Eddie Vedder Explains North Carolina Boycott At Last Night’s Pearl Jam Show

Yesterday afternoon Pearl Jam issued a statement cancelling a concert scheduled for tomorrow at PNC Arena in Raleigh, North Carolina in protest of the state’s recently passed HB2 law. Frontman Eddie Vedder explained the band’s decision at last night’s Pearl Jam concert at the Hampton Coliseum in Hampton, Virginia.

Vedder took an opportunity to speak to the crowd ahead of the start of last night’s encore. The singer started with “We had to make a real tough call about what we would do about the situation in North Carolina” to which a loud chorus of boos went up from the crowd. “I can’t tell from here if you are booing North Carolina, if you’re booing us for having to decide that we are not gonna play there. I would understand that too,” Eddie continued before explaining that at first the band was going to proceed with the show. “We thought we could take the money and give it to them and still play the show, but the reality is there is nothing like the immense power of boycotting and putting a strain and it’s a shame because people are going to affected that don’t deserve it but it could be the way that ultimately is gonna affect change, so again, we just couldn’t find it in ourselves in good conscience to cross a picket line when there was a movement.”

Eddie went on to apologize to those affected by the cancellation before dedicating a cover of “I Am A Patriot” to “all the soldiers in the LGBT community.” Last night’s Pearl Jam show included seven tour debuts: “Brain Of J.,” “Faithfull,” “Not For You,” “Long Road,” “Habit,” “In My Tree” and “Inside Job.” The tour continues on Thursday in Columbia, South Carolina.

Watch Eddie’s speech via fan-shot footage from rdeal1999:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yrDZlYnmVE8

Here’s the full text of Eddie Vedder’s speech via Rolling Stone:

“We had to make a real tough call about what we would do about the situation in North Carolina. Because they have a law there that broadly discriminates against a whole group of people. And I can’t tell from here if you are booing North Carolina, if you’re booing us for having to decide that we are not gonna play there. I would understand that too.

It was a hard process because we thought we could still play and make things right and we could fortify all the people on the ground working to repeal this despicable law.

We thought we could take the money and give it to them and still play the show, but the reality is there is nothing like the immense power of boycotting and putting a strain and it’s a shame because people are going to affected that don’t deserve it but it could be the way that ultimately is gonna affect change, so again, we just couldn’t find it in ourselves in good conscience to cross a picket line when there was a movement so…

So we apologize to those in Raleigh, we apologize to those who are going to Raleigh, we apologize to the locals who probably believe in the same things that we do. They have a reason to be pissed, and we’re pissed off too. But we gotta be pissed off at the right people and get them to change their minds because they made a mistake, a big mistake and they can fix it.

So tonight we play this one for all the soldiers in the LGBT community.”