  Pearl Jam hail from Seattle and
consists of Eddie Vedder (vocals), Stone
Gossard (guitar), Mike McCready (guitar),
Jeff Ament (bass), and Dave Krusen, replaced
by Dave Abbruzzese who was later replaced by
Jack Irons. Pearl Jam has been credited by
fans and critics as bring credibility back to
alternative rock in the 90s. By delivering
pure rock with an alternative edge, the band
has become one of the most respected rock
bands in the world, and also one of the
catalysts for what is now known as
"grunge rock."
 The origins of Pearl Jam began
in Seattle when Gossard and Ament belonged to
a hard rock band named Green River. In 1988,
the 2 joined up with Andrew Wood and Jeff
Turner to form Mother Love Bone
which released 2 LPs by 1990. After Wood
overdosed on heroin, and Mother Love Bone as
a band was no more, Gossard brought in
McCready and Krusen, and eventually Vedder -
and Pearl Jam was formed. The band's name was
created in honor of Vedder's Aunt Pearl's
homemade preserves.
 Pearl Jam's debut LP, Ten was released.
 # 172
Singles Artist of the Year
Ten sold moderately at
first but really took off in 19'92 on the
strength of the tracks "Evenflow,"
"Alive," "Black," and the
classic "Jeremy." Fans hungry for
pure, hard rock with intense lyrics and an
angry facade had found their band. Pearl Jam
found success with rock and alternative radio
and delivered videos that were heavily
rotated on MTV. The band also gained in
popularity when the toured with Lollapalooza
and showed that they were even stronger in
concert - as demonstrated with their 18-month
tour.
 Ten was certified gold.
Ten was certified
platinum.
 Ten was certified 2x
platinum.
Ten was certified 3x
platinum.
The video for "Alive"
was nominated for a MTV Video Music
Award for Best Alternative Video.
 # 96
Singles Artist of the Year
 Ten was certified 4x
platinum.
Pearl Jam won 2
American Music
Awards for Favorite Pop/Rock New Artist and Favorite New Heavy Metal/Hard
Rock Artist.
Pearl Jam were nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Hard Rock Performance ("Jeremy"),
and Vedder and Ament were nominated for Best Rock Song (songwriter)
("Jeremy").
 Ten was certified 5x
platinum.
The video for "Jeremy"
won 4 MTV Video Music
Awards including Video of the Year, Best Group Video, Best Metal/Hard Rock Video, and Best Direction (Mark Pellington) and
was nominated for Viewer's Choice.
 Pearl Jam's eccentric attitude
became more prominent with the release of Vs. In an effort
to continue their anti-sellout persona, the
band did not release any singles or videos
from the LP, yet the LP was a major hit with
retail and critics. Certain tracks, such as
"Daughter,"
"Dissident," "Animal,"
and "Go" did make it to radio and
became fan favorites. The LP hailed more
critical praise than their debut LP, and
introduced Abbruzzese as the band's new
drummer.
Rolling
Stone: "The 100 Top Music Videos" included
"Jeremy" at # 36
and
"Alive" at # 84.
 Vs. topped the Billboard
200 Pop Albums chart for 5 weeks.
Pearl Jam hit the Top 40 with
"Daughter."
Pearl Jam topped the Billboard
Album Rock Tracks chart for 8 weeks with
"Daughter."
 Pearl Jam topped the Billboard
Year-End Charts as the Top Pop Artist
- Duo/Group (singles & albums) and Top
Billboard 200 Album Artist - Duo/Group.
Ten was certified 6x
platinum.
 # 71
Singles Artist of the Year
Pearl Jam topped the Billboard
Modern Rock Tracks chart for a week with
"Daughter."
Vs. was certified 5x
platinum.
Pearl Jam was nominated
for 2 American Music
Awards for Favorite Pop/Rock Band/Duo/Group and Favorite Heavy Metal/Hard Rock
Artist.
