Eddie Vedder Biography - Artistopia Music

Eddie Vedder (born December 23, 1964) is the lead singer and one of three guitarists for the rock band Pearl Jam. He is notable for his "golden baritone" vocal style, and is considered a cultural icon of alternative rock.

Biography

Early life

Vedder was born Edward Louis Severson III in the Chicago suburb of Evanston, Illinois, the son of Karen Lee (née Vedder) and Edward Louis Severson, Jr


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. His father was a lounge musician. first = Brian His parents divorced in 1965, when Vedder was a year old. His mother soon remarried a man named Peter Mueller, an attorney, and young Vedder was raised believing that Mueller was his biological father. While living in Evanston, Vedder's family fostered seven younger children in a group home.

In the mid-1970s, the family, including Vedder's three younger half-brothers, moved to San Diego County, California. It was at this point that Vedder, who had received a guitar from his mother on his 12th birthday, began turning to music as a source of comfort. He particularly found solace in The Who's Quadrophenia. His mother and Mueller divorced when Vedder was in his late teens. His mother and brothers moved back to the Chicago area, but Vedder remained with his stepfather in California so he would not have to change high schools.

It was not until after the divorce that Vedder learned the truth about his parentage, that Mueller was really his stepfather. Vedder had met his biological father briefly as a child, but had believed that Severson was merely an old friend of his parents. By the time Vedder learned the truth, Severson had died of multiple sclerosis. (This is expressed in the song "Alive" on the album Ten.) Vedder's already bad relationship with his stepfather became increasingly strained. He eventually dropped out of San Dieguito High School in his senior year due to the pressures of balancing school with a nightly job at a drug store in Encinitas. He joined the rest of his family in Chicago, and it was at this time that he changed his name to Eddie Vedder, "Vedder" being his mother's maiden name.

In 1984, Vedder returned to San Diego with his girlfriend, Beth Liebling. He kept busy recording demo tapes at his home and working various jobs, including positions as a night attendant at a local gas station and a contracted security guard at the La Valencia Hotel in La Jolla. Vedder had several stints in San Diego area bands. One of those bands included future Rage Against the Machine and Audioslave drummer Brad Wilk.

Musical career

Bad Radio

In 1988, the rather shy singer became the vocalist for the San Diego progressive funk-rock band Bad Radio. The music of the original incarnation of the band was influenced by Duran Duran; however, after Vedder joined Bad Radio, the band moved on to a more alternative rock sound influenced by the Red Hot Chili Peppers. During his time with Bad Radio he premiered the song "Better Man", a song written by Vedder when he was in high school and which he based on the relationship between his mother and his stepfather. This song would later become a hit for Vedder's future band, Pearl Jam. Bad Radio was a popular live band in Southern California, but never released a record on a major label. Vedder's last show with the band was February 11, 1990.

Temple of the Dog

Throughout the rest of 1990 Vedder worked part-time at a gas station. Later that year, Vedder's friend and former Red Hot Chili Peppers drummer Jack Irons gave him a demo tape from a band in Seattle that was looking for a singer. He listened to the tape shortly before going surfing, where lyrics came to him. first = Cameron Vedder wrote lyrics for three of the songs as a mini-opera which he called the "Mamasan trilogy". The songs tell the story of a young man who, like Vedder, learns that he had been lied to about his paternity and that his real father is dead ("Alive"). He grows up to become a serial killer ("Once"), and is eventually imprisoned and sentenced to death ("Footsteps"). Vedder recorded vocals for the three songs, and mailed the demo tape back to Seattle. The three songs would later became Pearl Jam's "Alive", "Once", and "Footsteps".

After hearing Vedder's tape, former Mother Love Bone members Stone Gossard and Jeff Ament invited Vedder to come to Seattle to audition for their new band. They were instantly impressed with his unique sound. At the time Gossard and Ament were working on the Temple of the Dog project founded by Soundgarden's Chris Cornell as a musical tribute to Mother Love Bone's frontman Andrew Wood. Soundgarden drummer Matt Cameron and newcomer Mike McCready were also a part of the project. The song "Hunger Strike" became a duet between Cornell and Vedder. Cornell was having trouble with the vocals at practice, when Vedder stepped in. Cornell later said that "he sang half of that song not even knowing that I'd wanted the part to be there and he sang it exactly the way I was thinking about doing it, just instinctively."author=Nicholls, Justin Vedder would provide background vocals on several other songs as well. In April 1991, Temple of the Dog was released through A&M Records.

