March 6th, 2003 - Nagoyashi Kokaido: Nagoya, Japan

set: Given To Fly, Last Exit, Brain of J, Insignificance, Even Flow, Love Boat Captain, I Am Mine, Get Right, MFC, Improv, Immortality, You Are, Light Years, Green Disease, Daughter, Lukin, Spin The Black Circle, Save You
enc 1: Bushleaguer, Whipping, Better Man, Footsteps, Crazy Mary, Down, Rearviewmirror
enc 2: You've Got to Hide Your Love Away, Alive, Yellow Ledbetter, Rockin' in the Free World

Notes: After a three-week tour that included many highlights from Australia and Japan, the Far East Leg of the Riot Act World Tour was coming to a close with the last of the 15-date schedule. The run was passionate and energetic; a new lease on life for a band that has aged not just with grace, but also with purpose. This tour provided proof positive that the band, and its music, is still relevant today, and can still be played with the power and passion that they delivered in their sets throughout their great careers in this band. Pearl Jam fans will remember such dates as the Adelaide show, the first in a string of shows that must go down as some of their greatest. That run also included a three-night stand at Melbourne, a climactic show in Perth, not to mention historic nights in Tokyo and Osaka. While it wasn’t a long ride, it was most assuredly an intense ride, and tonight’s show was their send off to that side of the world.
The show started in an unexpected manner, with the opening notes to none other than “Given to Fly”. While I am normally a fan of the more mellow opener, which always gives you a feeling like you are on a boat, about to set sail, with this being the time you get to adjust to the circumstances that you are faced with (of course in a good way), the way this song actually builds works well for a Pearl Jam opener.

Now, it was on to the set, with the rockers coming in like lightning bolts of energy. “Last Exit”, “Brain of J”, “Insignificance”, and “Even Flow” were played one right after the other, each serving notice that the band had really found their groove, and that this run in Japan was no fluke. Once, again, McCready is on fire, and the band is just feeding off the heat from the flames. “Love Boat Captain” and “I Am Mine” then slow it down a little bit, while the band just continues to stay in fine form.

From there, they took a few chances, which frankly, did not work well for them. They have been struggling with playing a few of the new songs off Riot Act live, and the first of these, which they attempted to bring to life, was “Get Right”. Unfortunately, it doesn’t work well with the live Pearl Jam experience, and the band caught itself making mistakes and just blowing the song. After this, they rebounded well with “MFC”, and then went into an improvisational session, which was really interesting and neat. It sort of had the feel of “Interstellar Overdrive” by Pink Floyd, but not quite. It was a bit trippy, and sounded really nice. From there, they went right into “Immortality”, in which the band sounded a bit tired in the beginning, but turned the song into something special once they started to jam out the middle-to-end pieces of the song. From there, they went into strong performances of “You Are”, and “Light Years”. After that came the next failure from the band’s new catalog additions, “Green Disease”. For some reason, the band sounds great at capturing the energy, but consistently struggles through the song, particularly Vedder, who keeps forgetting the words to the song. This is definitely a song with potential, but one they will have to work on in rehearsals before bringing it back in the North American Tour next month.

From there, the show really seemed to pick up, with a wonderful version of “Daughter”, which featured Vedder emoting his typical moans for a tag. After that, the band closed out the set with very energetic, and seamless segues from “Lukin”, “Spin the Black Circle”, and “Save You”; All strong performances, and a good end to a good first set.

The band came out for its encore in a manner typical of this tour, with “Bushleaguer”. Sounding as good as it has in the past week, the band continued to perform this song well live, and went into “Whipping” to follow after Mike teased the audience with the opening bars to “Hunger Strike”. From there, they went into “Better Man”, and followed that up with the first pseudo-rare song from their catalog, “Footsteps”. It was the second time it was played on this World Tour, and it sounded wonderful. From there, they went right into “Crazy Mary” a song that has vastly improved since the addition of Kenneth “Boom” Gaspar on Hammond B-3. The band continued on with the onslaught of b-sides with “Down”, the b-side off the “I Am Mine” single. Finally, they closed out the first encore with a strong performance of concert staple “Rearviewmirror”.

After a few minutes, the Eddie Vedder came back out with a harmonica and guitar in hand, and played the Beatles cover “You’ve Got to Hide Your Love Away” live in front of a Pearl Jam audience for the first time. Other than a few typical Vedder mistakes, the song was nice, and very unexpected. After that, Vedder lead the crowd in the singing of “Happy Birthday” for Jeff Ament, for which was the significance of the day. Then, the band finished off the evening with essentially three closers, or at least three songs that were more than worthy of being the closer for the evening. First, they played an energetic and powerful version of “Alive”, which has really taken on a life of its own live since they brought it back to the sets. That was followed by the typical Pearl Jam show closer, “Yellow Ledbetter”, the b-side turned radio hit. But rather than leave stage and call it an evening, they played one more, and closed their spectacular Far East Tour with the fitting Neil Young cover, “Rockin’ in the Free World”. This is another song that has taken on new life with Boom on keys, and McCready left the show the way that he opened this tour, on pure fire, with unbelievable passion and energy for what he was playing.
Next, it is on to North America, mostly the United States. If the shows match the intensity and power of the shows out in Australia and Japan, we are going to have some lucky fans on this side of the planet. We already have plenty of lucky fans on the other side of the globe.

Cropduster Grade: A-