Pearl Jam is a Grammy Award-winning American rock band, formed in Seattle, Washington, and considered one of the most influential bands of the 1990s.Founded in 1990, Pearl Jam was one of the "Big Four" bands of the grunge movement,alongside Nirvana, Alice in Chains and Soundgarden. As of December 2006, Pearl Jam has sold over 31 million records in the U.S. alone.Pearl Jam is one of the few currently active bands from the alternative rock breakthrough of the early 1990s.

In a 2005 USA Today readers poll, Pearl Jam was voted the greatest American rock band of all time.In April 2006, Pearl Jam was awarded an Esky for best live act in Esquire's Esky Music Awards. The blurb called Pearl Jam "the rare superstars who still play as though each show could be their last."

Pearl Jam's history starts with the seminal grunge band Green River, which formed in 1984 out of a number of earlier Seattle bands. Green River included Stone Gossard (of March of Crimes and the Ducky Boys), Jeff Ament (of Deranged Diction), Mark Arm (of Mr. Epp and the Calculations, Spluii Numa, The Limp Richerds, and later Mudhoney), Steve Turner (of Mr. Epp and the Calculations, The Limp Richerds, Ducky Boys, and later Mudhoney), and drummer Alex Vincent. Green River toured and recorded to moderate success but disbanded in 1987. Green River was one of the first significant bands of the Seattle "grunge" genre and Arm is often credited as having coined the term.

In late 1987, Gossard and Ament had begun playing with Malfunkshun vocalist Andrew Wood, eventually organizing the band Mother Love Bone. Through 1988 and 1989, Mother Love Bone recorded and toured to increasing interest and found the support of the PolyGram record label, which signed the band in early 1989. Their debut album, Apple was released in July of 1990, six months after Wood died of a heroin overdose.

With the disintegration of Mother Love Bone in 1990, Ament and Gossard set out to create their next band. They recruited former Shadow guitarist Mike McCready and began playing recreationally as a trio. During this time, Soundgarden frontman Chris Cornell had written two songs as a tribute to Wood. Gossard, Ament and McCready agreed to help record the tracks. The project was called Temple of the Dog, after a lyric from the Mother Love Bone song "Man of Golden Words".

With the help of Soundgarden drummer Matt Cameron, the group began recording a number of songs, many of which would eventually be re-worked into demos for the future Gossard/Ament/McCready band. One such song by Gossard wound up as both a Pearl Jam song, "Footsteps", and a Temple of the Dog track, "Times of Trouble".

The trio began looking for a singer and a drummer and found former Red Hot Chili Peppers drummer Jack Irons. The trio gave Irons a 5-song demo to see if he would be interested in joining the band and to distribute to anyone he felt might fit the singing bill. Irons passed on the invitation but gave the demo to his basketball buddy, San Diego singer Eddie Vedder, during a hiking trip. Vedder had been the lead vocalist for a San Diego band, Bad Radio and worked part time at a gas station. As legend has it, Vedder listened to the tape shortly before going surfing. While he was out in the water, the music played in his head and the lyrics came to him. He rushed back and went to his girlfriend's house, who, at that time, had a cassette player with a built in mike. There, in one flurry of creativity, he recorded the vocals to three of the songs ("Alive", "Once", and "Footsteps"). The songs were what Vedder would later describe as a mini-opera. They formed a story of incest, madness, and murder that became known to fans as the "Mamasan trilogy". He sent the tape with his vocals back to the three Seattle musicians, who were so impressed that they had Vedder fly to Seattle. Vedder and the band hit it off, with Eddie even adding lead vocals to a Temple of the Dog song, "Hunger Strike". With the addition of Dave Krusen on drums, their first official show (as "Mookie Blaylock") was performed at the Off Ramp, a now-defunct Seattle club, on October 22, 1990.

1991–1995

The group was known (and actually toured) for a time as Mookie Blaylock, the name taken from the former All-Star basketball player for the Atlanta Hawks. Concerns about trademark issues arising from using an athlete's full name in an unrelated effort necessitated a change after the group was signed to Epic Records. On March 10, 1991, while appearing on Seattle radio station KISW's New Music Hour, Ed and Jeff announced that the band had changed their name to "Pearl Jam."

