Set List: Release, Corduroy, Insignificance, Animal, Hail Hail, Nothing As It Seems, Rival, Given To Fly, Light Years, Do The Evolution, Even Flow, In Hiding, Daughter/(The Wrong Child), Better Man, Nothingman, Leatherman, Grievance, Rearviewmirror;
1st encore: Once, Breakerfall, Immortality, Crazy Mary, Small Town, Porch, F*ckin' Up;
2nd encore: Yellow Ledbetter

The first moments of a concert are electric. Wait, that's not very good, not for an aspiring novelist...ummm...well, see, words kind of fail me here. It's hard to express what's magical about those first few moments, the last moments as the stage is set and you know it's coming. It's just...electric. Heck, probably even the first few moments of an N*Sync concert can be electric, if that's your thing. Music is music and I'm a live and let live kind of guy, so whatever.

I don't have as extensive a rock and roll history as some, but I've been privileged with a few great opening moments - Metallica tearing their way onstage, the first synthesizer strains of "Shine On You Crazy Diamond" from Pink Floyd at dusk, REM's triumphant return to Atlanta last summer, Pearl Jam stepping into "Sometimes" back in '96 in Charleston, the first time I saw them. Now I have another. I'll do my best to paint it.the crew is done, the crowd starts to sense it...the lights go down...Matt Cameron's out first, and the rest of the band appears as if by magic, and that great tension builds as I wonder how they're going to start...until I recognize the first strains of "Release." Ahhhhhhh...I could live in these moments forever. I can only hope my memory will do it justice. I deliberately avoided taking a recorder or camera to this show, since it's my first experience being this close (14th row...thanks, Ten Club), and I just wanted to savor it. It's still fresh, I'm still getting my thoughts in order, forgive the rambling...but to me, this night is the musical equivalent of Jordan going for 50, Montana throwing for 300 yards and four TDs, McQwire hitting four home runs in a game, a Gretzky hat trick...all in one. Electric, yeah, that sounds about right. Overused and pretty inadequate, but it'll have to do.

"Leatherman," "Crazy Mary," "Immortality," "Once," "Release," and "Yellow Ledbetter" all in the same concert?? Are you kidding???

I've been asked a few times: what would I'd say to Pearl Jam if I ever got to talk to them? That's a hard one. I could ask them how they do it. I could ask them what the REAL words to "Yellow Ledbetter" are. Or maybe I could just say thanks: thanks for all the music, all the great shows, all the memories that I'll play over and over...all the times when I was looking for the right way to express a mood, an emotion, a moment, and I had only to turn to a spot on a record to see that someone else out there was feeling the same things. I don't know if they'll ever read this, but just in case...thanks.

Matt Megrue (d_x_dude@hotmail.com):

I attended the show in Atlanta last night (Aug. 7th) and all I can say is that it blew my mind. I had fan club seats which turned out being about 16th row which was great.

They opened the show with "Release" which set a good mood for the overall show. After a few more songs Eddie cracked a joke about Philips Arena and how one side was box seats and the other was normal seating. And, it looked like the people in normal seats were free, and the ones in the box seats were in jail. Then he asked something like "Do they really serve champagne and caviar in jail?" He then went on to crack a few jokes on Ted Turner then said he really liked the venue. Then, in my most memorable quote of the night he said, "He might own this building but he doesn't own us!" Everybody went crazy and they rolled through a few more songs. (Sorry I can't remember the songs in any order, once I see the set list it'll help my memory.)

They didn't play a few I wish they would have like "Black," "Jeremy," "Alive," "Soon Forget," or "State of Love and Trust," but they made up for those with great versions of songs like "Yellow Ledbetter," "Leatherman," and "Crazy Mary." I think it was during "Crazy Mary" that Ed jumped down off the stage and was with all of the fans on the front row. That was pretty awesome.

The funniest moment of the show was when they played "Immortality" and Ed forgot the words. He started to sing and then backed up and shook his head. You could see him running through the words in his head but he couldn't seem to remember the first line. After the band had played the intro for about a minute or two, Mike finally walked over to Ed and said something that jogged his memory and Eddie finally opened with the first verse!

This was one of the best shows I have ever seen. There wasn't a bad moment at all. Thank you for taking care of your fans and I can't wait to see you again on the next time around.