girl don't like the distance in me,
the danger in me, the sickness in me
the stranger in me, the quickness in me,
the shiftlessness and shift in me

...Girl don't like the greed in me,
the speed in me, her need for me
the weed in me, the dealer in me,
the schemer in me, the dreamer in me

...Girl don't like the fader in me,
the invader in me, the penetrator in me
the not-quite-fade-awayer in me,
the I will see you later in me

But stay with me anyway
I'm a brand new believer
I went to the tomb without you
And they wouldn't receive me, no no no
And they wouldn't receive me, no no no
And they wouldn't receive me...

Where were you when the wheels fell off in Birmingham?
Where were you when I shed my skin in vain?
Where were you when we slid right off the motorway?

Maybe you stepped away, took a vacation day
You said a day with me is a night you've wasted

Where were you?"

The Mixture - Ike Reilly Assassination

The picture above is by Denver photographer Doug Beam from his fine set taken at the show. Quite an unforgettable night.

I can feel the earth begin to move, I hear my needle hit the groove

[2003 Glastonbury photo credit]

Two nights ago I watched the 2003 Britpop documentary Live Forever (more on that later), which begins by laying a foundation of the music scene in Nineties England from the initial impact of the Stone Roses -- so I smiled today when this fantastic cover version came up on a mix I'd made.

Yorn: "So like I said, this is hot shit for us to be over here at Glastonbury. We come from the U.S. of A and this is a very exotic festival that we love and we're happy to be here and we're huge fans of the music over here and blah blah blah . . . This is from Manchester, okay?"

She Bangs The Drums (Stone Roses cover, live at Glastonbury 2003) - Pete Yorn
(apparently this is encoded at a rate that streaming doesn't agree with. Until I can fix it, if you download it, it sounds fine; if you click the blue arrow, you get Alvin & The Chipmunks singing the Stone Roses, which is actually a whole different kind of interesting)


Speaking of she bangs the drum, I could not stop my own personal rhythm section pattered out onto my legs last night at the screening of the Pearl Jam documentary. Seeing and hearing Immagine in Cornice on the big screen with all the glorious surround-sound was an immense experience of live PJ fabulousness. My personal highlights were the renditions of Blood (ugh, love that song), Come Back (sheerly absurdly gorgeous), and a compelling ending of Rockin' In The Free World with every single Italian audience member's hands raised in the air, clapping along in unison.

In addition to the beautifully-done cinematic treatment of their live shows, the documentary also offered some very interesting behind-the-scenes glimpses: the urgent reorganization of the encore setlist backstage while the crowd screams for more, Jeff skateboarding at some deserted Italian skatepark, Ed and his daughter Olivia talking on the tour bus (and how cute is she?), a bunch of Italian kids sitting on the street belting out a passionate acoustic rendition of Porch. Stone barely made an appearance (it's all Stone's fault) and not surprisingly I would have liked for it to be longer so they could have shown more of what goes on that we don't see onstage. But overall, solid A. If I can't see PJ live this year, heck I'll settle for last night. Thanks to all who came out for an awesome experience, it was moltissimo fun.

Finally, the road to Denver will again be my buddy tonight as I head back up to see the Ike Reilly Assassination at the Larimer Lounge. Last time he was here it was acoustic and still mind-blowing, so I am very excited to get the full band baptism. I highly recommend this show if you can make it out.

Hot damn I did it! Theater screening in Denver of the new Pearl Jam movie: Immagine in Cornice

Well, this week is shaping up to be significantly better than last. I'm beyond thrilled to announce that I have actually arranged a big-screen showing of the new Pearl Jam concert movie, Immagine in Cornice, THIS Wednesday Sept 26th at the Denver Film Society/Starz FilmCenter theatre! That's in downtown Denver near the Pepsi Center (off 9th and Auraria) and in keeping with our Italy theme, it's very appropriately located in the Tivoli student union building. Couldn't have planned it better if I tried.

Showtime is at 7pm on Wednesday, and it will be a fantastically FREE event. Watch an excerpt from the film here.

Like-minded fans can meet up with us before the showing (say 5:30pm) at Brooklyn's across the street to get in a festive mood. They've got a good selection of beers, plus I think there are pool tables and your usual assortment of very healthy fried foods, also many loaded with cheese. If you think you will come to Brooklyn's first, please email me so I can give them a rough count. This will allow them to have adequate staff there if we all descend en masse.

