PEARL JAM

American band that helped popularize grunge music in the early 1990s. The original members were Eddie Vedder (original name Edward Louis Severson III; b. Dec. 23, 1964, Chicago, Ill., U.S.), Stone Gossard (b. July 20, 1966, Seattle, Wash.), Jeff Ament (b. March 10, 1963, Havre, Mont.), Mike McCready (b. April 5, 1966, Pensacola, Fla.), and Dave Krusen (b. March 10, 1966). Later members included Jack Irons (b. July 18, 1962, Los Angeles, Calif.) and Dave Abbruzzese (b. May 17, 1968, Stamford, Conn.). Pearl Jam came into being in Seattle in 1990 when guitarist Gossard and bassist Ament of Mother Love Bone decided to form a new band following the death of their group's lead singer, Andrew Wood. Named after the unusual homemade jam of new lead vocalist Vedder's great-grandmother Pearl, the band released its first album, Ten, in 1991. Alternative rock had already begun to receive mainstream acceptance, thanks largely to the popularity of Nirvanawho, like Pearl Jam, were part of Seattle's vibrant music sceneand Ten (featuring the major hits Jeremy, Evenflow, and Alive) became a multimillion-seller. With angry, stadium-style rock highlighted by Vedder's impassioned vocals, Pearl Jam joined Nirvana as the voice of Generation X. The group also earned a reputation for resisting the mainstream music industry. Notably, they refused to produce music videos for any of the songs on their second album, Vs (1993), and in 1994 they canceled a tour as the result of a heated battle over ticket prices. Instead, the band scheduled concerts at venues that were much smaller than the stadiums they usually played and experimented with unorthodox ticket distribution techniques. Following Vitalogy (1994), the group's third multimillion-selling album, Pearl Jam backed Neil Young on Mirror Ball (1995), then released No Code (1996), whose stylistic departure disappointed some fans. Despite good reviews, Yield (1998) was not a commercial success.