Review: Pearl Jam gets friendly on second galvanizing night in St. Paul

"Tonight is about friends," Eddie Vedder said early Saturday during Pearl Jam's second performance this week at Xcel Energy Center.

His friends like Joe Mauer, the former Twins great, who was in the audience. Friends like Bo, who had been to about 50 Pearl Jam shows but they'd finally just met. "Bo, where have you been all my life? So close," Vedder said.

Friends like Charlie, a Wisconsin youngster who recently died of epidermolysis bullosa (EB). Friends like Dr. Jakub Tolar, who leads a University of Minnesota EB research team funded in part by Vedder's family.

Instant new friends like the guy in front of the stage wearing a T-shirt emblazoned with "Pearl Jam is my drug."

Old friends like Rich Best, the former First Avenue booker who hired Pearl Jam and its members' other bands like Mother Love Bone into 7^th Street Entry and First Ave back in the day. Vedder invited Best, now an executive VP at Live Nation in Los Angeles, onstage for a handshake and a hug.

Not sure if any of the other 18,000 people at the X felt unfriended, but they sure experienced one unforgettably galvanizing night of timeless rock (no need to call it grunge anymore).

This veteran Seattle ensemble, one of the biggest bands of the 1990s, remains one of the best live rock bands touring today. These Rock Hall of Famers are so respected by their fans — many of whom wore Pearl Jam T-shirts from different tours and cities as well as new ones custom-made for St. Paul's two-night stand — that there were surprisingly few cellphones out during the performance.

Vedder, 58, was friendly, committed, passionate, compassionate, intense and physical, though not the light rigging-climbing frontman of old (he did jump off of two-foot high speakers on Saturday). The rhythm section of drummer Matt Cameron and bassist Jeff Ament (who wore a T-shirt honoring the Duluth band Low) was solid and driving, abetted by rhythm guitarist Stone Gossard. And the lead guitar work of Mike McCready was consistently heroic, elevating the tunes to new heights.

Like Thursday's opening night of PJ's first tour of 2023, Saturday's reprise lasted nearly 2 1/2 hours and featured 25 tunes, one more than the earlier gig. Five selections were repeaters — "Daughter," "Even Flow," "Porch," "Alive" and "Elderly Woman behind the Counter in a Small Town." Numbers were drawn from all 11 Pearl Jam studio albums.

Saturday's crowd was treated to three PJ classics, "Jeremy," "Better Man" and "I Am Mine," which weren't in Thursday's repertoire. Second show deep tracks included "Got Some" and "Severed Hand."

As for Saturday's covers, Pearl Jam offered Pink Floyd's "Brain Damage," Wayne Cochran's "Last Kiss" (played to the crowd behind the stage), a solo Vedder version of Tom Petty's "I Won't Back Down" (dedicated to his late friend Charlie) and a reading of Prince's "Purple Rain" — with opening act Deep Sea Diver sitting in — as the finale (the first time Pearl Jam has played it in the Purple One's home state).

After having spent a few days in the Twin Cities, Vedder got a little goofy Saturday when talking about newly legalized pot (his word) in Minnesota. He reminisced about how he and drummer Cameron used to smoke pot in San Diego "too early — in our lives and too early in the day. Back then you couldn't hurt yourself because you were getting it from a guy listening to Jimmy Buffett on the beach." Now, he said, pot is sometimes cut with harmful substances.

"Start with a little Indica," he suggested, referring to a reportedly calming marijuana strain. "And then start a group called the Indica Girls."

Some stoner jokes won't even garner laughter from friends.

Here is Saturday's set list:

Seated set

1. Pendulum

2. Elderly Woman Behind the Counter in a Small Town

3. Off He Goes

4. Nothing as It Seems

5. Daughter

Standing set

6. Do the Evolution

7. Last Exit

8. Once

9. Who Ever Said

10. Brain Damage

11. I Am Mine

12. Take the Long Way

13. Even Flow

14. Severed Hand

15. In Hiding

16. Unthought Known

17. Corduroy

18. Porch

Encore

19. I Won't Back Down

20. Last Kiss

21. Got Some

22. Jeremy

23. Better Man

24. Alive

25. Purple Rain