Come on out and bring friends who like any of the following things:
a) music
b) Pearl Jam
c) Europe
d) movies
e) free things

Here is a poster you can print and tack up to help get the word out on relatively short notice. If you are a student at a college in our area, or know somewhere that you could put some up, please do! Let's make this ferociously awesome.

Rock on, and don't let the bastards grind you down.

[photo credit Kerensa Wight]

Pearl Jam movies are so hot right now

[thanks to pearljamevolution for ripping/youtubing the video clips; that acoustic Lukin made me laugh out loud in its wonderfulness]

The new Pearl Jam tour DVD Immagine in Cornice which chronicles their scorchingly fabulous Italian shows from last summer (directed by Danny Clinch) will be released upon the salivating masses of PJ fans on Tuesday. My copy is somewhere in the mail in between Seattle and Colorado, according to the Ten Club, and I may try to attend what we fondly call a "dork gathering" of friends to watch this blessed film when it arrives in mailboxes all over the Colorado Springs/Denver/Boulder area.

However, for those unbelievably lucky saps living in "select cities" (Tulare but not Denver?) you get to go see an all-digital fancy schamncy movie theater premiere experience next week. I would love to see this movie on the big screen, since my speakers are just the built-in ones that came on the TV. I actually checked airfare to, like St. Louis and Vegas (but, uh, see previous post). For more information or to buy remaining tickets, see the D&E Entertainment page.

September 24
UK and Ireland Screenings
Covent Garden - Odeon
Surrey Quayes - Odeon
Manchester - Odeon Printworks
Dublin TBA

September 25
U.S. Screenings
Atlanta - Midtown
Austin - Highland
Berkeley - Elmwood
Boston - Kendall Square
Chicago - Lake Theatre
Chicago - Charlestowne 18
Detroit - Novi
Grand Rapids, MI - Celebration
Lansing, MI - Celebration
Las Vegas - Galaxy
Los Angeles - Plant 16
Memphis - Paradiso
New York - Zeigfeld
Philadelphia - Clearview
Riverbank, CA - Galaxy
St. Louis - Chesterfield
San Diego - UltraStar
San Francisco - Embarcadero
San Luis Obispo - Movie Experience
Santa Rosa - Lakeside
Seattle - Metro
Seattle - Galaxy
Tulare, CA - Galaxy

Also, the Into The Wild premiere was in L.A. last night, featuring a soundtrack by Ed Vedder (and is it just me or does Sean Penn look like he just fell off his barstool in that picture?). It opens ONLY in New York and L.A. this Friday, for those of you searching the movie listings fruitlessly. Apparently it will get wider release on October 12; I finally got the book from the library so I am preparing myself according to my philosophical principles ("always read the book before you see the movie").

Sing loud cuz it's outside, sing loud cuz you're still alive. Just sing loud, alright?

Last night at Monolith, the Flaming Lips closed the festival with a visually dazzling carnival of floating orbs and shimmering lights and confetti and dancing Santas. Sitting there under the stars, I had a moment. Maybe I was all festivalled out from the two nonstop days of sun, music, sponsored-by-New-Belgium-Brewery drinks, and lots (and lots) of stairs up and down, but during the song "Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots" I found myself sitting back, looking up at the stars, and all around me at the gorgeous silent beasts of red rock rising up to both sides, listening to the swell of the crowd singing along at the top of their voices. I felt something twist and swell and stab inside of me.

It was just a split second that can strike you anywhere, even at a crazy music festival on an indian summer night. Despite all odds, it was this faith-affirming moment (even if everyone around me was singing about not letting robots eat them) that made me glad for the power of something that beautiful through music. My mind started to wander to one of its favorite subjects, as it often does, wondering what it would have been like to hear the lovely and pure "Ship Song" bouncing off those rocks when Pearl Jam played there in 1995. I've heard the recorded moment dozens of times, but it's got such an innocence and immediacy that I can now picture it hovering and echoing live in that specific setting.

On the dark and winding drive home, I was explaining the perfection of that particular cover to my friend & rockstar concert companion Jake, who is [wonderfully enough] as big of a Pearl Jam addict as I am. He asked if I'd heard the "It's OK" tag from the Virginia Beach show in 2000. That Dead Moon song is one that they often work in as a tag at the end of "Daughter" and I've even posted another live version of it before from a few weeks after the Virginia Beach show. It's absolutely one of my favorites, the simple strength of the creed-like lyrics and the way the crowd always sings at their very strongest. But I hadn't heard this exact one he spoke of.

