The classic rock album that blew Eddie Vedder’s 10-year-old mind: “The locomotive”
Artists usually do most of their damage live rather than in the studio. It might be easy to get into a groove whenever you put on a show, but the hard part comes with trying to recreate that same energy every time you go onstage, making sure that one night is special for every person in the crowd.
While Eddie Vedder has learned to make every rock and roll show feel like a religious experience, he admitted that nothing was going to top what he heard on The Who’s Live At Leeds.
Being brought up in the early days of punk, Vedder already knew the importance of playing every note like it might be your last. Considering his love of bands like Fugazi, Vedder knew that anyone trying to become a rock star for a living would probably not go the distance, as he spent his time writing on the side while working as a gas station attendant.
Once his luck started to turn around with the dissolution of the band Mother Love Bone, Vedder got the opportunity to work with Stone Gossard on what would become Pearl Jam. Though the band were still looked at as fairly underground, Vedder’s melodies were pulled straight out of the classic rock playbook, singing with the same conviction you’d hear out of Neil Young.
Before the punk regime even started, Vedder looked up to what Pete Townshend could do within the confines of The Who. After becoming one of the biggest names in the Mod scene in the 1960s, Townshend proved that music could mean more than just three chords, eventually making sprawling rock operas that told a story across its runtime.
By the time the band ventured into Leeds to cut their live show, they were one of the most energetic bands in the world. Playing as loud and as furious as possible, many cite the live album as the beginning of hard rock, turning songs like ‘Summertime Blues’ into one of the most raucous rock songs of all time.
There’s something about that record that feels untouchable once you’ve heard it. It’s not just the volume or the speed, but the sense that the band are teetering on the edge of losing control at any given moment, only to pull everything back together in a way that feels completely instinctive.
That kind of danger is what separates a great live album from a merely good one. You can hear the room, the tension, the band pushing each other further than they probably intended, and that’s exactly the kind of chaos that players like Vedder would spend years trying to tap into every time they stepped out in front of a crowd.
While Vedder was still young when he heard it, he remembered not being able to express what he felt, telling Rolling Stone, “There was the mid-1960s maximum- R&B period, mini-operas, Woodstock, solo records. Imagine, as a kid, stumbling upon the locomotive that is Live at Leeds. ‘Hi, my name is Eddie. I’m 10 years old, and I’m getting my fucking mind blown!’”. If The Who had started a revolution with their live record, Vedder would spend the rest of his life preaching the good word.
Outside of his impressive vocal range whenever he stepped up to the microphone, Vedder didn’t take any precautions during the band’s prime, usually climbing up on the scaffolding during shows and jumping into the crowd. Even though Vedder was happy to follow his instincts at the moment, he remembered that he would run into trouble more than a few times, recalling getting many deep scratches on his back from the crowds that were clawing at him.
No kind of scratch was ever going to stop him from giving his all, though, doing everything he could to make sure the audience knew that they’d gone through a communal experience whenever they played live. The live show is where rock and roll is supposed to take off, and Vedder has made a living out of doing Townshend proud every single night.