 The band cancelled their summer
tour protesting the high prices of tickets
and the inability to keep their ticket costs
down. Ticketmaster was the band's main target
and they asked the U.S. Justice Department to
look into the agency's business tactics.
Gossard and Ament later testified before a
House Subcommittee on the issue of ticket
agencies. The cancellation of the tour was
also said to reflect the band's anguish over
the suicide of Nirvana's Kurt Cobain earlier
in the year. Once rivals for the same fan
base, the two bands had settled their
grievances and had become friends and
admirers of each other.
 Ten was certified 7x
platinum.
Ten was certified 8x
platinum.
Pearl Jam hit the Top 40 with
"Tremor Christ."
 Pearl Jam released Vitalogy and the LP continued
the band's multi-platinum status. A few
tracks on the LP became Top 40 hits including
"Spin The Black Circle" and "Tremor Christ" and one of the
band's biggest LP tracks, "Better Man." Rolling
Stone magazine called the LP
"excellent: ...it's a wildly uneven and
difficult record, sometimes maddening,
sometimes ridiculous, often powerful..."
Pearl Jam hit the Top 40 with
"Better Man."
Vitalogy topped the
Billboard Pop Albums chart for a week.
 # 63
Singles Artist of the Year
 Pearl Jam officially replaced
Abbruzzese with drummer, Jack Irons
(originally from the Red
Hot Chili Peppers) - Abbruzzese had been
fired by the band in late 1994. Pearl Jam's
problems with Ticketmaster continued and a
ruling handed down by the Justice Department
favored Ticketmaster.
Pearl Jam topped the Billboard
Album Rock Tracks chart for 8 weeks with
"Better Man."
Pearl Jam were nominated for an American Music
Award for Favorite Heavy Metal/Hard Rock
Artist.
Vitalogy was certified 4x
platinum.
 Pearl Jam were nominated for 2 Grammy Awards for Best Rock Vocal Performance by a
Duo or Group ("Daughter") and Best Rock Album (Vs.).
Vs. was certified 6x
platinum.
Pearl Jam toured with Neil Young and recorded with
Young on Mirror
Ball which was a moderate hit
commercially.
Ten was certified 9x
platinum.
Pearl Jam appeared at the
Redding Festival as the backing band for Neil Young.
 Vitalogy was certified 5x
platinum.
Pearl Jam hit the Top 40 with
"I Got ID."
 # 72
Singles Artist of the Year
 Pearl Jam won 2 American Music
Awards for Favorite Alternative Artist and Favorite Heavy Metal/Hard Rock
Artist.
Pearl Jam won a Grammy
Award for Best Hard Rock Performance ("Spin The Black
Circle") and were nominated for Album of the Year and Best Rock Album (Vitalogy).
The single
"Merkinball" was certified gold.
 Pearl Jam released No
Code which showed a slowing in the
sales and much less interest than previous
LPs. Some feel that Pearl Jam's tendency to
take themselves too seriously may have
hampered their fame and success. Eddie
Vedder's acceptance of awards are often laced
with derogatory comments about awards, yet he
shows up. Some critics also felt the LP was
too hard and angry - the band had been
accused of trying to imitating themselves.
Vedder's response to critical backlash and
lackluster record sales: "It's great. We
can be a little more normal now."
 Pearl Jam hit the Top 40 with
"Who You Are."
Pearl Jam topped the Billboard
Modern Rock Tracks chart for a week with
"Who You Are."
No
Code topped the Billboard Top 200
Albums chart for 2 weeks.
Ten was certified 10x
platinum.
