2024 Pearl Jam Concerts

The last show of the first leg of the 2024 tour starts with a powerful opening, as Black opens a show for the first time since Detroit 11/23/1991! Mike’s solo is tremendous, soaring into the stratosphere. Ed has on a guitar, and with the stage still dark, he starts Immortality next. Mike throws his head back for another soulful, intense solo. There’s a short, focused jam at the end with the band turned towards Matt, just riding on the tension. Ed says “Where are we? Oh, Seattle!” and mentions that the show is being broadcast live on SiriusXM radio. After Wreckage, Ed talks about the formative days of the band, saying that when he first met Jeff, he lived in a studio apartment “about 100 steps from the entrance to this building, on Johns Street…when I think about how long it took him to get 100 steps to this stage,” laughing and adding that Jeff’s family is there from Montana. He continues, talking about Mike’s job working at a restaurant across the street, teasing “…is this better than fuckin’ cutting pepperoni or whatever?” Mike responds “…it’s a little better, but [the restaurant] was pretty fun…we had a good time…I like this job better though.” Ed then mentions how Matt worked at Kinko’s, joking that “no wonder he never plays the same thing twice…he hates making copies!” He talks about his own job, working at Long’s Drugs, saying he would have ended up as an assistant manager, getting prescriptions for cost plus 10 percent. He calls Stone a “nepo baby” for working at Gossard Hardware, and says the point is to “be nice to your barista, because someday you might be asking them to get on the guest list…” Small Town has the “…glad I saw this place, thank you all for taking us…” lyric change and Ed compliments the crowd on their singing. After Jeremy, he points out that Ray McCready, Mike’s dad, is in attendance, to which Mike interjects “…hi dad, I’ll be home late tonight,” and Steve Gleason is there as well, Ed says “I see you smilin’!” He mentions that Mike has been playing through some pain, his friend Kenny Down had recently died of cancer, leading into an emotional Come Back. Ed dedicates Pilate “for the Seattle Pilots,” the original Seattle baseball franchise. Jeff shines on In My Tree. Over the intro to Love Boat Captain, Ed asks for the lights up and starts to speak:

“Let me tell you that this right here, this is something that we could never, for a second, take for granted, and we’re so grateful…to look around and see you all, this crowd, our town, our neighborhood, our city…”

He then mentions how it’s funny when he’s driving around and sees someone rocking out in their car to their music and tries to get their attention but they’re too busy, laughing as he adds “…oh well…see you next time.” He changes gears, talking how in this room our commonality is “music…but every day, our commonality is life…a roof over our head, food for our kids, ourselves, the ability to raise and educate a child, the freedom to love any gender, any identity…we are so very much the same in our needs…we are unified tonight in music but every day we are unified with the simple things…” At this point, he starts to get a little more animated, adding:

“…and let me scream this out…we cannot let ourselves be divided. To have the ability and the microphone to communicate, it’s not a gift, it’s a responsibility, and we would like to use it to say damn it, we’re being DIVIDED, and we should not be…we should not be…with all this chaos, we need to come together, amongst all the chaos, it’s insidious, and we should be refused to be used by a desperate politician, any politician, and we should remind ourselves that people have the power, thank you Patti Smith, never have truer words been spoken…if we let ourselves be divided, it’s easy to feel overwhelmed, any kind of apathy will be taken advantage of, we will be divided be fear…driven apart…we cannot let that happen…there is no them, there is us…and let’s not get trapped in this game of division, things are pretty fucked up right now…but it’s 2024, man, we are living in the future…we have to demand that our human needs are being looked after, and if you’re someone who is dividing us, we divide from YOU. We can’t not say anything…thanks for letting us say something…but we’re not gonna apologize for being hopeful…I see, I witness, I feel love…let love and unity win the day.”

