Cool player
Eddie Vedder reunites with local musicians for Hot Stove benefit
Eddie Vedder loves the Red Sox. This isn't a line he just tosses out when Pearl Jam comes through town.
Vedder had wanted to headline Fenway Park since at least 1992. And his dream came true last summer. At Pearl Jam's two-night stand in August, Vedder told the crowd he had hopped the fence at Fenway after a gig at Boston's long-gone Axis club and snapped some pictures (he even brought the Polaroids along to prove it). The rock champ will pay the park back this week when he joins his first Hot Stove Cool Music event in Boston.
The long-running benefit for Paul and Theo Epstein's Foundation to Be Named Later, which has raised over $10 million, takes place tomorrow at the Paradise. Along with Vedder, local rock heroes including Buffalo Tom's Bill Janovitz, Letters to Cleo's Kay Hanley, Belly's Tanya Donelly, and Will Dailey will fill the bill, and, as has become tradition, comic Mike O'Malley will emcee and Ed Valauskas will lead the band.
The all-star jam will be a reunion of sorts for Vedder, Valauskas and Janovitz.
“Eddie and I go way back, though we don't know each other very well,” Janovitz said. “Pearl Jam played before Buffalo Tom and Lemonheads on a bill at Avalon as their first LP was coming out. We also played with PJ one or two times later (at European festivals).
“Then there was the sort of legendary moment in 2006 when Theo (Epstein) and Eddie came and joined one of my solo residencies with my band Crown Victoria at Toad,” he added.
After a Pearl Jam gig at the Garden, Vedder and pal Epstein stopped in Cambridge club Toad (capacity 62) and jammed with Janovitz and Valauskas on Buffalo Tom's “Taillights Fade,” the Band's “It Makes No Difference” and a couple of Neil Young tunes.
“EV and I mostly just talked about our kids and caught up after almost 10 years of not seeing each other,” Janovitz said. “This Hot Stove Cool Music will be another 10 years in between the last time, there at Toad.”
Janovitz and Valauskas helped launch the Chicago event in 2012 when they joined Smashing Pumpkins, Jeff Garlin and Joel Murray on stage to raise money for charity. Vedder joined the Windy City's installment last year, but that was a rare Hot Stove that Janovitz and Valauskas skipped.
For Ed V., sorry, Boston's Ed V., every Hot Stove offers something new and reunites dear friends.
“Some of us don't get to hang out and play together but once or twice a year, so it is a bit of a family reunion of sorts,” Valauskas said. “I have also been extremely fortunate to play music with some people that I have no business being on stage with over the course of 17 years. James Taylor, Liz Phair, Derek Trucks, Nada Surf and, of course, the original Ed V.
“Even though we have managed to add some name acts to the shows over the years, we still manage to keep the overall feel of the event local, which is due to how hard Michael Creamer, Peter Gammons, and (Foundation to Be Named Later CEO) Allyce Najimy work to make this a special night,” he added.