Pearl Jam
I have been to see Pearl Jam four times now and it's not enough! First time we saw them was on the 1996 No Code Tour at London's Wembley Arena. It was an amazing gig, especially as I'd waited so long to get to see them.
We then had a 4 year wait till the next European Tour, so in the meantime I went to see Brad twice - once in Montreal and once in Seattle. Click on the link for more on Brad.
The waiting drove me mad....
But finally, in 2000, we got a full European tour. We had to make do with 3 dates, as we were about to go off on our travels. It was worth the wait. The shows we saw were amazing, with different sets each night and the Manchester gig had a setlist I couldn't have dreamed of.
Wembley was the first gig, with The Monkeywrench (Mark Arm and Steve Turner from Mudhoney, Tom Price from Gas Huffer) supporting. It was good to finally get to see at least part of Mudhoney, and I kept my fingers crossed for a Green River reunion, but it wasn't to be.
The next gig meant a trip up to Glasgow - Danny's first foray north of the border. The atmosphere seemed completely different to the Wembley gig and we were a lot more squashed, but the gig was fantastic. The long drive home in the pouring rain wasn't as much fun, but it didn't matter as we knew we were going to see Pearl Jam again the next day.
Manchester was the best gig, in my opinion, because it is almost my home town and we saw a lot of friends there and the setlist was second to none. I wibbled to 'Footsteps' and grinned along with 'Leatherman'. But then that was it - not seen Pearl Jam since then...
Mike McCready, Manchester .............................................................................Eddie Vedder, Manchester
Not all bad news though: whilst on our travels in Seattle (some pictures from Seattle here) we met Mike McCready at a free festival and later that year, after we got back to the UK, we saw Eddie Vedder at the Royal Albert Hall, playing with The Who as part of a benefit concert for the Teenage Cancer Trust charity.
To find out more about Pearl Jam, visit their Tenclub site.
