How About a Pearl Jam Obscure Fact Repository

Youkan Fakoff

Ok, I've got a question ❓ Who are the female voices singing on "Don't Gimme No Lip?

There are a few others I can't think of off hand, but I've always wondered who it was on the various tracks

Ledbetterman10

pleatherman said:

Hypothesis:  Pearl Jam did NOT play their first show as Mookie Blaylock. 

I used to accept as common knowledge that Ed, Jeff, Mike, Stone, and Dave played the Off Ramp on 10/22/90 under the moniker Mookie Blaylock.  But now I am not convinced that is true.  While several articles claim the band was called Mookie Blaylock for their first show, I find a stunning lack of evidence to support that.  No handbill or announcement for the show has circulated and chances are they were a last minute addition, anyways.  A commemorative set list for the concert with the name Mookie Blaylock written at the top exists, but that was created years later.  Any postcards or demo tapes from 10/90 make no mention of Mookie Blaylock.  I suppose a band name was superfluous when writing music in the basement and opening a show for your friends’ bands.  That necessity arose, however, when the situation became more serious and they were offered a supporting slot on the Alice in Chains tour.  Which also happens to be around the time the name Mookie Blaylock gains visibility.  This quote from Jeff Ament might sum it up best:

"We were about to go on a tour and still didn't have a name and needed one quickly. We were told it didn't need to be the name that we were going to use forever, just something for the tour. Someone saw the Mookie Blaylock card and said, 'How about Mookie Blaylock?' We decided to go with it ..."

Conclusion:  The band was nameless during the first month or so of its existence.  Once they adopted the Mookie Blaylock name, it was retroactively attached to their earliest demos and 10/22/90 show.  Then again, this thought only occurred to me today so please feel free to make a rebuttal.

Unfortunately I can't find a picture, but I believe the VHS tape of this first show was labeled something like "Gossard/Ament of Mother Love Bone new band" by whoever taped it. If I'm remembering that correctly, it does lend credence to the idea that they weren't called Mookie Blaylock for that first show. 

pleatherman

Youkan Fakoff said:

Ok, I've got a question ❓ Who are the female voices singing on "Don't Gimme No Lip?

There are a few others I can't think of off hand, but I've always wondered who it was on the various tracks

I wish i knew but I don't.  In fact, to give you an idea of how much I don't know, until reading a recent career-spanning interview with Jack Irons, I never realized Eddie is singing on "The Color Red" (a.k.a. Red Dot, Small Mosquito, Untitled, Red Bar).  That's okay, it only took me 24 years.
https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-features/jack-irons-interview-pearl-jam-red-hot-chili-peppers-joe-strummer-1339166/

"Tell me about “The Color Red.”
That’s another one from my four-track recordings that I did at home. I started with some drum pattern that I slowed down, sped up, and did some stuff on it. I was always trying to get my mine in. I was always trying to get whatever I was doing to be part of the band. They were very good about that, about indulging me. You’ve got five guys and everyone had a creative spark. That was one of them. It somehow came out as a good little interlude, and Eddie came up with a vocal for it. That’s really how that happened."

Tremorman

PJ family member with one of the most interesting and crazy discographies could be Matt's wife April Cameron who plays cello

She's played on

Pearl Jam - Binaural
Soundgarden - Superunknown and Badmotorfinger
Alice in Chains - Jar of Flies

Also  some Jeff solo stuff and Wellwater Conspiracy among lots of other things.

pleatherman

This might not be obscure now because Jeff and Stone just mentioned it on the Yield 25th anniversary Sirius special.  But I will document it regardless since those episodes are not available for long. 

While Jeff and Stone discussed who plays bass on the studio version of "Do The Evolution" (it's Stone), they revealed the bass player on Vitalogy's "Satan's Bed" is Eddie.

As for the Yield anniversary, perhaps now would be a good time to release the SVT Director's cut?  If it can be anything like the original concept described in Deep issue 15, that would be spectacular.

Mark Pellington:  While they were rehearsing the songs from “Yield,” the idea was, let’s make a 16-millimeter film and release it in theaters, kind of like “The Last Waltz” captured The Band. It would be about the process of rehearsing and have interviews with the band; a very no-holds barred, fly-on-the-wall, warts-and-all film about their process. I remember Cameron said I should direct it. He did the interviews, and I captured all the machinations of the rehearsal sessions. It was a documentary, but fixed in their studio space. It was very revealing about their personal history and infighting. They were going to let it all out and not withhold anything.  There was a long rough cut and Cameron was overseeing more of the edit, because my film “Arlington Road” got green-lit at the end of 1997 and started shooting in the spring of 1998...  Ultimately, they opted to withdraw a bit from the full-frontal, revelatory nature of it, and it became a 48-minute rockumentary-style home video. The idea of it being theatrical got pushed aside...  It still had the same songs and interviews, but it was a little more compressed, like a rockumentary would be.

Lost In Ohio

Lost In Ohio said:

simonster80 wrote:

Pearl Jam hold a guinness world record for "most simultaneous entries in an album chart in U.S.A"

7 entries beating their previous record of 5 entering the U.S top 200 chart in the one week . this occured on 17 march 2001

the entries were apart of their bootlegs released at that time

Seeing as they released all those shows at once, it might be a long time until that record is broken!

I posted that back on page 6 in December of 2013.

Lost In Ohio

majleap3 said:

On it's 1993 40-city tour, Pearl Jam lowered it's ticket prices to $18 -- over the objections of concert promoters who urged the band to charge up to three times that amount -- and negotiated lower commissions from T-shirt and souvenir vendors. The result, in the case of T-shirts, was a price lowered from $23 to $18. Promoters estimate the total loss to the band in ticket and merchandise revenues for the '93 tour alone at around $2 million

Compare that to the 2010 prices which were, what, around $80?

That's a great way to make a lot of fans.

Ledbetterman10

pleatherman said:

While Jeff and Stone discussed who plays bass on the studio version of "Do The Evolution" (it's Stone), they revealed the bass player on Vitalogy's "Satan's Bed" is Eddie.

The most shocking PJ revelation in years. Not since I found the Stupid Mop source material was I so shocked. 

pleatherman

This video could be of interest if you are the type of fan that likes to hear every song written by Stone, mindful of aquatic habitats, or perhaps just wanted to know what it might be like to go out to dinner with him.  Documented around the time he almost released a 2nd solo album in 2008, which was partially salvaged for 2013's Moonlander.  Barb Ireland is also featured on tracks from both Moonlander and the shelved 2008 record.  

Oh yeah, this one's called "Salmon Song." https://youtu.be/rHyWHl22ti8  

And here is some background about that night and others, plus more videos.  http://www.songsforeatinganddrinking.com/