Watch Pearl Jam cover The White Stripes song ‘We’re Going To Be Friends’
The White Stripes and Pearl Jam were a generation apart. One was a leading force during the Seattle grunge explosion of the early 1990s, and the other was spearheading punk blues during the garage rock revival of the early 2000s. They might have existed contemporaneously, but other than a love of guitars, nothing seemed to connect Jack White with a guy like Eddie Vedder.
Of course, Vedder and White are both pretty famous music nerds. Vedder especially loves to break out random covers during his live performances, whether Pearl Jam is busting out Neil Young’s ‘Rockin’ in the Free World’ or he’s doing a solo acoustic rendition of Bob Marley’s ‘Redemption Song’. Back in 2018, while Pearl Jam was playing hometown shows at what is now T-Mobile Park in Seattle, Vedder went for something a little more contemporary.
Taking the stage with just his acoustic guitar, Vedder kicked off the first encore of the band’s August 8th show by strumming out the chords to The White Stripes’ ‘We’re Going To Be Friends’. Originally released as a promotional single for the band’s 2001 album White Blood Cells, the earnest song about childhood friendship eventually grew bigger thanks to its role in soundtracking the opening credits to the 2004 comedy Napoleon Dynamite.
‘We’re Going To Be Friends’ evolved into one of The White Stripes’ most beloved songs. By the end of their career, the duo had performed the track nearly 300 times on stage together. It became the final song that Jack and Meg White ever performed together, helping Conan O’Brien say goodbye to his role as the host of Late Night before he moved on to his ill-fated tenure as the host of The Tonight Show.
The August 8th performance went over pretty well, so when Pearl Jam arrived in Vedder’s hometown of Chicago a couple of days later, ‘We’re Going To Be Friends’ once again served as the opening encore song. Pearl Jam hasn’t touched it since, but it probably stays in Vedder’s brain to this day, ready to pull out at a moment’s notice.
White himself must have found out about Pearl Jam’s rendition of the song, because just a few nights later, White returned the favour by performing ‘Daughter’ at his own concert. Cell phones weren’t allowed at that particular concert, but if you go snooping around the internet, you can find some rough audio of White busting out Vedder’s tale of domestic uncertainty.
Check out the video of Pearl Jam performing ‘We’re Going To Be Friends’ down below.