Pearl Jam

[ who then recruited Vedder and drummer Dave Krusen. The band signed to Epic Records in 1991. Drummer Dave Abbruzzese joined the band a few months later following the completion of the band's debut studio album, Ten. Ten broke the band into the mainstream, and became one of the best selling alternative albums of the 1990s. The band found itself amidst the sudden popularity and attention being paid to the Seattle music scene and the genre known as grunge. Upon its release, the band's sophomore album, Vs., set at the time the record for most copies of an album sold in a week, and spent five weeks at number one on the Billboard 200.

Feeling the pressures of success, with much of the burden of Pearl Jam's popularity falling on Vedder, the band decided to decrease the level of promotion for its albums, including refusing to release music videos. In 1994, the band began a much-publicized boycott of Ticketmaster, which lasted for three years and limited the band's ability to tour in the United States. Later that same year the band released its third studio album, Vitalogy'', which became the band's third straight album to reach multi-platinum status. Many of the songs on Vitalogy appear to be based by Vedder around the pressures of fame. It was at this time that Vedder began to be featured more on rhythm guitar.

Following the firing of Dave Abbruzzese in 1994, drummer Jack Irons, a close friend of Vedder, joined the band. The band subsequently released No Code in 1996 and Yield in 1998. The band once again changed drummers in 1998, with Irons leaving the band due to dissatisfaction with touring. Irons was replaced by former Soundgarden drummer Matt Cameron, who has been with the band ever since. In 1998, Pearl Jam recorded "Last Kiss", a cover of a 1960s ballad made famous by J. Frank Wilson and the Cavaliers. It was first released on the band's 1998 fan club single; however, by popular demand, the cover was released to the general public as a single in 1999. "Last Kiss" peaked at number two on the Billboard charts and became the band's highest-charting single. In 2000, the band released its sixth studio album Binaural and initiated a successful and ongoing series of official bootlegs. In 2002, the band released its seventh studio album Riot Act and in 2006 the band released its eighth studio album, the eponymous Pearl Jam.

On Pearl Jam records, Vedder uses the pseudonym "Jerome Turner" for his non-musical (usually design and artwork) contributions. He has also sometimes used the pseudonym of "Wes C. Addle" ("West Seattle").

Songwriting and influences

Vedder's lyrical topics range from personal ("Alive", "Better Man") to social and political concerns ("Even Flow", "World Wide Suicide"). His lyrics have often invoked the use of storytelling and have included themes of freedom, individualism, and sympathy for troubled individuals. Other reoccurring themes include the use of water metaphors, as well as the idea of leaving everything behind to start again (featured in such songs as "Rearviewmirror", "MFC", "Evacuation", and "Gone").

Critic Jim DeRogatis describes Vedder's vocals as a "Jim Morrison-like vocal growl." Vedder has inducted The Doors, Neil Young, the Ramones, and R.E.M. into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and in his induction speeches he has cited them all as influences. Other influences that Vedder has cited include The Who, The Jackson 5, The Beatles, Talking Heads, Sonic Youth, Fugazi, Tom Waits, and the Pixies.

Although best known as a vocalist, Vedder also plays guitar on many Pearl Jam songs, beginning with "Rearviewmirror" and "Elderly Woman Behind the Counter in a Small Town" from Vs. He began to change the band's dynamics as he started to play more rhythm guitar during the Vitalogy era. As he had more influence on the band's sound he began to remove traces of catchiness in the band's musical output. He said, "I felt that with more popularity, we were going to be crushed, our heads were going to pop like grapes." He has also contributed performances on the ukulele, harmonica, accordion, and electric sitar to various Pearl Jam recordings.

Live performances

Throughout Pearl Jam's career, Vedder has engaged in interactivity with the crowd during the band's concerts. Early on in Pearl Jam's existence, Vedder and the band became known for their intense live performances. Vedder participated in stage diving as well as crowd surfing. Looking back at this time, Vedder said, "It's hard for us to watch early performances, even though that's when people think we were on fire and young. Playing music for as long as I had been playing music and then getting a shot at making a record and at having an audience and stuff, it's just like an untamed force...a different kind of energy. And I find it kind of hard to watch those early performances because it's so just fucking, semi-testosterone-fueled or whatever. But it didn't come from jock mentality. It came from just being let out of the gates."Hiatt, Brian. "Eddie Vedder's Embarrassing Tale: Naked in Public" Rolling Stone. June 20, 2006. Even though he has ceased participating in more extreme concert activties, Vedder's connection with the audience has continued to play an important part in the band's concerts. He stated, "I look around the audience, and there's so many faces, and I've looked into the eyes of at least the ones I could see -- there's at least 1,000 faces -- and I've communicated directly to them and seen where they're coming from...One thing I don't feel is separation from the crowd. I don't feel like we're speaking from a platform, I feel like we are communicating on the same level."

