By Brian Ives
With both Pearl Jam and Soundgarden on the bill at this year’s Bridge School Benefit concert, it wasn’t a huge stretch that the 1991-era supergroup Temple of the Dog (featuring members of both bands) would stage some sort of reunion.
And that’s exactly what happened at both nights of this year’s annual Neil Young-headlined charity event, which took place Oct. 25-26 at the Shoreline Amphitheater in Mountain View, Calif.
On both Saturday and Sunday night, Soundgarden/Temple of the Dog signer Chris Cornell joined Pearl Jam on stage for the supergroup’s most well-known song, “Hunger Strike” (which is also the only TotD song to feature Pearl Jam frontman Eddie Vedder on lead vocals), from their 1991 self-titled album.
Related: Interview: Soundgarden’s Chris Cornell Looks Back on ‘Superunknown’
It was the first Temple of the Dog performance since Cornell joined Pearl Jam on stage at their “PJ20″ 20th anniversary concerts in 2011.
The group formed as a one-off project in Seattle in 1990, following the drug-related death of Mother Love Bone frontman Andrew Wood. The project featured Wood’s friend and one-time roommate Cornell, and two of Wood’s MLB bandmates, guitarist Stone Gossard and Jeff Ament. Gossard and Ament had already started recording their debut album with their new band — Pearl Jam — and brought that band’s lead guitarist Mike McCready to the sessions as well. The drummer was Soundgarden’s Matt Cameron, who joined Pearl Jam after Soundgarden broke up. Today, he splits his time between both bands.
Other collaborations that went down during the acoustic shows (per Sugar Mountain) included Neil Young joining Norah Jones‘ band Puss N Boots both nights for his “Down By the River” (which they cover on their recently released debut album). He also joined Beach Boy Brian Wilson on Saturday for “California Saga” and Sunday for “Surfin’ U.S.A.” On Sunday, Young also joined Pearl Jam for “Throw Your Hatred Down” from their collaborative 1995 album Mirror Ball.
Related: Interview: Norah Jones Glows Out of the Spotlight in Puss n Boots
Each night, Young was joined by Promise of the Real, the band led by Lukas Nelson (son of Willie Nelson) for part of his solo set. On Saturday night, they played “Mansion on the Hill,” “Country Home” and Young’s new single “Who’s Gonna Stand Up” together, with Eddie Vedder joining in on the latter song. On Sunday they joined him for “Mansion on the Hill,” “Country Home,” “Who’s Gonna Stand Up” and “Southern Man,” the latter also featuring Florence Welch of Florence + the Machine, who was on the bill as well.
Lukas Nelson also joined Pearl Jam Sunday for their song “Just Breathe,” which Lukas and Willie Nelson covered on the elder’s 2012 album Heroes.
Besides Young, Pearl Jam, Soundgarden, Puss N Boots, Florence + the Machine and Wilson, the lineup also included Tom Jones, Band of Horses and Bridge School co-founder Pegi Young, from whom Neil Young recently filed for divorce.
The Bridge School Benefit benefits the Bridge School, whose mission, per its website, “is to ensure that individuals with severe speech and physical impairments achieve full participation in their communities through the use of augmentative and alternative means of communication (AAC) and assistive technology (AT) applications and through the development, implementation and dissemination of innovative life-long educational strategies.”
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