Eddie Vedder on how Pearl Jam got through their to…

Pearl Jam are now 34 years and counting into their career, a much-cherished rock band long established as playing some of the most euphoric live shows you could witness on planet Earth, a group at ease with themselves and what they do. But it has been a hard-fought victory. Pearl Jam did not arrive at this place without overcoming hurdles… giant hurdles.

There have been deaths of friends, collaborators and peers – Kurt Cobain, Chris Cornell, Layne Staley, 7 Year Bitch’s Stefanie Sargent to name just a few – and devastatingly there was the tragedy at Roskilde in 2000 when nine people died during a crowd crush as Pearl Jam performed. Speaking to this writer in 2011, Eddie Vedder said that looking back over their career and seeing how they’d made their way through tough times had resulted in a new appreciation of the moniker they’d given themselves way back in 1990.