Vedder began incorporating social commentary and political criticism into his lyrics and performances early in his career with Pearl Jam. He usually comments on politics between songs, often to criticize U.S. foreign policy. During Pearl Jam's 1992 appearance on MTV Unplugged, Vedder stood atop his stool, took out a marker pen, and wrote PRO-CHOICE down his arm in large letters. During Pearl Jam's 2007 Lollapalooza headlining show, Vedder and the band played a song telling the crowd in Chicago to boycott the oil company B.P. Amoco because they had been polluting Lake Michigan and had not planned to stop after they received approval from the government when they enlarged their factories.

Vedder is known for playing "presets" at Pearl Jam shows, coming onstage with just a guitar (sometimes with a harmonica) and playing one or two songs to warm up the audience for the opening band. The songs performed during this part of the set are frequently slower acoustic songs such as "Long Road" and Cat Stevens's "Trouble". Many of these songs are not frequently on the Pearl Jam set list, giving audiences a chance to hear material in a more intimate manner.

Other musical projects

Eddie Vedder performing at the premiere for Body of War at the 2007 Toronto International Film Festival

Soundtrack contributions

Vedder has contributed solo material to several soundtracks and compilations, including the soundtracks for the films Dead Man Walking, I Am Sam, and Into the Wild. Vedder collaborated with Pakistani musician Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan for his contributions to the Dead Man Walking soundtrack. Vedder wrote two songs for the 2007 feature documentary Body of War produced by Ellen Spiro and Phil Donahue: "No More" (a song referring to the Iraq War) and "Long Nights".

Into the Wild

He contributed an album's worth of songs to the soundtrack for the 2007 film Into the Wild including a cover of Jerry Hannan's "Society" and the Indio song "Hard Sun". Vedder won a 2008 Golden Globe for the song "Guaranteed" from Into the Wild.title=65th Golden Globe Awards Nominations & Winners He was also nominated for a Golden Globe for his contributions to the film's original score. "Guaranteed" was also nominated for a 2008 Grammy Award in the category of Best Song Written for a Motion Picture, Television or Other Visual Media. Vedder promoted the Into the Wild soundtrack with his first solo tour in April 2008, a ten-date tour which focused on the West Coast of the United States. Vedder will follow up this tour with a fourteen-date tour in August 2008 focusing on the East Coast of the United States.

Collaborations

In addition to playing with Pearl Jam and Temple of the Dog, Vedder has performed or recorded with numerous well-known artists. He has appeared on albums by The Who, Ramones, Neil Young, Neil Finn, Bad Religion, Cat Power, Mike Watt, Fastbacks, Wellwater Conspiracy, and Jack Irons, and has also recorded with The Strokes, Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, The Supersuckers, Susan Sarandon, and ZEKE. Vedder performed three songs with the remaining members of The Doors at the 1993 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony. He also performed with R.E.M. at the 2007 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony. Vedder made a guest appearance at the Ramones' last show on August 6, 1996 at the Palace in Hollywood.

Other work

Vedder had a brief acting cameo in the 1992 movie Singles, along with Jeff Ament and Stone Gossard of Pearl Jam. He appeared as himself, playing drums in lead actor Matt Dillon's backing band, Citizen Dick. He was also interviewed for the 1996 grunge documentary Hype!. In 2007, he made a cameo as himself in the comedy film Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story.

Vedder is known for his outspoken left-wing social and political views. In 1992, Spin printed an article by Vedder, entitled "Reclamation", that detailed his views on abortion. Vedder was outspoken in support of Green Party presidential candidate Ralph Nader in 2000 and Pearl Jam played a series of concerts on the 2004 Vote for Change tour, supporting the candidacy of John Kerry for U.S. President. Vedder told Rolling Stone magazine, "I supported Ralph Nader in 2000, but it's a time of crisis. We have to get a new administration in."

