Set List: Corduroy, Brain of J, Hail Hail, Animal, Dissident, Given To Fly, MFC, Habit, Wishlist, Even Flow, Daughter/(Surrender by Cheap Trick), In Hiding, Jeremy, State of Love and Trust, Nothingman, Better Man, Leatherman, Alive; 1st Encore: Immortality, Rearviewmirror, Last Exit, I Got Shit/(Cinnamon Girl by Neil Young), Black, Do The Evolution; 2nd Encore: Yellow Ledbetter

Dan (dan@bigwave.ca):
Well, it was alot better than the Maple Leaf gardens show a few years back. The band is having alot more fun this time around and it shows.

The show started at 8:05pm on a very upbeat kinda tune in Corduroy. I was thinking they'd open with Release or maybe Sometimes but nope, they guys surprised me, and caught the pit in front of me off guard too! The next 4 songs kept building to one of the bands high points of the show, that being Given To Fly. Before the song started, Eddie simply stated that he "really likes this one" and you could tell.

Interesting to note that during the part in Habit that says "speaking of a child of the 90's" was changed for today as " ummmmm speaking as a dumbass, beer drinking, propaganda believing, missile shooting, american." Hmmmmm. Later he went on to say that the doomsday clock has been moved up and said "you people dont know what that means do you?!.. it means were all gonna die fuckers!!!".. freakin funny it was!

For SOLAT, Eddie said that Mike has a special guest for this song, but I didn't see anybody! (?) Oh Well, it was good anyway! (BTW) Mike has his hair bleached again. Even Flow was a clincher. The band played this song like they did 6 years ago. Way to go boys!

On to the "man" series. Nothingman... what a surprise. Better Man... always a pleaser. Leatherman... another great highlight... during this one Eddie addresses the crowd and says that next time around the band will play 3 or 4 shows in smaller venues. Sounds good to me man!

My fav of the evening would have had to be Do The Evolution. I know I'm jumping over some songs but oh freakin well.. .deal with it. DTE was great! My party was beginning to edge towards the exits and beat 39000 people, but it still rocked!

The show ended with Yellow Ledbetter. I would have liked if they played ROTF, but hey... Yellow Ledbetter was just swell too! All in all the show was amazing. I didn't think they would top the '96 Maple Leaf Gardens one, but hell... did they ever! My hat also goes off to Cheap Trick for a great opening set and Hayden, Matt Good, All Systems Go, and Cracker on the 2nd shows. They had some good art shit there too! Good job fellas!

Mubin Choudhury (yu215728@yorku.ca):
I am still trying to get over the fact that I went to one of the best concert of my life last night in Barrie,Ontario. It was truly an out of this world experience for me. Excellent. Peroid.

We (me and my friends) got there around 3 in the afternoon and the gates to the main stage weren't open then. There was however a second stage with a couple of bands playing. Out of the bands playing there we caught Hayden and Matthew Good Band. They were good and got the crowd there decently psyched.

Around 4 pm, I heard the Intro to Corduroy coming from the main stage. So we rushed to the gates to find the boys from Pearl Jam doing a soundcheck, and then Eddie breaks into 'I got shit', and the band plays the whole song and then leaves the stage.(completing their soundcheck.)

Gates opened around 5:30 and the crowd started rushing in. Cheap Trick took the stage after a while and played a whole lot of songs. I am not too into them, but I know that Rick can play the guitar like a maestro, he is just awesome. He even brought out his 5 neck guitar, which was sweet. But the crowd never got into them, but they did put on a decent show I suppose.

Pearl Jam takes the stage around 8 pm. People were already bodysurfing before the band came on. And as the band came in with Corduroy, the crowd of 38,000 people went bonkers (double the crowd of the Montreal show). I personally hated the fucking idiots who were body surfing , the didn't even let the real fans listen to the music. The first 2 songs, Corduroy followed by Brain of J., was almost unheard by many because of the moshing and body surfing that took place. Hail Hail and Animal didn't do much to calm the crowds either. It was the next song Dissident which calmed the crowd. And finally we could see them play and hear them properly. There on the crowd was pretty much decent and calm through out the show, Eddie even said he liked how the crowd handled themselves meaning a lot of other shows must have been insane!! But the energy was there. It was great. I don't think I have ever been so much into a concert ever in my life. Eddie sang his heart out and it just proved my long time belief that Eddie is the best singer ever. No one else just gives so much to a song like he does. Excellent.

My favorite song Nothingman was played and that almost moved me. That song is always fantastic, from every bootleg I have heard to the first time last night when I heard it myself, live in front of me.

Few things worth mentioning, In the middle of 'Habit' Eddie went something like: I am a missile shooting, propaganda spreading american. And that was damn hilarious, but it was expected after the recent stuff he said in the Indiana show. Also worth mentioning, Immortality had a kick ass solo by Mike, and so did Black. Truly amazing. Eddie played guitar through out the whole show except a few songs. They even played "i got shit', one of my other favs, surprisingly i was the only one singing the lyrics in my circle of people. guess a lot of people never picked up the fabulous cd 'merkinball'. 'do the evolution' had a beautifully animated video projected in the background. and the show ended with mikes beautiful guitar playing in 'yellow ledbetter'. great song. great vocals. matt just did a kick ass job on the drums.

Eddie said the next time around, they will have shows in Toronto itself (sweet) and they will do something like three shows to accommodate the same number of people but in smaller crowds. That got a lot of cheering by the crowd because hands down, the majority of the crowd there was from Toronto (including myself).

And I hope whoever is reading this got (or gets) the Pearl Jam Soccer shirt because its truly on of the best concert shirts ever seen, It sold out in no time. People were offering double the price to the fans who bought the shirts. Its just a GREAT shirt, of quality.

Thank you to Pearl Jam for making music that I grew up with and has been such a part of my life. Thank you for the show. It was truly the best one of my life. Thanks also to the fans who were there for the music, the atmosphere was a good one. Hail Hail Pearl Jam.