 Pearl Jam music could also be
found on some soundtracks including Singles with
"Breath" and "State Of Love
And Trust" (1992), The
Basketball Diaries (Vedder with Jim
Carroll on "Catholic Boy") (1995), Hype! with "Not For
You" (1996) and Dead
Man Walking with "Long Road" ;
compilations such as Sweet
Relief: A Benefit For Victoria Williams with "Crazy
Mary" (1993), In
Defense Of Animals with "Porch"
(1993), Bob
Dylan: The 30th Anniversary Concert
Celebration (1993), Music
For Our Mother Ocean (MOM) with "Gremmie Out
Of Control" (1996), Home
Alive: The Art Of Self Defense with "Leaving
Here" (1996), The
Bridge School Concerts Vol. 1 with
"Nothingman" (1997), and Tibetan
Freedom Concert with "Yellow
Ledbetter" (1997); and Temple
Of The Dog by Temple Of The Dog
(1991).
 No
Code was certified platinum.
Rock
'N Roll Hall Of Fame's 500
Songs That Shaped Rock And Roll includes
"Jeremy."
Pearl Jam's guitarist, Mike
McCready reportedly broke his collarbone
playing baseball. McCready was not able to
play with the band for about 6 weeks.
Pearl Jam found their work used
in a Washington court room. The video for
Pearl Jam's hit "Jeremy" was being
equated with a teenager who killed three
people at his high school in 1996. Attorneys
for the teenager claim that their client's
life paralleled the boy depicted in the
"Jeremy" video, and has a direct
causation to the teenagers actions. In the
"Jeremy" video, the teen is
believed to kill himself at the end of the
video, and not his fellow students.
 # 104
Singles Artist of the Year
 Pearl Jam hit the Top 40 with
"Given
To Fly."
"Given
To Fly"
topped the Billboard Mainstream Rock Tracks
chart for 6 weeks.
 Pearl Jam released Yield but the new tracks
were already being spread across the
Internet. All 13 tracks of Yield were played on a New
York radio station at the beginning of
December without authorization from the band
or their record company. Portions of 5 of the
tunes were then found and subsequently
removed from a web site. The songs, along
with many other Pearl Jam songs on web sites,
are often CD quality when in a format known
as mp3. The Recording Industry Association of
America (RIAA) and several record companies
have been taking action against many Internet
sites that offer mp3s on hundreds of major
music artists throughout the year.
The first single, "Given
To Fly"
officially hit U.S. airwaves and sparked some
interest in terms of "having I heard
this before?" It has been pointed out
numerous times that the single sounds very
similar to Led
Zeppelin's "Going To
California." Jeff Ament talked with MTV
about the new LP: "I think the last
couple records, Eddie has really been at the
helm of those records. I remember at the end
of the last record, he said, 'Y'know, this
was really a lot of work for me, and next
time, it would be great if I didn't have to
work so hard on the arrangements, and if
people came in with more complete ideas, and
even more complete songs, that would really
help me out a lot,' and I think everybody
took that to heart."
 Yield was certified
platinum.
Pearl Jam announced tour dates
in North America beginning in June and
running into September. Their first tour in 2
years used local ticket agencies for a bulk
of their sales.
Basketball star, Dennis Rodman,
showed up at a Pearl Jam concert in Dallas on
stage dancing, and trying to sing with the
band for 45 minutes - much to the dismay of
many critics. Rodman was described as wearing
no shirt or shoes and drinking wine to which
Vedder said, "I'm guessing you've been
drinking for about 3 days straight."
 Pearl Jam released their first
home video: Single
Video Theory - a documentary of the
band rehearsing songs from Yield.
Pearl Jam played a benefit
concert in Washington, D.C. for Voters For
Choice (which raises funds for political
candidates who favor abortion rights). Vedder
said at the concert: "If we lived in a
world where men got pregnant but still had
the same drive and mindset, this would not be
an issue... men would not allow this kind of
oppression..."
 Pearl Jam released their first
live LP, Live
On Two Legs. The 15 live tracks were taken
from the band's Yield tour.
 # 47
Singles Artist of the Year
Pearl Jam won an American Music
Award for Favorite Alternative Artist.
 Live
On Two Legs was certified gold.
Pearl Jam was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Hard Rock Performance ("Do The
Evolution | 
