Pearl Jam brought out surprise guest Peter Frampton during their concert Thursday in Nashville, with the two Rock Hall-inducted artists linking up for a rendition of the band’s “Black.”
“This gentleman was someone we looked up to before the Ramones. Some of our first guitar heroes, [like] Jimmy Page and Pete Townshend, he was right up there,” Eddie Vedder told the crowd before the Frampton Comes Alive rocker took the stage.
“It was one of reasons why we loved live records, and later we decided to release bootlegs because of his influence. He’s such an incredible human being on top of it. It is our honor, because at this point he’s become a good friend to the group. He’s recorded with Mike [McCready] and [drummer] Matt Cameron and we get to play with him tonight.”
Frampton, a longtime resident of Nashville, then joined the band to perform the Ten classic, wailing away alongside McCready on guitar solos that included Vedder teasing Frampton’s own “Do You Feel Like We Do.”
Frampton will embark on a North American tour later this month, six years after the guitarist announced a farewell tour due to his battle with inclusion body myositis. However, as evidenced by Frampton’s “Black” solo, the rocker has soldiered on despite the degenerative disease.
“We all have our battles. We’re all fighting something. I’m just a person who is out there, doing the best he can, and bringing awareness to IBM [inclusion body myositis], raising money where I can. We’ve got a lovely foundation at Johns Hopkins, the Peter Frampton Fund. People are still sending in money, which is wonderful. It’ll help us with clinical trials. Those are expensive. I’m raising money for them so we can find that magic bullet,” Frampton told Rolling Stone in 2024.
“I’m very optimistic. I’m speaking with my doctors all the time, and hearing all the new stuff that’s coming along, and the new technologies the scientists are finding in the lab. It looks like something could be coming around the corner. We’re always hoping for that.”
