Pearl Jam digs deep, keeps it real

BY RICK MASSIMO
Journal Staff Writer

MANSFIELD, Mass. -- Pearl Jam frontman Eddie Vedder announced from the stage at the Tweeter Center last night that the band had prepared 105 songs for its current tour, and that therefore it would not repeat a song in the three Mansfield shows it has in the next week. How many bands can say that? How many bands would, even if they could?

As Pearl Jam's radio play and sales clout have diminished from the days of their multi-platinum debut, 1991's Ten, its artistic stature and the devotion of its fan base has increased.

Vedder opened the evening by playing "Dead Man Walking" solo and introducing the Buzzcocks.

In slightly more than two hours, the band ran though its extensive catalog, playing songs off the latest album, Riot Act, but also stretching back to "Even Flow," from Ten. From the beginning of the opener, "Oceans," the audience was in the palm of their hands.

Singer Eddie Vedder was much more animated than on the group's latest album, Riot Act, on which he seems to drag down the musical energy. He still has the I'm-not-quite-sure-what-I'm-doing-here stage presence, but it soon turns compellingly awkward. Drummer Matt Cameron, along with Vedder and guitarist Mike McCready, provided the visual thrust, while bassist Jeff Ament and guitarist Stone Gossard seemed virtually uninvolved by comparison. Cameron's song, the driving "Get Right," was one of the night's highlights.

Alternating overdriven rock songs with artistically fractured power ballads, Pearl Jam played only a few songs from Riot Act, and spent very little time on stage patter. The group paused only for Vedder to explain the no-repeat policy, make an anti-war, pro-troops statement, make some semi-obscene comments about Celine Dion and praise opening act the Buzzcocks. None of the which-side-of-the-audience-can-clap-the-loudest rock-concert business. No plugging of the radio single. No compact 45-minute set where you can predict where the slow song is coming. If Pearl Jam occasionally wandered on its journey last night, it was refreshing to see someone try.

They occasionally fell into imitating their imitators with light-switch dynamics, and you couldn't always figure out exactly what Vedder was quite so worked up about. But it was still refreshing to see a good old-fashioned musical performance. When so few musical acts are taking the music (as opposed to themselves) seriously, we need more Pearl Jams, not fewer.

The first encore began with the beautiful "Thumbing My Way," from Riot Act, and included the chestnut "Leaving Here."

In the second encore, after a ukulele solo, Vedder donned a George W. Bush mask and wrapped himself in an American flag for "bu$hleaguer," the controversial song from Riot Act ("Born on third, thinks he got a triple.") It's hardly the strongest song on the album, more of a shaggy-dog imitation of talking blues. Rather than impaling the Bush mask on the microphone stand, a move that's gotten him into hot water in earlier shows on the tour, Vedder tossed it into the audience, then finished up with a Neil Young song with an unprintable title.

God bless the Buzzcocks. They make me smile, and they should be standard-bearers for unrepentant, stick-in-the-mud 1977-era punk rock in a time when it's become just another musical commodity.

Pearl Jam plays Tweeteer again tonight. They play again July 11, with Sleater-Kinney opening.