You Don’t Have To Scream Because Your Ears Are Bleeding

This post is dedicated to the 13 year old version of me. He would’ve been thrilled to have both of these tracks.

Wayne Campbell & Garth Algar “Pain Cave” – There’s a reason why I’ve never purchased Wayne’s World on dvd – I’m holding out for a box set that would include both movies, all of the SNL skits, and both MTV specials. It’s sort of shocking that this hypothetical set does not yet exist, but I hold out hope. To my knowledge, those MTV specials have not been aired in over a decade, but most anyone with any fondness for Wayne’s World tends to have a vivid memory of this song. I hadn’t heard this song for all of that time before yesterday, and I was vaguely surprised to realize how much of it was an obvious goof on Nirvana – back then, I think it only registered as a metal thing, even in spite of Garth shouting “eat your heart out, Nirvana!” over the bridge. (Click here for the website of a pair of Wayne and Garth lookalikes who are keeping the dream alive well over a decade after the heyday of Wayne’s World.)

Pearl Jam “Hard To Imagine” – When I was a teen, I was very obsessed with Pearl Jam, a condition that was exacerbated by the intense fandom of many of my friends at school, some of whom had been buying cd bootlegs featuring unreleased songs that the band had been playing live. At that point, half of the fun of being a Pearl Jam fan was being amazed by how much excellent material the band was willing to relegate to b-sides and soundtracks, or just not release at all. I had a live version of “Hard To Imagine” dubbed to a cassette from my friend Steve’s cd, and I would listen to it over and over again, totally baffled as to why the band would just abandon what was clearly one of their very best songs. I’d dub copies for friends, and talk it up with any Pearl Jam fan who would listen, totally confident that the band would put it out on their next record. Vitalogy came and went, and I rationalized – it just wasn’t right for that record, it would obviously pop up later on. When the tracklisting for No Code was announced in Ice, I convinced myself and others that the song “Present Tense” HAD to be a retitled version of the song. I mean, isn’t it obvious? The chorus is “things were different then, all is different now” – like, it’s the present tense!!! But no. Though I liked No Code and still do, my interest in Pearl Jam fell off sharply around 1997, and has only dimmed with time.

A studio version of the song was finally released in 1998, tossed off to the soundtrack of an obscure movie called Chicago Cab. At that point, it was hard for me to muster much enthusiasm. I never bought the soundtrack, and eventually just downloaded it from Audiogalaxy. It’s a lovely version of the song, though not quite everything it could have been. It still sounds lonely, nostalgic, and majestic, and the guitar at the beginning still evokes wet snow on the ground and the scent of smoke from wood burning stoves mixing with crisp air (probably just my sense memory from when I first heard the song, but whatever). I maintain after all of this time that it is certainly one of the best songs the band has ever written, and when I was looking at the band’s recent setlists a few weeks ago, I couldn’t help but to feel extremely jealous of the audiences who’ve seen them play it, as it has become a semi-regular song in their rotation following the release of their b-sides collection, Lost Dogs. I’m pretty sure that there was one show in Canada where they played this, “Breath,” “I Got Shit,” “Not For You,” and “Release” all in the same set, something that would’ve totally blown my mind when I was sixteen. (Click here to buy it from Amazon.)