Review & setlist: Pearl Jam makes a welcome return to Fenway Park with a burly mix of new and old

Boston witnessed a truly memorable show Sunday night with a teary-eyed frontman, rarely performed songs, and a tambourine-playing John Krasinski.

It’s been a long time since Pearl Jam last performed in Boston — fans may have even wondered if frontman Eddie Vedder and co. would ever come back. On Sunday however, the band returned for the first time in six years to Fenway Park for a 2.5-hour show that brought rarely performed songs, a teary-eyed frontman, and guitar solos that lit up the crowd. If we are in fact nearing Pearl Jam’s retirement, Boston witnessed a truly memorable show Sunday night from a band with an epic career. They looked and sounded better than ever.

There were appropriate Boston and sports mentions: Frontman Eddie Vedder wore his Dark Matter World Tour uniform: a Chicago Bears Walter Payton No. 34 jersey, also the number of years the band has been performing. He shared his own Tim Wakefield story, dedicating “Just Breathe” to the late Red Sox pitcher and his late wife Stacy. Bassist Jeff Ament donned a Larry Bird graphic T-shirt, and later changed into a Jayson Tatum jersey. Organist Boom Gaspar wore a yellow Boston Strong jersey. At one point, lead guitarist Mike McCready riffed the beginning of an Aerosmith song, later wearing a t-shirt of the band, paying tribute to one of our hometown favorites.

The 26-song setlist covered a range of their early hits and latest tracks from the April release of “Dark Matter.” Here are a few memorable highlights of Pearl Jam’s Fenway Park show on Sept. 15:

Eddie Vedder shared an emotional story about late friend Chris Cornell.

Before performing “In My Tree,” frontman Eddie Vedder brought the entire stadium to a standstill when he delivered an emotional story about climbing a tree with late friend Chris Cornell of Soundgarden. Vedder said he had not planned to share these details, and forgot why he was even telling it to a Boston audience. In recent years, he’s been more vocal about Cornell, who died by suicide in 2017. When Vedder revisited the tree a few weeks ago, he choked up recalling a moment when he heard a voice say, “It’s OK.” After the song, he told the audience: “I remember now, we called the tree the Green Monster.”

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Vedder dusted off rarely performed songs.

Pearl Jam is known to frequently change the set list for their shows, but the audience was treated to two lesser performed songs Sunday night.

First, we might want to thank Ted Nugent for getting Vedder riled up enough to play “Glorified G” Sunday night. “We love him,” Vedder told the audience. “But I said recently I didn’t own a firearm and don’t want to,” he added. At a recent show in Baltimore, the band performed a reimagined, anti-gun version of Nugent’s “Stranglehold,” which prompted a response on X from the pro-gun conservative musician.

Maybe Vedder tried to end the beef Sunday night, but he went on to perform “Jeremy” and “Glorified G,” a song inspired by another disagreement Vedder had with former drummer Dave Abbruzzese. “Glorified G” is a vocally challenging song for Vedder. He’d even declined to play it during a Howard Stern interview in April. It’s worth noting here the 59-year-old singer crushed the vocals throughout the evening.

Second, the band debuted “Blood,” from their 1993 album “Vs.,” for the first time in the Dark Matter tour. The performance had some notable stops and starts and Vedder said afterward, “We did not practice that.” To his credit, the band dusted it off after not having performed the song since their last visit to Boston in 2018.

Guitar solos were a show on their own.

If concertgoers left with only a few memories of Sunday night, one of them was certainly Mike McCready ripping a minutes-long guitar solo above his head during “Even Flow.”

“I like this part of the night. It’s like releasing an animal out of his cage,” Vedder said ahead of McCready.

Another hypnotizing solo moment came from Stone Gossard during the cover of Neil Young’s “Rockin’ in the Free World.”

The encore featured a Neil Young cover, tambourines, and John Krasinski.

Our readers have said Pearl Jam’s 2016 and 2018 shows at Fenway were some of the best the venue has ever had. Reader Ben in Brighton said of both, “They rocked through the curfew and kept playing another 30 minutes after the lights came on.”

On Sunday, the band turned the house lights on for the last few encore songs, illuminating a packed stadium and celebratory moments when tambourines were tossed into the crowd and passed around to celebrities and notable figures on stage — spotted were Vedder’s daughter, Olivia, and actor/director John Krasinksi. Reddit users are still trying to figure out the other celebrities up there. (Take a look at the video below — who do you think was chatting with Krasinski?)

The weaker parts of the evening were relatively minor and infrequent. When the live camera wasn’t filming the band or the crowd, a visualizer accompanied songs from the “Dark Matter” album, which felt reminiscent of an early 2000s Windows Media Player. There were also a couple pauses during “Rearviewmirror” and “Just Breathe” when Vedder checked in on nearby fans that may have appeared to be in some kind of physical distress. Crowd surges and distressed audience members certainly aren’t a new phenomenon — though after the 2000 Roskilde Festival tragedy in Denmark, it’s not surprising Vedder was quick to twice pause the show.

Opener Glen Hansard played a 45-minute set, which included a performance from Olivia Vedder singing “My Father’s Daughter.” It was Hansard’s first time performing at Fenway Park, and he returned on stage for Pearl Jam’s encore.

The band will play Fenway Park again on Tuesday, Sept. 17.

Setlist for Pearl Jam at Fenway Park — Sept. 16, 2024

1. Footsteps
2. Release
3. Given to Fly
4. Hail, Hail
5. Corduroy
6. Scared of Fear
7. React, Respond
8. Down
9. In My Tree
10. Wreckage
11. Even Flow
12. Dark Matter
13. Do the Evolution
14. Glorified G
15. Jeremy
16. Something Special
17. Rearviewmirror

Encore:

1. Just Breathe
2. Song of Good Hope
3. Blood
4. Better Man
5. Setting Sun
6. State of Love and Trust
7. Alive
8. Rockin’ in the Free World (Neil Young cover)
9. Yellow Ledbetter