Episode 281: Vancouver, BC – 9/2/2005

Ahhh, we’re officially in our Dark Matter era! This tortured podcaster’s department is delighted by the release of Pearl Jam’s brand new record, and furthermore are even MORE excited for a big tour year in 2024! That’s why today’s episode is the beginning of a six week run that will focus on every big location that Pearl Jam will play on the west coast. We’re gonna kick it off with the tour opener town covering a 2005 Canadian tour show in Vancouver!

Coincidentally, this Vancouver show in 2005 was also seen as the true kick off to that tour. The memorable Gorge performance was the night before, but since this run took you all the way through the Canadian plains, Vancouver got it started. We’ll talk a lot about how this tour was perhaps the first of it’s kind where the band wasn’t promoting a record, so they had the freedom to create some wild sets. This tour was also known for it’s heavy usage of songs featured on Lost Dogs, which had been release a little over a year prior to that time. We get to see a few at this show, including the rare appearances for songs such as U and Bee Girl. Save You, Better Man, Love Boat Captain and Immortality are great highlights, and you’ll get to see which song Ed tried to turn into a whistling sensation that may have backfired on him.

Oh, did I mention that we have our first taste of live performances from Dark Matter?! We’ll discuss Pearl Jam’s appearance with Howard Stern and get into both performances of Scared Of Fear and Running. Potato!


Episode 280: New York, NY – 4/17/1994

It’s a big week here on the podcast with lots to celebrate! It’s Dark Matter week! Coming off the heels of the film experience, we’ll share our instant reaction to listening to the album in that environment including what songs we’ve gravitated towards, and what we’re excited to hear live. Keep in mind that the Live On 4 Legs listening party will happen on Thursday night when the record drops everywhere, if you want to be a part of that round table, please reach out!

Although the brand new record is the lead, we don’t want to bury the purpose of the episode because it’s extremely vital to the history of Pearl Jam. The Paramount Theater show to close out the 1994 tour in the gallows of Madison Square Garden was one of a few fan club shows from this year. It comes a day after their legendary Saturday Night Live performance, a little over the week since the death of Kurt Cobain, and it is the final show involving drummer Dave Abbruzzese. While the fan club crowd was red hot and participated in every song from the hits to the b-sides, this was a night where Ed had a lot on his mind as he was unsure about the future of this band. We share excerpts from an article written in Melody Maker where a frustrated Vedder expresses his anger over Kurt’s death and even questions his own mortality. Directly following this show, Pearl Jam would cancel their plans for a summer tour and part with Dave A shortly afterwards.

Big storylines aside, this is an electric show with some absolute barnburner performances. Rearviewmirror, Daughter and Not For You all came off the heels of the SNL performance the night prior and proved to be just as powerful as they were on TV, other Vitalogy songs such as Whipping and Satan’s Bed are notable moments, Ten b-sides Alone and Footsteps were huge crowd moments and Garden and Blood were huge standouts as well. We’ll have a plethora of guests here as Javier’s Gear Guru segments will focus in on Dave A’s contributions to the band, and we invite Patrick and Brian from our sister podcast, Hallucinogenic Recipe, to come in and discuss the bootleg distribution for this show back in the mid-90’s.


Episode 279: Rochester, NY – 4/7/1994

The beginning of April in 1994 marked the start of a stretch that may go down as one of the most important runs in Pearl Jam’s history. It all starts with the Fox Theater show in Atlanta that everybody knows, and then shortly afterward the news of Kurt Cobain’s death shocked the world. Pearl Jam would go on to play a legendary show at the Orpheum Theater and then shortly after, they are front and center on Saturday Night Live. This show we’re covering here is from Rochester that took place the day before Cobain’s death was announced. After a few instances of playing through some tough off stage issues in the middle of the tour, this was during a run where the band was on a big time hot streak.

This show has some notable moments that makes it stand out among the others from this tour. Wash was the show opener, something that was so rare for the time that they had only done it once all tour. On top of that, it’s a big highlight from this show. This night features the second version of Corduroy ever played. We’ll break that down into detail and discuss how some of the identity remains the same as today, but little tweaks afterwards have made it more of a showstopping performance. And we’ll talk about Ed’s quote in reaction to the real story about Jeremy. Many great performances, and stories from our Patron Robert Rieb who requested this episode!


