Everybody Loves Our Town_ An Oral History of Grunge - Mark Yarm [165]
GARY LEE CONNER Roskilde was the biggest show we’d ever played; there were probably 70,000 people there. We had a great time hanging around with the other bands. Nirvana’s playing, Pearl Jam’s playing.
KIM WHITE I think everybody in the band was intimidated by the crowd, so everybody continued to drink all day. Denmark was playing the World Cup and they were showing the game on the big screen. When Denmark won, the crowd was going crazy. Right after, Pearl Jam played.
BRETT ELIASON (Pearl Jam soundman; producer/mixer) Ed went into the crowd, and security had been facing away from the stage, so when he went to climb back up onto the stage, they didn’t recognize him and one of them grabbed him and was manhandling him pretty good. Our tour manager at the time, Eric Johnson, went down there, got Ed behind him, and was just swinging at security guards. All the other band members jumped down and had a tussle until they finally got things worked out and the show could go on.
JEFF AMENT It made us feel like playing those huge shows maybe wasn’t as important as we thought it was. We packed our bags, and we left the next morning.
VAN CONNER That was the first time I ever hung out with Mike McCready. He came in our dressing room after Pearl Jam played, and he was pretty drunk. And we were like, “We’re gonna teach you how to drink, McCready!”
KIM WHITE Because Kurt and Mark were best friends, Kurt’s like, “I want you guys to headline the show.” And we were like, “That’s not a good idea.” Kurt’s like, “No, I really want to help you out. I think it would be great if you guys played after us and close the show.”
And we were like, “No, no, no, that’s really not a good idea.” But for some reason, it ended up happening. So, picture this: Denmark wins the World Cup, the crowd is going crazy. Pearl Jam plays, the crowd is going crazy. Then Nirvana plays, and the crowd goes crazy.
DAVE ABBRUZZESE Courtney was near the stage, yelling to security, “Don’t let those Pearl Jam fuckers up here!” And then she saw me and said, “Except him.” For some reason we got along. We watched Nirvana together.
VAN CONNER We had Jägermeister, vodka, and beer. Our dressing room was very fancy, but by the time we were set to go on, because of McCready and Lanegan—and I might have had a hand in it, too—there was literally nothing left to the room except for a pile of rubble two feet deep. Everything that could be broken was broken into little pieces. Lanegan was super-hammered.
KIM WHITE And then: “Ladies and gentlemen, the Screaming Trees!” And you hear crickets. You can hear the band’s footsteps as they walked onto the stage. That’s how quiet the crowd was.
GARY LEE CONNER We started playing a normal set. At one point, I heard Krist Novoselic, who was off to the side of the stage, say, “Play the one about the devil!” I said, “They’re all about the devil!” And then all hell broke loose.
BARRETT MARTIN We’re playing “Change Has Come” and Mark’s trying to sing, and it’s not coming out right, so he throws the mic stand down and then he sits on the drum riser, just sits in front of my hi-hat stand, and keeps drinking. We just keep playing the riff and wait for him to go back to singing.
KIM WHITE The two brothers came and sat down by his side and were like, “Come on, Mark, you can’t do this to us.” They got him a new mic and a new stand, and he got up to sing “Ivy.” And again, the mic wasn’t working, and the monitors weren’t working. He knocked one monitor over successfully and then the stage crew came to try to get him.
BARRETT MARTIN He runs to this corner of the stage and throws one of those big TV video cameras—destroyed a $50,000 camera. The security came after him, and they were throwing punches, but not landing any.
KIM WHITE The last monitor that Mark threw over landed on top of one of the Denmark television station’s cameras and broke it. One of the mic stands hit a guy in the audience wearing