Pearl Jam

We are dipping into the Far Out vault to look back at one of Pearl Jam's greatest songs and how it was inspired by a tragedy that affected Eddie Vedder.

Within the original video for the song, an actor was seen putting a gun in his mouth in an attempt to capture the tragedy of Delle’s suicide. Rather than turning the gun on his schoolmates, which has sadly become the norm for the modern age, he turned it on himself, committing suicide in front of his English class at Richardson High School. Eddie Vedder noted the tragic events after reading about them in the Dallas Morning News, which read: “Because he had missed class, the teacher in his second-period English class told Jeremy to get an admittance slip from the school office. The track was based on the true story of Jeremy Wade Delle, a 15-year-old sophomore who brought a heavy calibre gun to his school in 1991. It was hard to flick across the MTV network in 1992 and not witness the Pearl Jam video for ‘Jeremy’ finding its spot in the hearts and minds of an entire nation. The song featured on the band’s triumphant 1991 LP Ten — a record that survives as one of the Seattle scene’s most significant efforts — is widely regarded as one of Pearl Jam’s best songs. Inspiration for rock and roll has long outgrown the seedlings of influence that gave teenagers such joy in the 1950s and ’60s. Then, the music was heavily influenced by chasing girls, driving hot rods and rebelling against authority.