Episode 278: Copenhagen, DEN – 7/5/2022

Let’s look back to a Pearl Jam show that was played less than two years ago in Copenhagen, Denmark. Every time the band makes their way through there, its with heavy hearts attributing back to the 2000 tragedy at the Roskilde Festival where nine people lost their lives. During the initial 2020 run scheduled before Covid happened, the date that they were set to play Copenhagen was on June 29th, just a day short of the 20th anniversary of that day. The band wear their hearts on their sleeves for an emotionally powerful version of Love Boat Captain where Ed expresses his sorrow and explains how it changed the band moving forward.

This week we have an interview with Joshua and Yonat Goldberg, a father and daughter who experienced their first Pearl Jam show on this night. We’ll get to hear their background of how they discovered the band and bonded over them before deciding to take a visit to Denmark to see them. It’s a great story for anyone who has passed music down to their children in hopes to get them to feel the same impact that they experienced at a young age.

Outside of Love Boat Captain, we’ll focus in on performances of Lukin, Daughter, Retrograde and Never Destination, While Javier will join us to discuss the 2022 reemergence of Garden, and a little bassy Stone Gossard on Dance of the Clairvoyants.


Episode 277: Memphis, TN – 3/25/1994

This episode is about uncovering unsolved mysteries within Pearl Jam lore. We’re back to celebrating the 30th anniversary of the memorable 1994 tour, and we find ourselves covering a Memphis show that does not get the acclaim that other shows from this run do. But perhaps this show is more significant than we think? We invite on Patron Mike Cribier to share his stories from this night that had been held back for quite some time. After sharing his recollection of this show to Pearl Jam fan run sites, his information could not be verified, and his story was never told. We’re going to rectify that in this episode!

As video from the early 90s tends to be a crapshoot for some Pearl Jam shows, this is indeed a show that does not have any visual aid. So how is it possible to tell if or when things are happening just by listening to bootleg audio? The stories that get revealed feature a fan getting heavily involved in Leash, Mike crowd surfing while wearing a Nosferatu mask and potentially the most important, Ed smashing his mic stand into the ground to create a massive hole. This is something that was famously done in Boston only weeks after, but could this have been the first ocassion?

We’ll get into talking about those storylines, as well as some excellent performances with the highlights being Deep, Not For You, Porch and Blood. We’ll also talk about a pre-Vitalogy version of Last Exit… that a fan in the crowd knows the lyrics to?


Episode 276: Eindhoven, NLD – 3/5/1992

Pearl Jam was on a special run as the season turned to spring in March of 1992. They were headlining small club shows in Europe, clicking well together on stage and getting incredible reactions from the crowd who knew the catalog. While we have looked into some of the highly praised Netherlands shows from this run (Den Haag, Utrecht), this episode touches up on a show that is a bit forgotten about from Eindhoven.

Being the 20th show on a rigorous touring schedule, being on the road can kind of catch up with you after a while. After canceling a show two days prior to give Ed vocal rest, he came into this show without the normal zip on his fastball. Songs that are usually known for high-octane intensity were a bit laboring on Ed’s voice. We’ll talk about that, and how the setlist likely needed rearranging to try and capture momentum, but we’ll also talk about some of the major issues that they were having with crowds at the time. During this version of Alive, there are multiple moments of commotion – a guys loses his “spectacles” and stage divers are carelessly jumping on and off the stage whilst kicking people in the head and stepping all over the band’s gear. We’ll focus on a message from an irate Jeff Ament, who had just about enough of the shenanigans happening at the time.

Also, we had some new sound bytes revealed from Dark Matter this week! We re-recorded our original opening segment that was about it being a little bit too quiet with a month to go until the release date because we got snippets of both Something Special and Running within the days between our recording schedule. We’ll talk about what we hear from those songs, and we’ll break down Stone Gossard’s interview with Jonathan Cohen for SPIN.com.


Episode 275: Pensacola, FL – 3/9/1994

This episode begins our coverage celebrating the 30th anniversary of Pearl Jam’s Vs. tour in 1994. With this tour falling smack dab in the middle of the band’s prime, there are a plethora of storylines inside and outside of the shows that make this year a memorable one. Vitalogy songs were getting played in the set prior to the album’s release, legendary shows took place in cities such as Boston and Atlanta, dealing with Ticketmaster, bomb threats, backstage break-ins, and Dave Abbruzzese exit from the band.