So we cued it up. And it kicked the wind out of me:

It's OK (Virginia Beach 8/3/00) - Pearl Jam

This concert was Pearl Jam's first time back on stage since nine fans in the crowd had lost their lives during their set at the Roskilde Festival on June 30, 2000. With the melody of the song starting to pulse and build and carry through the night air, Ed says to the crowd:

"The last time we had to ask the crowd to do something it was under completely different circumstances than this. So, it's a little nervewracking to . . .
It'd be nice to start, uh, anew.
So, I was gonna ask you to do something and maybe you'll do it?
[crowd cheers]
And it's uh . . . singing.
Sing.
Sing loud cuz it's outside, sing loud cuz you're st-. . . you're still alive.

Just sing loud, alright?"


Man. I know that it makes me sound like a weepy emotionalist to just come right out and say it, but Ed's speech and the way the crowd sings along with all their hearts fairly reverberates with redemption, and listening to that moment made hot tears spring into my eyes last night that just would not stop coming even as I looked out the car window and tried to make them go back into my eyes. But at the same time, I was so glad for it, glad that music could still move me like that twice in one night for such different reasons.

The real, non-rambling reviews from Monolith start soon.


[thanks to Five Horizons for the mp3 clip]

Come with me and Vedder off "Into The Wild" [with a FULL album stream!]

Ed and I are totally going on a journey into the backcountry and you are invited to join us.

We're just a few weeks from the opening of the movie Into The Wild that Vedder soundtracked, based on the Jon Krakauer book of the same name. Reports from the Telluride Film Festival had folks leaving the theater screening with tears running down their faces, so people, get ready. I still haven't read the book so I don't know the ending (but . . . I'm guessing he dies).

GO LISTEN: The entire Into The Wild solo Vedder album is now streaming at WROV The Rock of Virginia (with voiceovers at the start and end of each song, but who's complaining?).

I'd heard about half the tracks on this album from little leaks, but this is the first time I've experienced it start-to-finish. My impression is that it's a superbly nuanced, ramblingly organic album. But to allay concerns of going soft or being coddled -- even though it is acoustic, it's not at all boring or sedate or old-mannish. There are several tracks that borderline wanna bust out the rock and yowl, with fierce strumming and solid drum action. There are even a few scarcely suppressed growl-screams that Vedder does best, to the delight of this rocker girl.

We've gotten lots of warm acoustic Pearl Jam songs over the years (think Thumbing My Way, You're True, Soon Forget, Off He Goes) but they're always sandwiched on albums between other rockers. This cohesive effort feels like a long Saturday afternoon in late summer with the right proportions of relaxed rambling and more intense energies.

As far as first impressions go, one of my favorite songs so far is the closing track, "Guaranteed," which I've listened to about a dozen times. It captures an ineffable, unspeakable sweetness and emotion for me, a song to a soul adrift in a figurative sea. I also am drawn to the humble ukulele meandering of "Rise." The soundtrack opens with the short and spirited "Setting Forth," which is acoustic but impassioned. Despite having the same name as both the Candlebox screamer and the new Social D song, "Far Behind" is neither of the two. Instead it is one of those almost-rockers I was mentioning above, and I love that. "Society" is a slightly heavy-handed collaboration with North SF-Bay singer songwriter Jerry Hannan about our modern wants and needs, and both "Tuolumne" and "The Wolf" are instrumentals, with the latter containing some chill-inducing ethereal yips and howls from Vedder.

If the goal of a soundtrack is to effectively score the emotional terrain of a film, and tease out a feeling into the foreground, Vedder seems to succeed with this effort. I look forward to seeing the movie and adding the visual storyline to my impressions of the heart of this film that Ed has scored.

PearlJam.com is currently doing a special presale of the solo album bundled with a limited-edition commemorative tshirt. The album will officially be released next Tuesday the 18th.

[In related PJ bundle news, they're also taking preorders of the new Immagine nel Cornice DVD with a tshirt as well. Like a good little Ten Club member, I've already placed my order, and am waiting with bated breath]

Um . . . new from Blind Melon?

Yesterday Stereogum highlighted the fact that Blind Melon's MySpace page has some new tracks on it. This is odd, to me, considering that lead singer Shannon Hoon died back when I was in high school.

