Music Review: Pearl Jam Live at Benaroya Hall

So having been paid this weekend, I took the chance to actually buy something when I was grazing at Circuit city this weekend. I spied a brightly colored Pearl Jam bootleg. I've been a Pearl Jam fan since minute one (part and parcel of living in the Pacific Northwest). I had remembered reading about this show online.

Yes, it's another Pearl Jam live album. But no, it's not like their other 700 brown paper bag live albums. For one thing, it's an intimate, unplugged, home-town performance, almost full of rarer melodic songs. The most mainstream Pearl Jam song they play that night is "Daughter". For another, the set list is geared toward mellower, moodier fare like Low Light, Think Air and Immortality. For a third thing, the band had just recorded "Man of the Hour" for the Big Fish soundtrack a few days before and debuted the song publicly for the first time at this show. And for a fourth, part of the proceeds goes to charity.

The recording is truly excellent (better than the most recent DMB live at the gorge CD set I bought), the setlist is the most unique Pearl Jam has ever played, and on the whole, it's a remarkable musical performance. It's been fun to just buy this off the cuff and end up with an honestly incredible live CD set. This show goes instantly into my top 3 of live CD recordings, right with Dave Matthews Live @ Luther College and the Counting Crows VH1 Storytellers show. It's really that good.

So out of the 700 live Pearl Jam official bootlegs, this recording is a singular and unique experience. If you like Pearl Jam at all, buy this CD. It's that damn good.