This episode features a Rock For Choice show that took place in Pensacola, Florida a year after the death of Dr. David Gunn, a doctor who performed safe abortions on women who were unable to birth a child. The band has actively supported a women’s right to choose going back to their formation. You may remember moments such as Ed wearing a t-shirt with a coat hanger on it during their 1992 performance on Saturday Night Live, and most famously at MTV Unplugged where Ed wrote pro-choice on his arm with a marker. The point of the episode is to discuss some of the band’s history of activism, but also within the nature of our world at this current moment, it was extremely difficult to provide an episode on abortion rights without addressing what’s going on. That means you will get to hear our heartfelt opinions on the subject at hand. If this is something that you are uncomfortable listening to at this point in time, please take note of that before checking out the podcast.

The entire night had references (some subtle, others not so much) to the cause that they were fighting to defend, none more relevant than opening with a cover of Tom Petty’s I Won’t Back Down. The performances are the height of the era with the band absolutely locked in, and Ed tearing into the vocals on songs such as Dissident, Glorified G, Blood, Alive, Porch and many more. We also get to hear a speech from David Gunn Jr. as well as instances where Ed will attack the subject head on.


Episode 274: Fenway Park – 8/5/2016

For this episode, we’re going back to Pearl Jam’s first ever appearance at Fenway Park back in 2016. It’s appropriate timing because they’ll be playing two shows there to close out the tour in September. While it has all of the baseball references and former Red Sox player appearances, the overarching focal point of this episode will focus on the personal experience that Randy had during this show. Have you ever had a concert blunder that you wish you could take back? Did you ever miss a chunk of the set due to arriving late or other negligence? That’s what we’re going to talk about here as this show was the one and only time that Randy was not in his seat for the opening song. He’ll take you through the whole story and hopefully absolve his demons by the end of the show.

***Please note that our audio for this episode is not up to snuff due to connectivity issues during the recording. It’s listenable, but expect some glitches throughout***

Playing in one of MLB’s legendary cathedrals, Ed would mention on multiple occasions at this show that playing Fenway was a dream come true. It was a night dedicated to celebrating the big moment, and there were plenty of special guests and special performances to back that up. We get our fair share of rarities at this show, including one of the ultra rare deep cuts in their catalog, Strangest Tribe. Back to back with Into The Wild song Society may consist of the rarest opening to an encore of all-time. We also get two massive covers that hadn’t been seen at Pearl Jam shows going back a decade. Bob Dylan protest song, Masters Of War was a massive highlight that hadn’t been played in 200 shows prior to this, and I’ve Got A Feeling brought you back to the early 90s and was played for the first time since 2004. Add in that former Red Sox pitcher, Bronson Arroyo, joined in to play Black and former first baseman Kevin Youkilis brought out a uke, it was jam packed with unforgettable moments.

Our Gear Guru segments on this episode will have Javier talking about a delay effect coming from Mike on Masters Of War, and a little bit of Ed talk on guitar during Porch.


Episode 273: Brooklyn, NY – 10/18/2013

This episode is jam packed with stories and breakdown from the first night of Pearl Jam’s two show stint at the Barclays Center in Brookyln from 2013. We invite a very special guest onto the pod, the former COO of Barclays and the Brooklyn Nets, Fred Mangione. Fred gives us an angle that we haven’t discussed a lot from the professional landscape – the business side of booking concerts. As a diehard fan of the band himself, Fred will talk about when the Barclays Center opened, there was stiff competition to pull acts away from Madison Square Garden, the biggest destination for entertainment acts in New York City. He’ll talk about how they managed to get Pearl Jam to pivot from their usual location to land them on the Lightning Bolt tour. We’ll also get to hear the story about how they were originally set to play in Brooklyn for 2016, as well as the details of how the band’s attendance record was broken thanks to The Boss.

