Episode 370: Rock Werchter Festival – 6/29/2012

Pearl Jam’s 2012 was more of a transitional year than anything. Backspacer had been released four years prior, and while they weren’t ready to release new material, they still went through on a short touring stint of Europe and a U.S. festival run. One of their European stops happened to be at the Rock Werchter Festival, a festival that they’ve appeared at a total of six times throughout the years. We’ll dig into this show for this episode and discuss the stigma surrounding Pearl Jam at festivals and the type of fans they are aimed to structure their setlist for.

This shows clocks in at just over an hour and a half featuring only 20 of their mostly popular tracks, but don’t let the setlist fool you as the die hard European crowd brings the heat and stays loud and engaged the entire night. Songs like Corduroy, Small Town, Even Flow and Better Man – if these performances were introduced to you, you’d never know that it was from a festival. We’ll compare and contrast the European and U.S. festival crowds and how the setlist construction may not fulfill the diehards, and why in some cases that may not be a bad thing.

Tune into this episode as we’ll treat you to an under the radar performance and continue telling the story of Pearl Jam through the Chronology Series!