Pearl Jam & Grape Jam
As we prepare to bring in our first fruit next week (maybe Monday & Tuesday as it’s looking now…) I’ve been loading up the iPhone with tunes and playlists for crush. I am unabashedly in love with the new Pearl Jam album “Backspacer” – easily their best work since the first two albums, imho. The track “Just Breathe” is a masterpiece that has been on endless repeat here for most of the day…
In one of my previous incarnations, I was an executive at Epic Records, during the time we signed the band and launched their groundbreaking first record. One of of my proudest posessions is my 5X-Platinum award for their debut album “Ten” (the album has gone on to sell over 15 million at last count, btw.)
It’s a bizarre and unlikely connection and history for me. Singer Eddie Vedder’s real father, who he never knew, was a close “friend of the family” when I was growing up in Chicago. His dad was very close to my mom – who was in her 70s when I took her backstage to see Pearl Jam in 1993 in New Orleans. It was a classic rock & roll moment I’ll never forget – her pushing his hair out of his face and instructing Eddie to “look at me when I’m talking to you” and telling him that he was a “handsome young man who looked so much like his father.” Eddie ended up spending that night in New Orleans Central Lockup after getting into some kind of trouble in the French Quarter – don’t know if it was my mom that pushed him over the edge or what…
At any rate, kudos to Eddie and the boys for a brilliant piece of work (which debuted at #1 this week, btw.) It will be inspiring me on the sorting line throughout crush and beyond…