Continuing with this month’s theme of focusing on shows that the hosts attended, Randy will talk about his stories from this night… or lack thereof. Riding solo at this show, we’ll start a conversation about how memories can tend to fade over time without having anyone to share them with. Going to shows alone is great, you get to dictate when you get in the building, you don’t care if you embarrass yourself if you sing a little louder and you can focus on your own fun. That’s all great in the present, but when looking back over a decade later, those memories tend to fade a little bit because you never created a bond with a friend going through the same experiences that you did. Now, it’s probably impossible to forget everything. We’ll spend some time talking about songs like Crown Of Thorns and Oceans where the memories have been kept fresh over the years.

There are no Gear Guru segments this week. Why you ask? Because the whole entire show is a Gear Guru segment! Javier joins Randy to help break down this show, and he’ll go in depth on songs like Release, Infallible and Yellow Moon.


Episode 272: Columbia, SC – 4/21/2016

We take a trip to what is now eight years in the past (extremely hard to fathom!) to cover Pearl Jam’s show in Columbia, South Carolina. There are two major themes heading into this show. Firstly, this show was originally intended to take place a day after a show in Raleigh, North Carolina, which was canceled in protest of the state’s HB2 law. The other big storyline heading into the show was the untimely death of rock ‘n’ roll legend, Prince, that was announced earlier in the day. With heavy hearts, the band set forth to pay tribute to a man who had given so much of his life to music, as Ed would call him, the most amazing guitar player he’d ever seen.

This is another show where we get to talk about John’s adventures and stories, so we’ll dig deep into the two top stories that dominated conversation on this night. It was a set with a shared balance of the deep cuts like Oceans, Light Years, Marker In The Sand, Sleight Of Hand and All Those Yesterdays mixed in with massive showstopping performances of Lightning Bolt, Immortality, I Got Id, Rearviewmirror, Chloe Dancer/Crown Of Thorns and more. But one of the more peculiar things about this set is an OTOTO (one time, one time only) performance of the Into The Wild track, Rise. Done as a birthday dedicated to his mom Karen, this song has not been seen at a Pearl Jam show since.

We’ll dig deeper into a few songs during our Gear Guru segments where Javier will break down Lightning Bolt rarity, Infallible, and for the first time ever give a full breakdown of Crown Of Thorns.


Episode 271: Atlanta, GA – 9/22/2012

We’ve had a very busy week! Album announcement? Check! Debut single announcement? Check! Tour announcement? Oh you better believe it, check! So of course there was a lot to react to during this time period, which we did with two episodes focusing on all of the great stuff that lies ahead. While the normal weekly episode may have been pushed back a day, there was no way that we weren’t going to get to Atlanta 2012 this week.

This one is personal in many ways for John. It was his first show in 14 years, but he would tell you that more importantly, this is the last time to date that Pearl Jam has visited Atlanta. Twelve years have gone by without returning to the city the featured one of the greatest Pearl Jam shows of all time in 1994. It seems a little befuddling, right? While much of this episode focuses on stories of being there and experiencing them for the first time in over a decade, there is a lot of questions to be asked as to why the band has ignored the ATL, and perhaps a plea or two to try and convince them to go back in the near future.

We have some solid performances of Better Man, Porch and Corduroy in this show, and Javier’s segments this week will focus on Why Go as well as an interesting effect added to a cover of The Clash song Know Your Rights. It’s tour time people, get excited. It’s the best!


Episode 270: Nashville, TN – 9/16/2022

As we await details on Pearl Jam’s forthcoming twelfth studio album, the month of February will be dedicated to covering shows that Randy and John have attended in the past. First up, we’re gonna dig into the Nashville show from the Gigaton tour that they both were in attendance for. The weekend was a huge party as Pearl Jam was center stage on Broadway, but the run including Louisville and St. Louis was the first time they played three shows in a row since 2006. Feeling big energy from a crowd who was game all night and playing in an arena with impeccable acoustics, the band constructed a set jam packed full of show stoppers and great stories to live up to the hype of playing in Music City.

