Jam passes sell-by date

Back then, the Pearl Jam front man was in his late twenties and, in common with bands like Rage Against The Machine, still young enough to make the ideology feel fresh after the disaffection of the Eighties.

Fast-forward 15 years to last night's show at Wembley Arena and Vedder's earnest conviction now seems horribly clichéd. Jibes at Tony Blair were always likely to raise a cheer, but when he began a second encore with a solo acoustic number built around the painfully simple, repeated refrain "No more war", the crowd seemed to shudder with collective embarrassment.

Worthy though the sentiment may have been, the blinkered naivety with which it was rendered was cringeworthy.

Elsewhere, the set favoured more recent material at the expense of arguably better known tracks from Pearl Jam's earlier albums. There wasn't a single song from second LP Vs, though Alive, from the band's debut album Ten, was a predictable highlight.

Musically, Pearl Jam showed themselves to be as gifted as they ever were. Mike McCready played most of the guitar solo for Why Go behind his head, but the band's delivery often felt perfunctory, the audience's frenzied air punching underlining the stiffness of the band on stage.

In the end, it was only the devotion of the fans that saved this show from becoming a self-indulgent love-in by a band old enough to know better.

Pearl Jam
Wembley Arena
Arena Square, Engineers Way, HA9 0DH