The song Eddie Vedder called “the most meaningful”
The morbid tone of death has always coated the city of Seattle. Though the music scene of the city may have blown up in the wake of grunge in the 1990s with acts like Soundgarden and Pearl Jam, everything was brought to a standstill once Kurt Cobain died by his own hand in 1994, closing the door on a whole subgenre of music instantly. While most fans mourned Cobain’s death like a family member, Chris Cornell couldn’t help but think back to the first time it happened.
When the Seattle scene was still starting, one of the biggest acts was Mother Love Bone, featuring the charismatic singer Andy Wood. Although Wood was not the most technically gifted singer in the world, the charm he brought to every show they played was unmatched. Right as the band were about to release their debut record Apple, though, Wood was already near death, having succumbed to a heroin overdose and being kept on life support.
After he passed on, the surviving members of Mother Love Bone kept playing in different outfits before Cornell got an idea. Being Wood’s former roommate, Cornell had created demos for songs written in tribute to his friend but shelved them because they didn’t fit Soundgarden’s style. Bringing in drummer Matt Cameron, Cornell’s idea was to work on these songs with the surviving members of Mother Love Bone as a tribute album entitled Temple of the Dog.
Although the band appreciated the gesture and went through with it, they had already started assembling a new band with a singer from San Diego named Eddie Vedder. Being relatively new to the Seattle scene, Vedder was a bit shy about watching some Temple of the Dog recording sessions before striking up a friendship with Cornell during the sessions.
As Vedder began opening up, Cornell had the idea of singing a duet with him called ‘Hunger Strike’, with each of them taking a separate verse before coming together during the chorus, with Cornell layering a wailing harmony over Vedder’s baritone. When talking about being welcomed to Seattle, Vedder always had an affinity for the song, recalling in Pearl Jam Twenty, “That’s probably one of my favourite songs that I’ve ever been on, or the most meaningful”.
Guitarist Stone Gossard would also remark on how important Cornell and Vedder’s friendship was, almost as if Cornell was introducing Vedder to the rest of the Seattle scene. Then again, it wouldn’t be long before Pearl Jam began taking off from the strength of their album Ten, which left Temple of the Dog to get lost in the shuffle.
Even without the supergroup playing huge gigs, Vedder always carried the shadow of Wood with him, paying tribute when he could and even performing the Mother Love Bone song ‘Crown of Thorns’ on the band’s tenth anniversary in the early ‘00s. Although Vedder might be the vessel that stands at the front of every Pearl Jam show, he still feels like he has some connection to his fellow singer, saying, “I would occasionally think about Andy. I’d been saying, ‘He’d love to play this place. He’d love to play ‘The Garden’. He would’ve torn that shit up”.
Until his death, Cornell also kept in touch with the band, appearing now and again at Pearl Jam shows to do a rendition of ‘Hunger Strike’ with the impromptu-reformed Temple of the Dog lineup. Although Vedder may have laid down different emotional vocals throughout Pearl Jam’s discography, no one ever forgets their first.