Pearl Jam's drummer, Dave Krusen, left the band shortly before the launch of their debut album Ten. He was replaced by Matt Chamberlain, who had previously played with Edie Brickell & New Bohemians. After playing only a handful of shows—one of which was filmed for the "Alive" video—Chamberlain left to join the Saturday Night Live band. Chamberlain suggested a drummer named Dave Abbruzzese as his replacement. Abbruzzese joined the group and played the rest of Pearl Jam's live shows supporting the Ten album and continued to record with the band for the next two albums.

Released on August 27, 1991, Pearl Jam's debut album Ten (named for Mookie Blaylock's jersey number) contains 11 tracks dealing with dark subjects like depression, suicide, loneliness, and murder. The album produced four hit songs: "Even Flow", "Alive", "Jeremy", and "Black". Many interpreted "Alive" as an inspirational anthem due to its decidedly uplifting instrumentals and chorus. Vedder has since revealed that the song tells the semi-biographical tale of a son discovering that his father is actually his step-father, while his mother’s grief turns her to sexually embrace her son, who strongly resembles the biological father.The song "Jeremy" and its accompanying video were inspired by a true story in which a high school student shot himself in front of his classmates.The video for "Jeremy" was put into heavy rotation by MTV and became a huge hit. Ten stayed on the Billboard charts for more than two years. The album has gone on to become one of the biggest-selling rock records ever, going duodecuple (12x) platinum.

As mentioned above, Ten dealt with dark subject matter but is almost universally considered to be a high water-mark of the early 1990s alternative rock sound, with Vedder's unusually deep and strong (and later much imitated) voice alternating between solidity and vibrato against the unrestrained, guitar-heavy, pure rock sound that harkened back to Led Zeppelin and other rock bands of the 1970s, eschewing any hint of the muted electronic sound associated with the 1980s. Ten is generally considered to be an exemplary album of the early 1990s.

With the success of Ten, Pearl Jam became a key member of the Seattle grunge explosion, along with Nirvana, Alice in Chains, and Soundgarden. Nirvana's Kurt Cobain angrily attacked Pearl Jam in interviews because he saw them as commercial sell outs.Cobain later reconciled with Vedder, and they reportedly became friends.

Pearl Jam toured relentlessly in support of Ten. In 1992, they made television appearances on Saturday Night Live and MTV Unplugged and took a slot on that summer's Lollapalooza tour, joining other bands such as the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Soundgarden, and Ministry, among others. In Europe they appeared at the well-known Pinkpop Festival in the Netherlands. This concert became legendary when Eddie Vedder jumped from a TV-camera-mast right into the crowd. After the touring for Ten was completed, the band set to work making their sophomore album.

Stone Gossard, Jeff Ament, and Eddie Vedder appeared in the 1992 film Singles directed by Cameron Crowe. The film's events were set against the backdrop of Seattle and the grunge movement. Stone, Jeff, and Ed had small parts as members of a band called Citizen d**k which they had actually filmed when Pearl Jam was still known as Mookie Blaylock. Pearl Jam contributed two songs to the film's soundtrack, "State of Love and Trust" and "Breath".

At the 1993 MTV Video Music Awards Pearl Jam received four awards for their video for "Jeremy," including Video of the Year and Best Group Video. The band capped off the award show by joining their idol Neil Young to perform his song "Rockin' in the Free World". Some consider the performance to be one of the most memorable moments in the award show's history.

Released on October 19, 1993, Pearl Jam's second album Vs. set a record for copies sold in the first week of release (950,000). It has since gone septuple (7x) platinum. Vs. included the hit songs "Daughter", "Dissident", "Go", "Rearviewmirror", and "Animal". "Daughter" reached the #1 spot on both the Billboard Modern Rock and Mainstream Rock charts, spending a total of eight weeks on the latter. Vs. was originally titled Five Against One (taken from the lyrics of "Animal"), but was changed to Vs. shortly before release of the album. Some early pressings labelled with the Five Against One title are valuable. The band made a conscious decision beginning with the release of Vs. to scale back their commercial efforts.They declined to produce music videos after the massive success of "Jeremy" and opted to give fewer interviews as well as make fewer television appearances.