In his spare time, Vedder is a surfer and active in surf related conservation efforts; most notably, The Surfrider Foundation. Vedder shows his support for environmental activism by sporting an Earth First! tattoo on his right calf. The logo is of a monkey wrench crossed with a stone hammer. Vedder is also a vegetarian and animal rights activist.

Eddie Vedder is also a longtime and outspoken supporter for the Free the West Memphis 3 movement, a cause that advocates the release of three teenagers (now in their 30's) who were convicted in 1994 of the gruesome murders of three little boys in West Memphis, Arkansas. On an interview with Larry King on December 19, 2007, Damien Echols, who is on death row for the murders, said that Vedder has been the "best friend a guy could have" and that the two of them have collaborated on songs while he is in prison. The song "Army Reserve" on Pearl Jam's 2006 self-titled album features a lyrical collaboration between Vedder and Echols.

Personal life

Vedder married longtime girlfriend Beth Liebling in 1994. The couple divorced in 2000. Vedder is currently in a relationship with model Jill McCormick. He and McCormick have one daughter, Olivia, who was born June 11, 2004.

Vedder attended San Dieguito High School, now called San Dieguito Academy. Vedder donated proceeds from a 2006 Pearl Jam concert in San Diego toward the construction of a theater for the school in the name of his former drama teacher, Clayton E. Liggett. Liggett was Vedder's mentor in high school. Vedder wrote the song "Long Road" upon hearing of Liggett's death in 1995.

Vedder is a friend of The Who guitarist Pete Townshend and former Soundgarden and Audioslave singer Chris Cornell. In late 2007, Vedder wrote the foreword to a new Pete Townshend biography, Who Are You: The Life of Pete Townshend. The book was published in the UK in March 2008 and will be released in the U.S. in the fall. Vedder was a close friend of the late Ramones guitarist Johnny Ramone, being by Johnny's side on his deathbed. Since Johnny's death, Vedder and Pearl Jam have played the Ramones' "I Believe in Miracles" regularly at live shows. He is also a friend of famed surfers Kelly Slater, Laird Hamilton, and fellow musicians Jack Johnson and Ben Harper. He was featured with Laird Hamilton in an episode of the documentary series Iconoclasts in 2006. While surfing with Tim Finn in New Zealand in 1995, Vedder was carried ft off the coast and had to be rescued by life guards. He also has paddled outrigger canoes on occasion and in 2005 was nearly lost at sea trying to paddle from Moloka'i to Oahu.

Vedder is a big Chicago Bulls fan and is a good friend of former Bulls player Dennis Rodman. The Pearl Jam song "Black, Red, Yellow" is about the Rodman/Michael Jordan/Phil Jackson-era Chicago Bulls teams. The middle of the song features a voice-mail message Rodman left for Vedder asking Vedder to return his call. Vedder is also a long-time fan of the Chicago Cubs, and is good friends with pitcher Kerry Wood. Vedder sang the national anthem before the third game of the 1998 NBA Finals in ChicagoPapineau, Lou. "20 Things You Should Know About Pearl Jam". VH1.com. June 30, 2006. and has sung "Take Me Out to the Ball Game" at four Cubs games since 1998. In 2007, a few days before performing with Pearl Jam in Chicago for Lollapalooza, he threw out the first pitch at Wrigley Field, the home of the Cubs.

Religion

Eddie Vedder is an atheist. There have been several instances in which Vedder has made athiest statements. At a concert in July 1998, he stated, "I would thank God, but I don't believe in it." When asked in a 1998 interview about his feelings on God, Vedder responded:

"I think it's like a movie that was way too popular. It's a story that's been told too many times and just doesn't mean anything. Man lived on the planet -- his fingers an inch apart, this is 5000 years of semi-recorded history. And God and the Bible, that came in somewhere around the middle, maybe 2000. This is the last 2000, this is what we're about to celebrate about an 1/8th of an inch with his fingers. Now, humans, in some shape or form, have been on the Earth for three million years across the room to indicate the distance. So, all this time, from there toward the other side of the room, to here the 1/8th of an inch, there was no God, there was no story, there was no myth and people lived on this planet and they wandered and they gathered and they did all these things. The planet was never threatened. How did they survive for all this time without this belief in God? I'd like to ask this to someone who knows about Christianity and maybe you do. That just seems funny to me."

Industry Music Artists

Eddie Vedder