Set List: Of The Girl, Last Exit, Given To Fly, Ghost, Corduroy, Wishlist, Immortality, Even Flow, Thin Air, Cropduster, Grievance, Driven To Tears by the Police, I Am Mine, Alive, Black;
1st encore: Daughter, Save You, State of Love and Trust, Bu$hleaguer, Better Man, Lukin (sung by Michael from Fargo), Leaving Here;
2nd encore: Small Town, Rearviewmirror, Rockin' In The Free World, Yellow Ledbetter

Wow. Pearl Jam has done it again with another fantastic ENERGETIC concert...I am too flustered to think in a linear fashion so I'll just point out some highlights...

Idlewild: Probably the best opening act I've ever seen. I bought "The Remote Place" a couple of weeks ago to prepare myself. The are infectious and energetic without being too catchy or "poppy." The crowd was respectful.

Mike McCready: Without a doubt the star of the show. The audience seemed to really connect with him. Solos up the wazoo from Michael. I got something of his later on, but I'll speak of that later...

Band Energy: The energy level is way up on this tour. If you thought Pearl Jam was lively on the 2000 tour you ain't seen nothing yet...Even Stone is jumping around more. If you haven't seen them yet, you are in for a treat.

Lukin: This has to be the first time in PJ history they have let a "civilian" sing a song by himself. Amazing. I think his name was Mike Bradley or Matt Bradley, either way he's a lucky guy. He'd been holding up a "Lukin" sign and when Ed told him he "couldn't remember the words" he told him he could sing it. Ed said he'd think about it and then after the next song called the dude's bluff by letting him up on the stage to sing and jump around. The audience lived vicariously through him...

Driven to Tears: Having not heard this song before (although they have played it more that few times on this tour already) it came as a surprise. It was kind of refreshing listening to the guys play a song I couldn't sing along too. Good tune.

Right after the first two songs Ed started singing "Looking California, Feeling Minnesota" from Soundgarden's "Outshined." It was a nice little moment and the band certainly was "feeling Minnesota" tonight with a 4 song encore (it just didn't END!) closing with "Yellow Ledbetter."

I heard nearly every song I wanted to hear and so many more and to top off the night:
Walking out my friend looks at the ground and picks up a yellow guitar pick. It has "Mike McCready" stamped on one side and a palm tree on the other. We were probably 30 or 40 rows back at that time so I have no idea how it got there (can Mike whip a pick that far?) Either way it was kind of a magical thing (my friend graciously gave me the pick as I paid for the tickets).

So thank you "Ten Club" (Center section, 13th row). Thank you Idlewild. Thank you Pearl Jam. And thank you Mike McCready for the guitar pick...

Chris Dugan
Bloomington, MN USA

Well, I just got home from the St. Paul PJ concert, and it was fabulous! As was the case 5 years ago, the Twin Cities was excited to see PJ and let them know it. The set list is not up yet as I write this, so I'll have to work from my less-than-perfect memory.

When the list does come up, you'll see that it's a dream come true of rarely played songs, as well as frequent favorites. Alive, Black, SOLAT, RVM, Leaving Here, Immortality. Ed wasn't up to singing Lukin, as a fan requested, so Ed had the fan sing it. He did a great job and the crowd showed its appreciation! Something that likely won't show up on the set list is a line from Soundgarden's Outshined: "Looking California and Feeling Minnesota." The song actually isn't complementary of our state, but we appreciated the reference, anyway.

I got a chuckle during Alive when Ed coaxed a fan to hand him his cell phone, and he sang Alive to the person on the other end as well as to the audience at the Xcel Center. Now, that would be a phone call to get!

The band was in top form thru all, and it was an exciting show to see. They must have learned from 1998 when the fans actually booed after 1. no second encore and 2. no Yellow Ledbetter. YL was the last song played and the fans were going nuts. Well, we went nuts most of the time. And we seemed to have genuinely touched Ed at our appreciation. He patted his heart a couple of times to express his feeling.

As was the case in other venues, the crowd sang frequently (and loudly). I was surprised at the number of songs that people seemed to know. Well, there's probably much more that I can't bring to mind that someone hopefully will. I just want to add that it was such a nice touch by Jeff to put a Wellstone sticker on his bass. I didn't notice it until he held it up high to give it to the tech. Thanks, Jeff.

I hope the guys got the peony I asked the security guard to take back to them. The table outside of the dressing room was the closest I could get to handing it to them. It came from my garden, so I hope someone will enjoy it!

Thank you for the great concert! I'm only sad that it's the last I will see of them this year. :_(

Sue Bloyer
St. Louis Park, MN