Randy and John have differing angles when it comes to their personal experiences on this night. For Randy, it was his fourth show out of six during that run with heavy hitting shows such as Toronto, MSG, Camden and St. Louis surrounding this night. He’ll talk about how some of the memories from this night tended to fade until relistening and rewatching the events that took place. For John, this was his first show since 2016, so after a six-year hiatus he was ready to jump back in and be a part of the atmosphere again. They, and everyone else who attended this show, were treated to a setlist that featured massive moments such as Nothingman as an opener for only the second time, an incredible back-to-back featuring Black and Present Tense, Rats thanks to that night’s tour poster, a mind blowing Immortality, a heavy hearted River Cross and many more moments that make this show stand out.

The Gear Guru segments for this show will focus on the aforementioned version of Immortality, and we’ll even get a little demo from Javier! And he’ll also discuss the 1958 Flying V that came from the Gibson Vault that Mike used on both Alive and Ledbetter.


Episode 269: Columbus, OH – 5/6/2010

This episode is a very spiritual affair that will have us look deep into the depths of Pearl Jam as a “religion” of sorts. We’re discussing Columbus 2010, and during one of Ed’s speeches he talks about it being national prayer day and considering turning the band into a religion in order to be tax exempt, and have Stone as their Jesus! So the episode is somewhat molded around the theme of the fanbase celebrating the band as if it were a religion, and how our experiences with the music also creates a common bond with others throughout our community. They even tie performances into this theme such as Faithfull, Marker In The Sand, and of course Alive.

While we read from the old testament of Pearl Jam, we are visited by a holy spirit in this show in the form of Mike McCready. During the pre-set, Mike came out and played a two-song solo set, something that he almost never does. Digging into a Stones cover of Dead Flowers and an original song written for his son, we’ll talk about his efforts and why a solo record could work really well for him. Another big topic from this show stems from an unsolved mystery of a fan local to the Columbus area. Brian Shaffer disappeared while out with friends in April of 2006, and 18 years later this has remained a cold case. Ed raises awareness to the situation, and it’s something that has remained a pinned thread on the Ten Club forum to this day. The band plays a haunting version of Come Back in his honor that makes for one of the most powerful moments at this show.

Thanks to our Patron, Travis Howell, for requesting this show and joining us to tell his story. Javier will join this episode to talk about how much he loves the sound of the 2010 tour (which is not very much at all) and will focus on Amongst The Waves and Marker In The Sand.


Episode 268: Melbourne, AUS – 11/16/2006

With some rumors swirling about Pearl Jam playing Australia this year for the first time since 2014, we thought now would be as good of a time as any to get into a show from down under. 2006 was the last time they played Australia without the help of the Big Day Out festival. For Melbourne, they were treated to three great shows in the same fashion that they had done in previous years, such as 1995 and 1998. While the performances are great from this show, there is one thing that will make this one go down in the annals of Pearl Jam history, and that is… Ed’s butt cheeks.

Yes, you read that right. Three nights in Melbourne means that shenanigans are bound to be had both after the shows and on the off day, which Ed had partaken in. During his escapades, he was informed of a traditional Australian drinking game in which you take a 50 cent coin, wedge it between your butt cheeks and then try and walk with it over to a cup and see if you can drop it in. In the spirit of a night three, Ed plays the game on stage to pretty hilarious results. Also, Stone takes a crack (ha….) at it as well.

Aside from that, we have some great performances at this show. We’ll end up talking about Jeff a lot who is prominent in the mix on such songs like Hail, Hail and Even Flow, and Javier’s segments this week will focus heavily on the Telecaster sound during World Wide Suicide and Save You, as well as Mike’s Ibanez (not Gibson) Flying V on Present Tense. Big thank you to our Patron, William Rees, who submitted this episode request and joins us to tell his story

 


Episode 267: Prague, CZ – 9/22/2006

This episode is manhandled by a recurring theme in which Pearl Jam has never attempted prior or since. On a 2006 night in Prague following a very memorable series of shows in Italy, the band balanced a main set sprint with a first encore where five songs all connected. As we are used to sometimes seeing the songs Better Man, Nothingman and Leatherman used together in what has been dubbed “The Man Trilogy”, on this night the trilogy expanded it’s tribe by adding in Dead Man and Man Of The Hour into what we dub as The Man Pentology. This is a one off instance which was never repeated in this group of five again, and we’re excited to share it with you because it’s things like this that seem to get forgotten about over time. Especially at a show that was not played in America.

