Back in the early nineties, Nirvana and Pearl Jam were possibly the two biggest bands in America, but despite both groups having sprung from the same Seattle grunge scene, Kurt Cobain didn’t initially think they had both stayed true to their roots. Cobain even famously accused Pearl Jam of “pioneering a corporate, alternative and cock-rock fusion.”
Now seventeen years later, Eddie Vedder is reissuing Pearl Jam’s breakthrough album Ten and has spoken out on Cobain’s early opinions of his band. “I don’t think Kurt understood us at the time, but we became friends and I’m glad we had some of the great conversations we had, that I’m always going to keep up here,” Vedder told The Sun, pointing to his head.
“I don’t talk too much about him in respect to Krist (Novoselic) and Dave (Grohl) and I know he said that early stuff about not liking us,” Vedder added. “But there’s a couple of complimentary things that he said in public about me as a human being, which I’m proud exist. But if Kurt were around today, I know he’d say to me, ‘Well, you turned out OK.’”
After years of dedication to their fans, a war with Ticketmaster and very few questionable licensing deals, Vedder has put all the early-nineties criticism over the band “selling out” to rest. “People offered us money to sell out but do I look like a whore?” he said.