The Long Road

Way back in the early nineties, I remember watching the vein in Eddie Vedder's forehead and wondering just how much longer he could go on like that. Then Kurt Cobain shot himself, and I began to dread hearing the news about Eddie and how all that intensity finally caught up to him. Nirvana and Pearl Jam are both in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Kurt beat Eddie to Cleveland by three years. Posthumously. Eddie lived long enough to induct the surviving members of The Ramones, sporting a leather jacket and a fresh mohawk haircut. Eight years after Kurt pulled the trigger.
As it turns out, maybe I didn't need to worry about Eddie quite so much. Rather than seeing his music as a window on his suffering, it turns out that maybe he was expelling the demons from his soul through his lyrics. How do I reckon this? Back in 2011, he released and album of Ukulele Songs. I expect there are plenty of ways to connect up grunge to ukulele, but not through the depths of suicide. Because Eddie and his bandmates, to crib awkwardly from another album title, lived through this.
These are the guys who came tumbling out of Seattle in that first great wave that helped clear the beaches of hair metal, at least for a while. And long since we all put our flannel shirts back in the closet, they are still making music. Not as a reunion act, with a new lead singer, but a working band with thirty years on the road. Yes, they have a few drummers in their past. Who doesn't? They have a new album coming out in March: Gigaton. Pearl Jam is alive and well.
After years of tilting at windmills such as Ticketmaster, Pearl Jam continues to make music and tour. After all these years, it is perhaps sad irony that I bought my tickets to the upcoming date in Oakland through Ticketmaster. They were not cheap. But I suppose that's what age and experience will get you. Those are expensive items. And this will be the start of the potential tirade by some about how they sold out and their new stuff doesn't sound like their old stuff and they were never that good anyway.
Which isn't a very objective standard. What is objective is that thirty years later Eddie Vedder is still alive and kicking. Maybe not as hard as he used to. He's fifty-five years old. I don't kick as hard as I used to. And worrying about things like burning out or fading away is left for others. Pearl Jam has done neither. Which affords them my applause. And the money for a ticket to see them play.