After disbanding for a time, they've now replaced Hoon with a new singer, one Travis Warren. Am I being too narrow minded, or myopically lead-singer focused, in doing a bit of a double-take? When the frontman --the distinctive voice of your band-- dies, it seems weird to replace them and go on as the same band. First Alice in Chains, now Blind Melon? Take a listen to the new song:

Wishing Well - "Blind Melon"

I really cherish some of the older stuff from Blind Melon. I can do without the No Rain because I have heard it so many times (even though it's still catchy with those snaps), but these tracks are absolute essential favorites. If you've never heard Blind Melon beyond the radio hit, you should probably seriously really take a listen to these, I promise:

Tones of Home - Blind Melon
(a fantastic, flirty, bluesy opening and sublime harmonies)
Paper Scratcher - Blind Melon
(rocks)
Soup - Blind Melon
(this one takes a blessed long time to build, but I love that meandering, like a stream, and then the break like a waterfall)

ADDENDUM: 2 COVERS
Out On The Tiles (Led Zeppelin) - Blind Melon
Three Is A Magic Number (Bob Dorough) - Blind Melon

And on a loosely related note (I'm telling you it really does all come back to PJ), here are Jeff Ament and Eddie Vedder in Denver last summer performing "Bee Girl," the salute and warning to the dancing bee girl in the Blind Melon music video and on their 1992 album cover:


EDDIE VEDDER & JEFF AMENT, "BEE GIRL"

New Eddie Vedder solo song: "Hard Sun" (with Sleater-Kinney's Corin Tucker)

Clearly intended as a birthday gift for me (it's tomorrow), the first Eddie Vedder solo song from the Into The Wild soundtrack has now been posted on the Into The Wild website. This initial listen sounds well-suited to what I understand the movie is about (note to self: get the book!) -- a journey into the great wide open, wanderlust, sweeping vistas, solo strength.

It builds from an organic acoustic/tambourine affair to a heavier, fuzzier, driving thing of beauty by the end. It is apparently a cover of an obscure song by Canadian musician Gordon Peterson under the name Indio, from the 1989 album Big Harvest. Searching for information on Peterson is near impossible, as he seems to have all but vanished since the album was released, but the original song apparently features backing vocals from Joni Mitchell.

Ed's version ramps up the Middle-Eastern influences and reminds me of Pearl Jam songs like "Who You Are" or "Face of Love," a bit exotic. Sleater-Kinney punk goddess Corin Tucker duets, taking the part that Joni filled 18 years ago.

Hard Sun - Eddie Vedder & Corin Tucker
(or stream at Hype Machine or IntoTheWild.com)

The soundtrack album of solo material from Eddie Vedder will be coming out one month from today on J Records, and the Sean-Penn-directed movie opens in U.S. theatres on September 21.

Trailer for new Pearl Jam live Italian tour DVD: Immagine In Cornice

If you've known me for more than a week, you might know that two of my favorite things in life are Pearl Jam and all things italiano. I lived and studied in Italy for a time, and I am completely smitten with the language, the culture, the people, the coffee, the food, and even the music.

So this new DVD forthcoming from Pearl Jam is enough to make me fairly pass out from the pleasure wiring in my brain short-circuiting with a zillion tiny sparks.

I believe the official title of the DVD is Immagine In Cornice ("Eemah-geenay een Cor-nee-chay -- "Picture in a Frame," named after the Tom Waits cover performed in Milan) although they've gone back and forth on translation issues (it could be "Telaio"). The DVD is due out September 25, with a presale starting through pearljam.com on August 22.

The film was shot in a variety of formats from Super-8 to Hi Def, and was directed by Danny Clinch, a man who has worked with tons of greats. Some of my favorites from Clinch are the September feature with Ryan Adams, the Pleasure and Pain documentary with Ben Harper, and the recent Broken Radio video with Jesse Malin & Springsteen. You can also explore Clinch's very cool Three on the Tree Productions site to learn more about the rad work he does. I want his job.

Clinch says, "Picture in a Frame is a film I've really wanted to make. The band invited me to Italy and gave me the access I needed to show a side seldom seen by their fans. It has become a collaboration as well. The band even offered me some music that has never been heard and Mike went into the studio to create some more music for the soundscapes. This is a look at Pearl Jam that no one has seen yet. A trip through northern Italy with the band, through the document and through abstraction."

Here is the first glance at the trailer. I'm dying . . .


Hearing Eddie speak in Italian makes me so happy, you seriously have no idea. He doesn't do too badly, either.

The last three seconds of this trailer are priceless ("Jam? Like [spreading motion] jam?")