On the road with Pearl Jam, lead singer Eddie Vedder’s dressing room contains all the comforts of home: a dartboard (“Gives me a little focus before we run out,” he said); a Chicago Bears football jersey (No. 34, Walter Payton); and a picture of the great Hawaiian surfer Duke Kahanamoku, which always travels with him.
Vedder, who loves to paddle out, likens songwriting to surfing: “You put these building blocks together, so you can kind of, let’s say shape the perfect wave, you know, that has a couple turns, and then a barrel, and then the lyrics come – the lyrics come from surfing that wave.”
Pearl Jam’s latest wave, “Dark Matter,” is the 12th studio album from a band that’s been playing together for nearly 35 years. Vedder said, “Pretty much everything I’ve ever written, it’s always started as a paper napkin. Now cloth napkins, ’cause we’re staying in better hotels!” he laughed.
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Vedder was 12 when his mother gave him his first guitar. “My birthday is December 23,” he said. “So, I begged to have the two gifts put together to afford something as extravagant as an electric guitar, which I think was $115.
“I walked in Christmas morning. And I could see the silhouette of it. [!!!] And then the lights came on and it was a vacuum! And then everybody finished opening their presents. [I’m getting a little chills!] And they said, ‘Oh, one more…’ And they pulled out a guitar case. So, that was nice!” Vedder laughed.
That sounds kind of cruel! “Well, I don’t think they meant to,” said Vedder. “How ’bout my mom getting lucky and getting a vacuum for Christmas?”
Vedder’s record collection included The Jackson 5, James Brown, and The Who. “We had a babysitter bring over ‘Who’s Next,’ and left it there. I didn’t see the sun for about two weeks!” he laughed.
He called The Who’s music a lifeline: “Records like ‘Quadrophenia’ gave me the knowledge and hope and antidote to despair, knowing that somebody else was going through what I was going through.”
Vedder was living in San Diego in 1990, when he heard a group of Seattle musicians was looking for a singer. They sent a cassette of instrumental songs. He wrote lyrics to them, while surfing: “I was doing those midnight shifts security. So, when I went for a surf in the morning, I remember it being super foggy and one of those days where you think, ‘Maybe I won’t go out.’ But I had the music in my head, the instrumental, and just kind of wrote it. And then, I was still wet when I hit ‘record.'”
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Bassist Jeff Ament listened to Vedder’s tape, went out for coffee, then returned to listen to it again. “And then, I remember calling Stone and I said, ‘You need to come over here right now,'” he said.
Ament, and guitarists Stone Gossard and Mike McCready, flew Vedder up to Seattle to audition.
“You felt it,” Vedder said. “You were like, ‘Oh, this is what it is. This is heaven.'”
Pearl Jam’s debut album, “Ten,” would be one of the biggest-selling rock records ever, staying on the Billboard charts for nearly five years.
The sudden success was overwhelming: “It was an avalanche that hit us at the front end of all of that,” Ament said. “So, we were just digging out, trying to survive, and you sort of regain control, sort of feel like we were in control of our destiny.”
They fought with their label, refused to make videos, and sued Ticketmaster. Ament said, “I remember those tickets came out, and the tickets would say, $28 Pearl Jam. But then we’d be like, ‘Wait a minute, we’re charging $16.'”
“You just felt this corporate, you know, fingerprints on you,” Vedder said. “And you wanted to break free, and rebel, and claim your music for yourself and your crowd.”
Pearl Jam and its “crowd” have long been deeply loyal to each other.
In Missoula, Montana, where Ament has lived since he went to the University of Montana, he hosts a fan fair with local non-profits before the gig: “You just want to help people, you just want to do more for the community.” He thinks of this tour stop as a hometown show. “Yeah. It’s like a lot of history, family, and old, old friends,” he said.
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On tour, Vedder labors over every set list, selecting from a voluminous list, which also contains “a lot of covers, things we played once.”
How long does that process take? “Sometimes a ridiculously long amount of time!” he laughed.
He writes up his set lists in calligraphy, which he learned to pass the time on the road. “It keeps me focused and entertained,” he said.
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Does he still enjoy being on the road? “Wrong question!” Vedder laughed.
When several band members got seriously ill this summer, Pearl Jam had to cancel three dates. “This was like a Euro bronchial with pneumonia on top of it,” Vedder said. He described it on stage as almost like a near-death experience. “A near-awful-death experience. I don’t necessarily mind dying!” he laughed.
Vedder turns 60 this December. Ament is 61. Mason asked, “You obviously must have a lot of trust that if you all get together, something’s gonna happen?”
“Well, it does,” Vedder replied.
Asked why they think the band is still working after all this time, Ament replied, “It’s miraculous in some ways that we made it through. And then also it’s just a testament to our friendship.”
“I was gonna say, good, clean living!” Vedder laughed.
You can stream Pearl Jam’s latest album, “Dark Matter,” by clicking on the embed below (Free Spotify registration required to hear the tracks in full):
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Story produced by Jon Carras. Editor: Mike Levine.
