Pearl Jam's Manchester, England Concert History

Night 2 in Manchester opens with ripping versions of Go, Animal, and Hail, Hail to set the pace for the night ahead. Ed applauds the crowd for having “more energy than all the bankers and all the accountants that must have come to last night’s gig,” and says that the “beautiful rainy day…reminds us of Seattle,” before transitioning into I Am Mine. Later, Ed introduces Mike as “one of the best friends you can have in your life” before a three-headed attack on Even Flow, with Mike pulling out his bag of tricks, then Stone takes over with a melodic lead, and Matt brings it home with a thunderous drum fill. Prior to Deep, Ed talks about how he thinks assholes are put here so that we don’t become like them before recounting the song’s origin:

“I was walking in Seattle, I’d only lived there less than a year, and a lighter kinda fell out of the sky onto the sidewalk, and I looked down and I looked up to see where it was coming from, and about four stories up there was a guy, real skinny, kinda scabby-looking dude in a windowsill with a band around his arm, putting a needle into his elbow, the inside of his elbow, and man, once I saw that I just knew I would never fucking do that, it was the most pathetic-looking thing I’d ever seen…”

The theme of troubled souls seeking affirmation continues throughout the set with stirring versions of Down, Present Tense, and Save You. Stirring crowd participation on the Better Man intro. In the encore, Just Breathe is dedicated to a couple, Lisa and Tobias, who met at the 2010 Hyde Park show. Ed talks about all the firsts that have happened in Manchester, the first railway station, splitting the atom, and says they’re going to try something less important but just as hard, and it’s the live debut (and only performance to date) of Hitchhiker! The band ably performs the song, which has a slightly extended jam/bridge, even with Mike checking to see what the other band members are doing and Stone laughing about the whole thing. The final encore concludes the narrative around the theme of escapism turned to progress with Life Wasted and Alive. Comic moment after Alive as Mike, without looking, holds out his guitar for the tech to take, but no tech comes, leading him to have to put the guitar back on quickly as Sonic Reducer starts. He throws in a short “Little Wing” tease in the Ledbetter solo and after finishing, goes out into the crowd and gives someone his “NUDEDRAGONS” shirt, returning to the stage shirtless for the bow and then using his camera to film the crowd, as he’s the last to leave the stage.

Ed’s voice is in good shape already on this, the first night of tour, with a soaring Release to open and the crowd heartily singing along. Just before the Corduroy solo, he shouts “you got it!” across to Mike. Ed reminisces after Given to Fly:

“…the first time we played Manchester was February 21st, 1992…we played about ten songs, that’s all that we knew…we know more than that now, and there’s more people here now.” 

He introduces his guitar tech Pete, saying “I thought he might have been from Manchester but he’s from Cornwall – good surf!” After Even Flow, he introduces “Mr. Mike McCready on the Fender Stratocaster,” then adding an introduction to the guitar he is holding: “…this here is a Fender Telecaster.” The Buzzcocks’ “Why Can’t I Touch It?” is briefly covered for the first time in the band’s history not as a Wishlist tag. Ed then begins Immortality but makes a mistake during the intro, leading him to say “Please present me with another guitar – as much as that guitar tries, it’ll never be as good of a friend to me as this one.” After the break, he gives a “special toast to the back” and states how he usually gets healthy on tour, as “the doctors and scientists agree that a bottle of wine a day is healthy for you…oh, a glass? Fuck that!” Just Breathe is dedicated to Liz and Tim who got married the previous week, and toasts Liz and Simon, part of the crew who were recently married. He goes on to toast “all of the newlyweds, particularly all the men who married someone called Liz” – and then states it must be good, as “Richard Burton married Liz [Elizabeth Taylor] twice.” Following Arms Aloft, Ed acknowledges “one of the great songwriters and humans to ever walk the earth, Mr. Joe Strummer,” then offers yet another toast, “to Joe, we’re still thinking about you man.” He mentions the recent stage collapse in Toronto in which Radiohead lost a crew member: “it’s a tragedy, our crew are our family and I’m sure it’s the same for them,” sending their love and thoughts to Radiohead, their family, and crew. Ed explains Come Back will be played after a request from a fan he met the previous day, because “life is fragile – if you have a request, make it known.” A vibrant Alive sees War Pigs tagged onto the solo. Closing the proceedings with Rockin’ in the Free World, Ed shouts during the intro “we’ve never played this one in Manchester before!” During the song there’s a call-and-response chant with the still-vocal Manchester crowd and “Mr. John Doe from X!” is introduced mid-song to join in. Ed leaves the stage with “…thanks for having us, it’s good to be back on the road, alright Manchester!”