I've never gone out of my way to hide my love for Pearl Jam. Call it
cliche, dorky, or just plain
obnoxious, I don't care. In 1993 I was 13, and my friend Jenny Barr had her older, high school-aged brother tape me both
Vs. and
Led Zeppelin III, and I can unflinchingly state that those dubbed cassettes absolutely changed my life. After the 7th grade, I never heard music again as I had before. Thus began a long and loyal infatuation with Pearl Jam, culminating in the strategic meetings of various band members in various places and the never-ending search of all 500 import singles in an effort to collect
every b-side the band recorded. In 2000, sheer determination drove me from Dallas to New Orleans and back, then across Texas to Houston and Lubbock, with another stop in Dallas in-between on a band-bus following trek that amounted to five shows in six days. While the trip was exhaustingly fun and memorable, I retired my Ten Club membership and officially burned out on Pearl Jam.
Fast forward to more recent times. The more I delve into the musical psyche of that which is unequivocally considered
good music, the more I'm blown away by guys like Neil Young. With Neil Young, guitar lines and lyrics are one in the same, in that Old Black is capable of holding as much emotional weight as any of old Neil's words. Young has the rare quality of effortlessly conveying a narrative instrumentally, sometimes opening a song with three or four minutes of melody and solo before stepping to the mike to udder any lyrics at all. I had the good fortune of witnessing Neil Young & Crazy Horse in all their ragged glory burn down the barn in 2003 at the Bonnaroo Festival in Manchester, Tennessee, where Neil commanded the altar and took me to church and back with one of the most truly memorable performances I've ever seen. I've heard 30+ years of live recordings and seen 30+ years of live footage, and for my money Neil Young & Crazy Horse were never better than that night in June.
The connection is this: In 1992, after taking notice of their cover of
Rockin In The Free World, Pearl Jam were invited to perform at the Bridge School Benefit, a legendary annual weekend in San Francisco of top-notch acts performing rare acoustic sets with proceeds benefiting Neil's charity. Somewhere around Spring 1993, Pearl Jam was invited to open for Neil Young on his European tour. This was just before
Vs. came out, and they were honestly one of the biggest, if not
the biggest bands in the world. After the
Jeremy video debacle they'd given up on making videos, and seemingly MTV altogether. Therefore, it came as a shock when in September of that year they decided to perform on the MTV Video Music Awards. So here you have the most popular band on rock radio playing an unreleased song from their forthcoming album on an internationally-televised awards show. There was a rumor that Neil Young was going to play with Pearl Jam, but he never showed for soundcheck and nobody really knew what was going on. I think this was when MTV was still somewhat live and spontaneous, if you can imagine. Of course, they actually played music back then too, so...
Pearl Jam comes out with a ripping version of
Animal to an enthusiastic crowd,
blah blah the song is over. Instead of the band putting down their guitars and walking offstage, Eddie steps into the mic and says something along the lines of, "
You know this guy," and out walks Neil Young, Old Black in hand. Neil begins the opening riff to
Rockin In The Free World with his trademark lumberjack swagger, and I'll be damned if it's simply not the single greatest rock music performance in the history of television. Screw
The Beatles on
Ed Sullivan, this was real tension, passion, and angst in the midst of Corporate America, an intense and furious flannel whirlwind of unleashed bravado and downright spirituality.
You watch the ferocity Neil's two(!) white-hot solos and tell me you aren't convinced the man wasn't temporarily possessed by something greater than us all.
YouTube: Pearl Jam - Animal (1993 MTV Video Music Awards)YouTube:
Pearl Jam featuring Neil Young - Rockin In the Free World (1993 MTV Video Music Awards)After feeling somewhat rejuvenated in playing with this (relatively) young band, Young Neil decided to retire Crazy Horse for a bit and make an album with Pearl Jam in 1995.
Mirror Ball was released on Reprise as a Neil Young album -- for competing record company legal reasons, the name Pearl Jam could not appear on the album -- yet the band (sans Vedder, save for a few backing vocals) provided comfortable and capable backup for the lumbering legend. Although it's not one of Neil's more famous (read: popular, if heard
at all) albums,
Mirror Ball is convincing proof that he wasn't done yet. In fact, he released almost an album a year his
entire career, a feat spanning an incredible 38 years, with no signs of stopping. The matchup of Neil's feedback-driven guitar and timeless ragged melodies with the primal grooves of newly-christened Pearl Jam drummer Jack Irons is worth the price of admission alone.
MP3: Neil Young & Pearl Jam - Act Of LoveMP3: Neil Young & Pearl Jam - I'm The OceanMP3: Neil Young & Pearl Jam - Throw Your Hatred Down
In an act of good faith, Neil returned the favor and appeared on Pearl Jam's
Merkinball single, a two-song effort that is in my opinion, the best thing Pearl Jam ever released. Pairing Vedder's vocals with Neil's trademark guitar on
I Got Id and trademark pump organ on
Long Road proved to be a hit; I can remember when
I Got Id was played seemingly three or four times an hour on the radio, and all of a sudden Pearl Jam became cool again.
MP3: Pearl Jam feat. Neil Young - I Got IdYouTube: Eddie Vedder, Mike McCready, & Neil Young - Long RoadSoon after, Neil decided to tour
Mirror Ball around Europe, and brought Pearl Jam (again, sans Vedder) along for the ride, meaning they had to learn a handful of Neil's songs, too. For the most part, I think the band did a good job. This noisy 12-minute version of
Like A Hurricane is HUGE, and rivals any Crazy Horse version, period.
MP3: Neil Young & Pearl Jam - Like A Hurricane (Live in Europe 1995)Buy The CD: Neil Young - Mirror BallBuy The CD: Pearl Jam - Merkinball
Sparklehorse is the nom de plume of acclaimed crackly-whisper vocalist and songwriter Mark Linkous. Linkous formed Sparklehorse somewhere in Virginia around 1995; Capitol soon stumbled onto his demo and signed the band, eventually releasing his debut album, Vivadixiesubmarinetransmissionplot, in 1995. The most current Sparklehorse album is Dreamt For Light Years In The Belly Of A Mountain, released in 2006 on Astralwerks. While still a relatively underground phenomenon, Sparklehorse has somehow managed to release album after album of quirky lo-fi pop experimentation on -- get this -- a major label, creating a rare enigmatic occurrence where Corporate America lends a hand to an artist whose career sales figures look pathetic when compared to that of, well, anyone on Billboard's Top 200. Regardless, the music stands up, and is especially recommended for fans of mellow contemplative damaged pop, or The Flaming Lips, circa 1991-2000. Of course, no proper run-down would be without the obligatory drama story, so here's his: somewhere around 1996, while on tour in Europe, Linkous passed out in his London hotel bathroom, pinned between the toilet and the bathtub, limp-bodied on a mixture of Valium and antidepressants with his legs tucked below his body, resulting in little blood flow from the waist down. He was confined to a wheelchair for some time and even toured sitting down, from what I've heard. Still an excellent band, one of my favorites.
