Wow, so tonight was the last show of Media Decay’s Pearl Jam week, and also the last show of this leg of Pearl Jam’s tour.  It was the second night at New York’s famous Madison Square Garden, and revered home of some legendary Pearl Jam performances.  This show in particular sold out incredibly fast and tickets were almost impossible to get.  Everyone wanted to be there.  Everyone was hoping for something spectacular.  And the band delivered.  They not only delivered a super energetic 2 hour 40 minute set, but they delivered a crazy setlist and even a “new” song (more on that a little later).  Perhaps the best part was that thanks to my fan club membership and a worked out trade with another fan club member, I found myself sitting in the 11th row center for this amazing show.

Band of Horses opened as they did on Tuesday in Newark, and for the rest of the tour except last night at The Garden.  From what I could tell they played the same set, although I enjoyed it more this time.  Maybe the sound was a little better?  I don’t know why, I was just a little more into it.  The only difference is Eddie didn’t come out and play with them tonight.  They did 45 minutes.

At 8:50 for the third show in a row, Pearl Jam took the stage.  They opened with Corduroy, which the recorded version of doesn’t sound incredibly upbeat but live it is and the crowd was already shaking the building to it’s foundations.  From there they did not let up.  It was a super energetic set that only let up a slight bit at times, usually for massive sing-alongs.  There are so many highlights to this show but let me try to talk about some of the bigger ones.

First off let’s talk about some rarities.  They did Black Red Yellow which hasn’t been played live since 2005, and in total before tonight only 5 times ever.  They also did Push Me, Pull Me, also before tonight had only been done 5 times.  And bassist Jeff Ament sang Sweet Lew, only done once before.

I personally loved Nothing Man, which was a massive sing along.  Although the crowd was deafening with their singing throughout the night some particular highlights were of course Better Man which Eddie at these MSG shows loves to do and just let the crowd sing the entire first verse alone without any help or prodding.  This is an amazing sight to behold and you could see Eddie’s face light up hearing it sung perfectly by the packed house.  But the big surprise was on Black.  The audience screamed along to the entire song but at the end a bit of spontaneous magic happened that the band was even shocked by.  So after the main part of the song was over and where on the album version it goes into “do do do do do do do” the band was just jamming out and soloing and the crowd was doing the do do’s.  Before you know it though the crowd is another instrument in the song.  They kept going, and going.  The band even slowly one by one stopped playing and it just continued till finally Matt Cameron ended the drum part.  It was amazing and unplanned and just perfect.

I have to say my absolute favorite part of the night though was when they pulled out a song I’ve waited forever to hear, and it’s not even technically a Pearl Jam song.  It’s a Temple of the Dog song, and for those of you who don’t know Temple of the Dog was basically the current lineup of Pearl Jam (minus Boom of course), with Chris Cornell on vocals, and on one very famous song Hunger Strike Cornell and Vedder duet.  Tonight they played that song.  Except instead of Chris Cornell, Ben the lead singer of Band of Horses did that part, and although he obviously can’t match the unique sound of Cornell’s voice he did a damn good job trying.  I really freaked out when they launched into this.  It was crazy.  I’ve always wanted to hear this song live, and it’s not something they really do often.

Another shocker was like I mentioned before, the “new” song.  It’s actually an old song but this version is so different that on the official setlist it has a new name.  Like last night at the start of the first encore they brought out a string quartet and they did the same few songs with them.  Last night they did a version of the super short, super fast song Lukin (you cannot make out the vocals it’s so fast) with them.  Tonight though Eddie said he worked with the quartet and wrote a new song then went into a slow unrecognizable song, until a few lines in when everyone realized it was Lukin!  It turns out Vedder re-did the song in an ultra slow, acoustic style and that version is now officially Lukin II.

They also did several covers.  Mc5′s Kick Out The Jams, The Who’s The Real Me, a bit of Sleater-Kinney’s Modern Girl, and the usual ending for Better Man, English Beat’s Save It For Later.

Overall the set and the show were insanely great.  This one show is a perfect lesson in how to perform.  Every single member of the band was firing on all cylinders, with Vedder even doing some insane vocal stuff.  The songs were great, even old classics they’ve done a million times, the crowd was not only into the show, but an active part.  You won’t find much better than this.

Below you’ll find the set list as well as a ton of pictures (click to make big).  Tonight the pictures weren’t that bad due to my proximity to the stage, so I hope you enjoy.  Once again I’ll say that no audio is posted because they are officially releasing this show in a couple of weeks and you can get it from their official site.  I suggest you buy this one.

And thank you if you’ve followed our Pearl Jam Week coverage here at Media Decay.  Be sure to subscribe to our RSS feed and follow us on Twitter (@mediadecay), you never know what kinds of goodies we’ll post.

Set List
Corduroy
Hail Hail
Do The Evolution
World Wide Suicide
Got Some
Breath
Nothing Man
I’m Open – dedicated to Howard Zinn
Unthought Known
Grievance
Amongst The Waves
Present Tense
Not For You/Modern Girl (Sleater Kinney)
Push Me Pull Me
Rats
Daughter/WMA
The Fixer
Why Go

1st Encore
The End with string quartet
Just Breathe with string quartet
Lukin II with string quartet
Black Red Yellow
Sweet Lew
Given To Fly
Spin The Black Circle
Rearviewmirror

2nd Encore
Wasted Reprise
Better Man/Save It For Later (English Beat)
Black
The Real Me (The Who)
Hunger Strike with Ben Bridwell from “Band Of Horses” (Temple of the Dog)
Alive
Kick Out The Jams (MC5)
Yellow Ledbetter/Star Spangled Banner