As mentioned, this is one of the fastest main sets you’ll ever witness from the modern era clocking in at an hour and 8 minutes. When sets tend to trail on the faster side, that’s all thanks to Matt Cameron’s furious pace that he brought to the table during shows in this era. Songs like Sad, Daughter and Marker In The Sand were all revved up more than usual, and even the songs that already have that identity  such as Last Exit, Whipping and Animal were all amped up a little more than usual. We’ll work quick through this set, but not before taking a moment to feature some of our favorite songs, including a few Filthy Fills tossed in there.

Check out this week’s Gear Guru segments with Javier where he’ll break down a phaser that McCready uses on Life Wasted, to talking about a pedal no longer featured on Stone’s board that was implemented in this version of Insignificance.


Episode 266: Birmingham, AL – 4/9/2003

The coldest show in Pearl Jam history located in East Troy, Wisconsin was so cold that it was dubbed the nickname ‘The Ice Bowl’. When you think of cold weather areas, Wisconsin makes a lot of sense to have held the coldest show ever. But the second coldest show? If you had Birmingham, Alabama on your bingo card, I will assume you’ve cheated. Yes, you’ve heard correctly. On a cold night in April of 2003, Pearl Jam played in front of a smaller capacity crowd in 40 degree weather… in deep south Alabama. It’s kind of crazy to say aloud, but the storyline for this show is how both band and crowd react to the situation, and the put together a very good show despite all that transpired. Our Patron Tasker Hewitt will join us for the episode to talk about his experience of being in the crowd on that night.

The weather isn’t the complete story here, because had they of sold well for original venue Birmingham-Jefferson Convention Complex Arena, they wouldn’t have had to worry about the rough temperatures. The original plan was for them to play in the same arena which they played in 1998, a larger capacity building than the amphitheater they’d end up moving to, but tickets were not in very high demand and that’s what forced the switch. This led to a great crowd full of hardcore fans that all filled up the GA ready to make it a memorable night. In ways it was. They have some great stretches of songs in which the band purposefully made sure that the crowd stay energetic, the best example being a stretch of Even Flow, Daughter and Better Man played as the 4th 5th and 6th songs of the night. There are some great moments in this set. We’ll spend a lot of time on songs such as Thumbing My Way and Animal, and Black will be a massive discussion point as well.

But if there is one thing to take away from this night, it’s the way they ended this show. After Yellow Ledbetter, the band still has their instruments strapped in. A tease of Sweet Home Alabama from McCready at the end of Ledbetter would potentially make this crowd think there was more ahead. Instead, it was one of the weirdest troll jobs in the history of this band. Matt clicks his sticks four times, the band strums one note, and everyone walks off as if everything was normal. We’ll get into this at full detail and try to figure out what the hell was going on.

Javier returns to the show this week for segments focusing on both Even Flow and Black!


Episode 265: Camden, NJ – 9/1/2000

Welcome to the unofficial sixth season of Live On 4 Legs Podcast! While 2024 is gearing up to be a massive year for Pearl Jam and we plan to be there covering it every step of the way, we’re still very excited to get you guys the weekly episodes covering all of your favorite shows throughout the history of this band. We’re going to kick off the new year with a great show from the Binaural tour in 2000 located in Camden, New Jersey. This show took place near the end of the first North American leg, which had it’s ups and downs due to it’s proximity to the date of the Roskilde tragedy. By this point, the band had kind of found their own way out of the funk and strung together some excellent shows down the home stretch.

This Camden show is a standout due to it’s remarkable run from the middle of the main set straight through to the end. It kicks off with an electrifying Given To Fly, features a version of Better Man which we’ll have tons of talking points about the tag, Present Tense’s “twinkle”, Spin The Black Circle’s sheer speed and Black’s ability to melt your soul. It was not the best show for Ed’s voice, but everyone powered through it and the band had his back in times which he struggled. Another storyline from this night was the contingent of fans who brought signs for Breath with them, very similar to the moment at MSG on the previous tour, and for the only time during this entire tour year the band makes a setlist adjustment in order to play it.

Also, what 80’s metal songs were tagged at the end of Yellow Ledbetter? Stay tuned, the answer may surprise you… or may not. You can pretty much look that up.


