BILLY CORGAN says PEARL JAM was nearly KICKED OFF of RED HOT CHILI PEPPERS’ tour.
Without question, 1991 was a great year for music. So, it goes without saying, it was also a great year for live music. Between the first Lollapalooza and the rise of the grunge, there were a lot of great shows to be seen in ‘91, including Red Hot Chili Peppers’ tour with Pearl Jam and Smashing Pumpkins.
However, during a recent episode of Billy Corgan’s podcast “The Magnificent Others,” he revealed to guest Tom Morello (of Rage Against the Machine) that Pearl Jam was almost kicked off of that tour because of how different the music business was 30 years ago.
“We were on the Chili Pepper tour. It was Pearl Jam, Pumpkins, Chili Peppers was the bill. We played about 40 shows on that tour. And during the tour that’s when [the Chili Peppers’ hit single] ‘Under the Bridge’ took off, and that record just blew up like crazy. And Pearl Jam had I think one song out, it would have been ‘Alive’ or something,” Corgan recalled.
“And I remember coming to one of the gigs, it was about halfway through the [tour], and we were hanging out with them every day, like you do on tour. And they all look like somebody had died. And I said, ‘What’s wrong with you guys?’ Because they’re usually kind of an upbeat bunch.”
“And they go, ‘They’re gonna withdraw our tour support.’ I was like, ‘You’re on this massive tour.’ [They said] ‘If this single doesn’t catch, they’re gonna pull our support.’ That’s what people don’t understand about the way that business worked back then. If that song hadn’t caught on…”
Pearl Jam’s album “Ten,” which featured the song “Alive,” would go on to sell 13 million copies in the U.S.