Love Boat Captain has the lyric change “…20 years ago today…” Still energized by the speech, Ed gives Porch an energetic intro. He comes out solo after the break, saying that “there’s no other guest list bigger than the one we have when we’re in Seattle…San Diego, Chicago…nope. Seattle.” He says that he wishes it were longer, getting emotional as he adds “there are certain names that I so deeply wish were on the guest list tonight, but we lost ’em too early and in ways that we could never imagine, and dammit if I can’t stop thinkin’ about them, but that’s a good thing too.” It’s the first time Nine Inch Nails’ “Hurt” is played at a Pearl Jam show, Ed on acoustic, similar to the Johnny Cash cover. After the song ends, Ed takes a moment and puts his head down on the guitar, mournful. The band returns for Inside Job, Matt’s wearing a Chris Cornell shirt which is shown on the screen and gets a nice cheer from the crowd. The visualizer for Inside Job is an outer space galaxy, similar to the new songs. Spin the Black Circle is dedicated to Easy Street Records. Afterwards, Josh comes up front and starts Something Special, and Ed interjects “..no, nope!” Josh starts it again, seemingly confused at the delay, and Ed exclaims “No! No! No, no, that’s the right song…” and then jokes “…new guys, you know.” He says “…we might not play in Seattle again for a while, I’m gonna have a drink and enjoy it…” and then says the people who run the arena said they could play anytime they want, joking “Tuesdays at Climate Pledge!” He says the first time he played Something Special for his girls, “I did cry a little bit…they’re both here tonight, but they’re not gonna see my cry on the radio tonight,” and he dedicates it to all the kids of the band members. Mike again throws in a little of War Pigs during the Alive solo, the crowd sounds great as well. Ed says “we’ll bid you adieu with this one on a historic day,” and Deep Sea Diver joins for RITFW, which has the lyric change “…a thousand points of light for democracy…” Ed says “see you in the car next time” and Setting Sun closes out the west coast leg.

The first hometown show in nearly 6 years opens with Release, the crowd is loud and welcoming. Thin Air is a surprise, the first since 2022. After Low Light, Ed says “it’s about time we played this damn place,” and talks about how they were in the building a month ago getting the tour ready, saying they had thought about starting the tour here but decided to end it there “because it’s Seattle.” After Wreckage, he mentions “every street in this town is full of memories…wrote this song there, recorded that song there, broke up that fight there,” adding that he takes his daughters to school and will say “see that little apartment building, that’s where they filmed Singles,” joking that they act interested. He continues, saying “it’s always been a point of pride to be part of the musical community in this city, the artistic community…I hope we represented this town well…it really has been like a dream,” and then changes gears, talking about Trump and wondering when he’s “asleep in the courtroom, is he dreaming of being a rock star?” I Am Mine is one of the highlights of the night, Mike does so much in a short time. During the Even Flow solo, Mike runs over to the other side of the stage, and Jeff goes up to Mike’s pedal board and starts adding effects and hitting pedals with his feet, while still playing the bass line! When Mike runs back to his side after, Jeff gives him a playful shrug, as if to say ‘I did the best I could.’ After Even Flow, Ed mentions a 10-year-old drummer who’s in attendance. Ed goes down front and sings Daughter to a young girl, and the tag features him repeating the line “rise up,” a debut tag of Springsteen’s “My City of Ruins”, which has been done by the band and Ed, but not as a tag. Waiting for Stevie continues to be the breakout new song that we thought it would be, Ed prefacing it with “this is about a young woman who finds her calling.” He sits down and talks about Bill Walton, who recently passed, and a picture of him at a PJ show is shown on the screen. Ed calls him a “big man with a huge heart, a wide path of peace and love behind him,” and they dedicate Man of the Hour to him. Following that, Ed says he’s “nervous to play the next one…what would you call that, Satanic Panic?” and they break into Satan’s Bed. Jeff drives a propulsive RVM to close the main set. Ed dedicates Just Breathe to “our wives who used to be our girlfriends…who became moms,” then he jokes “now that we’re older…we’re excited they’ll be our girlfriends again.” The spotlight moves over to the pump organ, where Ed starts River Cross and the band gradually joins in and it gets heavy at the end. Ed dons a Kraken jersey during Alive and goes down to pour wine for the front row, and Mike adds the “War Pigs” tease. Deep Sea Diver comes on stage for Watchtower, Ed says “whoever knows how it goes…starts the song!” Stone points at Jessica from DSD, and she starts it, played at a slower tempo. Jeff’s sitting on the drum riser for Ledbetter, and as Mike is coming out of the first lead, he transitions into Little Wing, and the whole band follows, with Mike going back into the Ledbetter outro at the end. Ed says “you’re gonna make us want to make this a more usual occurrence…not just Thursday, but again and again and again…”