Pearl Jam was deeply affected by the death of Nirvana frontman and grunge pioneer Kurt Cobain. At the band's April 8, 1994 concert in Fairfax, Virginia, Eddie Vedder proclaimed, "I don't think any of us would be in this room tonight if it weren't for Kurt Cobain."On April 16, 1994, just eight days after Cobain's death, Pearl Jam gave a tribute to Cobain while appearing on Saturday Night Live. The band performed an extended version of "Daughter", with Vedder adding lines from Neil Young's "Hey Hey, My My (Into The Black)", which Cobain's alleged suicide note had quoted. In the closing credits Vedder pointed out the letter K (for Kurt) on his shirt, over his heart.

Pearl Jam cancelled their 1994 summer tour as a result of a Ticketmaster boycott. The band brought a lawsuit against the ticketing company that accused them of being a monopoly whose anticompetitive practices allowed markup prices of more than 30%. The band's intention was to get ticket prices lowered for their fans. Following the lawsuit, the band chose to use alternate ticketing companies and non-Ticketmaster venues for future shows.

In August of 1994, after Pearl Jam had finished the recording of their third album, drummer Dave Abbruzzese was fired "due to artistic differences", according to the band. His replacement would end up being Jack Irons, a close friend of Vedder's and the former and original drummer of the Red Hot Chili Peppers who had originally introduced Vedder to the members of Pearl Jam. Irons made his debut with Pearl Jam at Neil Young's 1994 Bridge School Benefit, but he would not be officially announced as the band's new drummer until their 1995 Self-Pollution satellite radio broadcast.

Pearl Jam's third album, Vitalogy, was released first on November 22, 1994 on vinyl and then two weeks later on December 6, 1994 on CD and cassette. The CD became the second-fastest-selling in history, with more than 877,000 units sold in its first week. It eventually achieved quintuple (5x) platinum status. Many of the songs on the album appear to be based around the pressures of fame.The song "Spin the Black Circle", an homage to vinyl records, won a Grammy Award in 1996 for Best Hard Rock Performance. Vitalogy also included the hits "Not For You", "Corduroy", "Immortality", and "Better Man". "Better Man", a song originally penned and performed by Vedder while in Bad Radio, reached #2 on the Billboard Modern Rock chart and #1 on the Billboard Mainstream Rock chart, spending a total of eight weeks on the latter.

In 1995, Pearl Jam backed longtime idol Neil Young on his album Mirror Ball. Contractual obligations prevented the use of the band's name anywhere on the album, but the members were all credited individually in the album's liner notes. Also, two songs from the sessions were left off Mirror Ball - "I Got Id" and "Long Road". These two tracks were released separately by Pearl Jam in the form of the EP Merkin Ball. This EP is considered the official companion to Young's Mirror Ball.

Pearl Jam's popularity began to decline over the next few years. This would first be evident with the release of their fourth album, No Code. Released on August 27, 1996, exactly five years after the release of Ten, No Code represented a deliberate break from Ten's anthemic stadium sound, favoring experimental ballads and noisy garage rockers. Although the album debuted at #1, it quickly fell down the charts. No Code included the singles "Hail, Hail", "Who You Are", and "Off He Goes". It stood out with its emphasis on subtle harmony ("Off He Goes"), eastern influences ("Who You Are"), and spoken word ("I'm Open").

As with Vitalogy, very little touring was done to promote No Code because of the band's refusal to play in Ticketmaster's venue areas. Nevertheless, they toured the US playing epic shows such as Randall's Island and The Meadows in Hartford. A European tour followed in the fall of 1996. Memorable shows included the worldwide broadcast of "Checkpoint Charlie" from Berlin and an Ed Vedder solo show in Rome backed by some friends on bass and drums. During that show, Eddie premiered Yield´s "MFC" among others.

On February 3, 1998, Pearl Jam released its fifth album, Yield. The album was proclaimed as a return to the band's early, straightforward rock sound but was Pearl Jam's first album not to peak at #1 in the Billboard charts since Ten in 1991. Yield debuted at #2 but like No Code soon began dropping down the charts. However, the album did go platinum in the US, selling 1,500,000 copies. Yield included the singles "Given to Fly" and "Wishlist". The band hired famed comic book artist Todd McFarlane to create an animated video for the song "Do the Evolution" from the album. It was their first music video since 1992. The music documentary Single Video Theory, released on DVD, follows the making of Yield.