Pearl Jam
Live At The Garden

THE REVIEW

Roskilde 2000 is just a memory, a bad memory, and Pearl Jam chase it away by remembering those kids who just wanted to listen to music, the same music that echoes at Madison Square Garden in New York City.

Boom Gaspar's organ introduces "Love Boat Captain" and opens a concert that will end up on this double DVD to testify what the PJ are in 2003. The adrenaline rises when the band starts with "Last Exit", almost as if to apologize for starting slowly, without singing at the top of their lungs but in a hushed and almost whispered way. Eddie Vedder is not at his best, the beautiful "In My Tree" shows how his voice sometimes wanes, falters, suffers on the higher notes, but who cares? Classics like "Even Flow", where the grit is the same as fifteen years ago, can only leave you enchanted.

McCrady enjoys himself in pentatonic, Vedder drinks wine from the bottle, Cameron pounds on the drum skins like a madman and then you really start to have fun, along with them. "I Am Mine and Low Light" are a winning pair in arenas and auditoriums, and "Wishlist", with an emotional play of lights, turns the MSQ into a high school prom. If the first part of the show is a mix of slow and fast, the second part is full of surprises. In the choir of "..Don't call me daughter.." a great like Ben Harper joins in, accompanying Eddie in a wonderful "Indifference". Steve Diggle is as happy as a child while he picks up the guitar and plays "Baba O'Riley", but after all, who wouldn't be? Obviously, not all their concerts will have guests like in New York City, but what matters is listening to Pearl Jam play live like they've always done and hearing them close with "Yellow Ledbetter" with the lights on, the singer exhausted, and the audience gathered around a single stage, singing the same words… endlessly.

"...to me, because I need it."