Left photo credit @sharptoe on Instagram, right Matt Cameron.
Legendary Rush frontman Geddy Lee attended Pearl Jam’s show in Toronto on Thursday, and Eddie Vedder gave Lee a special shoutout during the show after performing “Cropduster.” Ed referred to the line “Let the fluency set it down”. It comes from an Italian friend’s idea of an American colloquialism. Ed talks about cities and their ‘erections’ or monuments. He says Rush is monumental. {Geddy Lee is sitting on the monitor wing}. The audience cheers loudly. Mike plays a couple of chords from “Fly By Night”. Jeff plays a couple of notes from Cygnus X-1. Ed says we have been a band for twenty five years but if we wanted to play a Rush song we would probably have to play for another twenty five. Geddy laughs. Ed continues “they have XYZ (sic) we are more like LMNOP. Getting back to monuments and erections we have the Space Needle and you have the CN tower. This next song was written underneath the Space Needle.”)
Setlist and notes posted by Sea (via John) on the PearlJam.com forums:
(Jeff is wearing a ‘We Are The North’ shirt he amended to say ‘North West’.)
01. Why Go
02. Corduroy
03. Mind Your Manners
04. Brain Of J
05. Animal
(Ed comments that some pretty good things have been going on here the last couple of nights. He compliments the fans for being so vocal during the game last night. He talks about the prodigious amounts of pot Shawn Kemp smoked. He then complains that Seattle no longer has a team then suggests that Pearl Jam support the Raptors. When he mentions the opposing teams player Dwyane Wade and gets some boos he continues, “yeah, you don’t like him because he is good if he sucked you’d love him.”)
06. Garden
(Ed wants to acknowledge the people in Fort McMurray and Manitoba are helping with the fires and even though we are enjoying ourselves here those people are on our minds. “We are gonna give some dough to them to help out if we can and the money we are sending came from you so thank you.”)
07. I Am Mine
08. Nothingman
09. Cropduster
(Ed refers to the line “Let the fluency set it down”. It comes from an Italian friend’s idea of an American colloquialism. Ed talks about cities and their ‘erections’ or monuments. He says Rush is monumental. {Geddy Lee is sitting on the monitor wing}. The audience cheers loudly. Mike plays a couple of chords from “Fly By Night”. Jeff plays a couple of notes from Cygnus X-1. Ed says we have been a band for twenty five years but if we wanted to play a Rush song we would probably have to play for another twenty five. Geddy laughs. Ed continues “they have XYZ (sic) we are more like LMNOP. Getting back to monuments and erections we have the Space Needle and you have the CN tower. This next song was written underneath the Space Needle.”)
10. Even Flow (once again, an audience member helps sing the end of the song)
(EV expresses awe with Mike’s guitar playing by saying he would offer up all of his genitalia to play that well and asks if anyone is making that offer? He also introduces Matt “Fucking” Cameron. And Stone Gossard who starts the next song)
11. Daughter/WMA/Blitzkrieg Bop-(Ramones) this is just Hey Ho Let’s Go twice
12. Green Disease
13. Unthought Known
14. Present Tense
(“Right now we would like to play the whole Binaural record for you.”)
15. Alone
16. Lightning Bolt (Mike goes to the back of the stage and plays to crowd there. Towards the end of the song Mike looks to be having a casual conversation that no one can hear.)
17. Do The Evolution
18. Blood
Encore Break One
Ed thinks their families will understand if they stay and play a few more songs. He waves at people in suites and very high seats. He talks about the legalization of pot in Seattle and how well it is working. He brings up a “diabolical” genetic disease called EB. He describes some of the awful symptoms of the disease. He praises Toronto’s hospital for sick children for working with a hospital in The United States. He gives special thanks Dr. Elana Pope.
A French flag was tossed onstage and Ed talks about the tragedy at the Eagles of Death Metal concert and mentions Pierre-Antoine Henry, a fan club member killed at the concert. The next song is for his family.)
19. Just Breathe
20. Oceans
21. Inside Job
(We would like to play the next song for our longtime friend Michele [Anthony]. She has worked with us since we were kids. She specialized in difficult artists. We wouldn’t be here without her)
22. Breath (Ed gets on the barricade and sings)
23. Lukin
24. Porch (while the band goes nuts behind him Ed reflects light off of his pick guard back into the audience. Ed gets back on the barricade for the end of Porch. Mike goes to the barricade to let fans strum his guitar.)
Encore Break Two
(Ed says the band is providing a couple of autographed guitars for auction at the Tyler McGill memorial benefit concert and auction being held Queen Victoria’s Pub on Midland Avenue. Tyler was killed by a random act of violence in 2007 and the benefit raises money for youth music programs.)
25. Last Kiss-(Cochran) (played 360)
26. Last Exit
27. Better Man (EV stops singing but continues playing. As the audience sings the part for him Ed starts talking about the tour wrapping up and how cool Toronto is and how tolerant the people here are. He tells a story about a driver in Miami that was talking about “the coloreds , and the gays.” The guy was an older guy and was set in his ways and was everything that the people he was talking about were not. Also the guy was saying this in front of Ed’s children. Ed thought to himself how is this guy so intolerant and what kind of country do we live in? He then considered that the guy was old and out of shape and very overweight. He reasoned that this guy is gonna die soon and take all of his stupid ideas with him and that is great. He praises Toronto again and says how much they will miss it. He goes back into the song)
(Boom gets introduced)
28. Crazy Mary-(Williams) (during the solo section Mike comes over and plays with Boom. Ed sneaks his hand in to play some keys as well)
29. Black
30. Alive
(Ed introduces Donna Grantis who is back to play with the band again. He also takes some time to mention what an honor it is be able to play with Geddy Lee in the house who is not only the definition of a virtuoso musician but is a truly wonderful and kind person. The band breaks into a few seconds of Cygnus X-1 again)
31. Baba O’Riley-(Townshend) w/ special guest guitarist Donna Grantis
32. Yellow Ledbetter
(during the bows Ed says “we’re the Northwest, proud to be in the North.)
