Pearl Jam
Last weekend Dicker and I went to see Pearl Jam play at the Sydney Football Stadium, along with 35000 other folks. We were both going to the concert straight from work, so we had each had fairly full days with our respective employers. We rode there on Dicker’s motorbike, him riding like an experienced motorcyclist, me holding onto the back and feeling less than masculine. We found a ‘parking spot’ fairly close to the entrance and in we went…
…to find that most of the other 35000 people were far more interested in texting, or taking photos of the stage with their phones, that not many of them seemed all that bothered about actually moving to the music or singing along. Apart from a couple of stoned guys, and a small group of Pacific Islanders, we were the only people who actually moved at all. People seemed quite upset with us for wanting to dance around, and this was in the front section of the so called ‘mosh pit’. Rock n’ roll has certainly got a lot tamer over the past decade or so, and I don’t think it’s for the better.
Ed’s voice was fairly shot, as he had a bad case of the flu. He stripped about 5 or 6 songs off the planned setlist, according to some music geek posts on various PJ forums, but even so they played about 27 songs which is impressive. A lot of people were upset that some of the bigger ‘radio’ songs didn’t get an airing, but I was happy with the majority of the song choices. The only downer for me was not hearing Yellow Ledbetter as a closer.
In any case, I enjoyed my eighth PJ live experience, and will definitely see them if they tour again. Hopefully the ‘every three years’ thing will happen, and we’ll be there in 2012.
November 30th, 2009 at 1:59 am
Maybe rock hasn’t got tame, just Pearl Jam fans. They all have kids and a mortgage now. It’s tough to dance when you have so much responsibility.
December 2nd, 2009 at 11:41 am
Ooh ouch Tom…
December 2nd, 2009 at 11:48 am
I certainly didn’t mind them not playing the “big hits”… I’ve heard them play those songs live and seen them in concert enough times that i didn’t even notice.
I loved the concert but I have a large bias towards Pearl Jam – being that they’re the greatest band in the entire history of music ever – IMHO…
The only thing i was annoyed with was the crowd… Pete and I were down near the front and it was stale… people were more interested in taking photos than singing along or having a groove (particularly the dude with the pony tail wearing the white wide brim cricket hat and a backpack – poo to you!)