Episode 264: Chicago, IL – 9/7/2023

It’s our final episode for the 2023 season, and what better way to close out than finishing with a show from this tour year. In the last episode, we covered the night one show from Chicago, and this episode will take us to the second night at the United Center. This show had a lot to live up to in many people’s eyes as night one was considered, at least by our panelists, as an instant classic show. The second night had to follow up on all of the stories, rarities and energy that made night one so special. And in ways it certainly did live up to it, but perhaps did it fail to capture the same magic as the show on September 5th did? We polled our social media followers and asked them what they thought the more impactful show was, and we’ll share the result on the episode.

There are a couple of big takeaways from this show. They involved the local sports teams into the night a little more and featured a version of Present Tense coming off the popularity of The Last Dance, and they also made an announcement that the Blackhawks would be retiring Chris Chelios’ number. The rarities were once again in the mix as this crowd was treated to some of the more difficult songs to catch at a Pearl Jam show nowadays – Tremor Christ, Green Disease and Marker In The Sand. But there is a big elephant in the room to address that took a stranglehold over the second half of the show, and that is the contingent of Ten songs played. Compared to night one where Gigaton led the clubhouse with 4 songs off the album played, there were a whopping 8 songs from the Ten record on this night. Of course the majority of your crowd is going to love Ten, in this scenario the question needs to be asked – how much is enough?

We’re joined in this episode by our Gear Guru Javier Hervas, not just for a few sprinkled in segments, but for the entire episode! Javier and Randy sat with each other at this show and will share all of the stories of hanging out with friends, finding good records, taking shots of Malort, and of course, the performances. This includes a story about a nickname given to Randy by another fan at this show that a few people out there would probably not want to stick. All the answers will be found in the episode that we have made.


Episode 263: Chicago, IL – 9/5/2023

Let’s finish off the year strong by covering the two night stay from this year’s Chicago shows! We’ll talk extensively about night 1 in this episode and discuss why this was in fact a true instant classic in the Pearl Jam catalog. It had a perfect mix of everything you want from a Pearl Jam show – electric performances, great crowd connection, incredible storytelling and of course ones for the serious collectors. Randy was at this show, which means he’ll do his own fair share of storytelling about the moments that made a profound impact on him, and a little of the journey that took him from Connecticut to Chicago. Including one horrifying story about a bathroom in a Chicago dive bar…

Being in Chicago, the show is of course a homecoming party for Ed. But this was the first instance where they played a show outside of Wrigley Field since 2009. So now you have a much more intimate crowd, how does the night go down? Well for starters, Release is going to end up being your opener, because that’s always what happens there. Then you’ll get a Bulls or Cubs reference, a few stories about his days living there as a child and maybe some shout outs to friends. Those things happened, but the night wasn’t about any of that. It was a night to pay homage to family. Having attended his Aunt Sandy’s funeral the day prior, Ed was feeling nostalgic for going back on some of the memories he had of his grandmother’s apartment growing up. The story that unfolded from revisiting the old stomping grounds was an emotional high point on a night where there were many. We also got a Rearviewmirror dedication for beloved community member Frans Von Franquemont who lost his battle with cancer earlier this year.

The Gear Guru warms up for his big full episode appearance next week by gushing over a rare type of pedal that Mike McCready used for Retrograde that was heard in the song Higher Ground, and talking about the bag of tricks Mike doled out in this edition of Even Flow.


Episode 262: Vancouver, BC, CAN – 9/4/1993

This episode is our fifth and final in our run of celebrating 30 years of the Vs. era. We’ve decided to go backwards a little bit and veer away from the November/December shows by covering one from Vancouver when they opened up for Neil Young back in September from that year. After five years, this is our first opportunity to discuss a show that emanated from the Seattle’s neighbor to the north, so we’ll take some time to dig into the history of shows from there and find something special about each of them. For this show in 1993, it’s only 16 songs, and suffers a bit from really bad acoustics in a big football stadium that did not meet expectations of ticket sales. Although Pearl Jam and Ed seemed ripe to take a jab at the place every opportunity they got, they made the most of it and gave the crowd a preview of half the Vs. record which was still over a month away from being released. This show was also the follow up to the legendary performances of Animal and Rockin’ In The Free World at the VMA’s, so we’ll talk a little about the immediate impact of those two moments.