I Just Read About That…

[ATTENDED: October 3, 2017] “Let’s Play Two”

When S. and I went to the screening of Let’s Play Two, we never would have imagined that one year later we’d be seeing Pearl Jam in Wrigley Field as well.

This film is a few things, but primarily it is an exploration of Eddie Vedder’s passions.  It is a showcase for Pearl Jam’s music.  It is also a showcase for the Chicago Cubs.

This is not a concert film exactly.  There are plenty of songs in the film, but they are interspersed with footage of the Cubs and of fans of locals and of Eddie touring Wrigley.

I don’t follow baseball, but I did when I was younger, and Wrigley is iconic.  It was very cool to see all of the insider footage inside Wrigley when Eddie and the band are given a tour of the facility.  I liked that it was cut with footage of a young Eddie talking about Wrigley and being a huge Cubs fan (in 1992, he took a piece of turf that was lying outside the stadium).

This film lovingly looks at Eddie’s obsession with the Cubs.  The fact that Pearl Jam played Wrigley on August 20 and 22, just a few months before the Cubs won the World Series (November 3) is a wonderful dramatic tie in.  [The fact that the giddiness of the win was shut down by the horrors of the 2016 election is very unfortunate].

It’s true that Pearl Jam had played Wrigley once before (in 2013), but that show had a serious rain delay which meant the show was somewhat tainted (even if it also meant it was amazing since they played way past curfew).  There’s also some pertinent Vedder/Cubs info about that year:

In 2013, in the middle of one of the worst Cubs seasons ever, Pearl Jam played Wrigley for the first time and the concert was interrupted by a massive storm. When Pearl Jam finally retook the stage just before midnight to resume the show, Vedder said, “Ernie Banks likes to say, ‘Let’s play two.’ I say, ‘Let’s play until 2 (a.m.).’ ”  By the time the band returned to Wrigley last year, Banks had died, but the song he urged Vedder to write — “All the Way” — had become something of a North Side anthem.

So in 2016, they played two nights–two amazing shows.   And while you can’t really compare the band’s playing two nights at a Field with the Cubs breaking a 100-year-old curse, the soundtrack and the way the film is paced makes a really exciting memento of the Cubs’ year.

As I said, I’m not really a baseball fan (although I was happy for the Cubs), and obviously I knew what happened that season, but the way the movie is paced and framed and the music and reaction shots made me very emotional as the Cubbies finally did it.  It was cleverly constructed to show details about the Cubs so that non-fans could learn and get swept up and fans could nod knowingly and also be swept up in the excitement.

And it’s all cut with some great moments from the Wrigley shows (selectively placed to work with the dramatic rise and fall).

I can see that if you are just coming for Pearl Jam you might be disappointed in the relative lack of Pearl Jam in the movie.  Although I expect that anyone who loves the band will also get caught up in the narrative.

And because I like behind-the-scenes footage, it was fun seeing so much else going into the movie.

Pearl Jam and Cubs fans are given a ton of screen time.  Joe Shanahan, owner of Metro, where Pearl Jam played its first Chicago concert in 1991, has stories about the Cubs and the band.  Beth Murphy, the wife of Jim Murphy, who founded Murphy’s Bleachers across from the park 37 years ago, is a wonderfully emotional character in the movie.  She talks about the Cubs, about Wrigley, about Eddie and his family and about the band.

The most exciting (to me) moment in the film came from a rehearsal on Murphy’s rooftop.  They jam quietly on the roof as fans walk by.  I can’t even imagine being in town for the show and walking by the stadium and seeing the band on the roof of a pub playing songs.  But this is better than walking by since the cameras linger and show the guys interacting, laughing and having a great time in the shadows of Wrigley.

I’m really glad we went to the movie.  If nothing else, seeing a concert movie in a theater gives you a full blown audio experience–not as good as a concert, but really amazing nevertheless.  It was almost as much fun as the one we saw in Boston (which was in a club and was packed).  It was also neat to meet some other local Pearl Jam fans–something a bit more rare than you might think.

There’s an accompanying CD but it is basically a movie soundtrack–songs from both shows, but not a complete show.

I don’t remeember if these songs were in the movie or not, but these are what’s on the disc.

TRACK LISTING

1. Low Light

​2. Better Man

3. Elderly Woman Behind The Counter In A Small Town

4. Last Exit

5. Lightning Bolt

6. Black Red Yellow

7. Black

8. Corduroy

9. Given To Fly

10. Jeremy

11. Inside Job

12. Go

13. Crazy Mary

14. Release

15. Alive

16. All The Way

17. I’ve Got A Feeling