The Story Behind: "Jeremy" by Pearl Jam

Jeremy is a song by the American grunge rock band Pearl Jam. It was released as the third single from the debut album Ten in 1991. The song was on the fifth spot on the Mainstream and Modern Rock Billboard charts, while it reached number 79 on the Billboard Hot 100 when it was re-released in 1995.  

Backstory/Lyrics

The song's lyrics were inspired by two real stories that Vedder knew about. The first story was found by Vedder in a newspaper article about a 16 year old student Jeremy Wade Delle from Texas, whom shot himself with a .357 Magnum revolver in front of his teacher and classmates in an English class. 

The second story was about a student that Vedder personally knew when he was attending junior high school in San Diego, that didn't take his life, but shot up a classroom. This memory got stuck in Vedder until he decided to write a song about it, stating: »So it's a bit about this kid named Jeremy and it's also a bit about a kid named Brian that I knew and I don't know... the song, I think it says a lot. I think it goes somewhere... and a lot of people interpret it different ways and it's just been recently that I've been talking about the true meaning behind it and I hope no one's offended and believe me, I think of Jeremy when I sing it.«  

Writing/Recording Process

Most of the instrumental part of the song was written by bassist Jeff Ament, whom had two riffs he wrote on acoustic guitar, that he wanted to play on his Hamer 12-string bass guitar he had just bought recently. One of the riffs he had written became the famous intro that we hear in the song.

Engineer Rick Parashar also overdubbed the bass on the outro and added a cello to the mix, which Ament though really made the song stand out. The song was finished when Stone Gossard (guitarist) was sick, when only Eddie, Rick and Ament were in the London Bridge Studios in Seattle. Ament also stated that this was the song that needed the most work to make it sound like he wanted to, but the work payed off since it is one of the best Pearl Jam songs.

Music Video

The song had two different videos. The original video was filmed by photographer Chris Cuffaro, whom Vedder became acquainted in 1991. The video featured fade in fade out shots of the band that are on a revolving platform performing the song, filmed in black and white. The video was financed by Chris himself, as the label Epic didn't like the idea of a video for this song.

Later in 1992, the label decided to film the video by the time that Cuffaro finished his music video. They have recruited video director Mark Pellington, whom wasn't a big fan of the band but after talking to Vedder about the lyrics connected with his passion to spread the message in the lyrics.

The video featured fast shots of images, graphics and texts making it look like a collage. The scenes were filmed at Bayonne High School in New Jersey. It featured the band playing, but mostly with close up shots of Eddie singing the song. After the release the video won Best Video of the Year, Best Group Video, Best Metal/Hard Rock Video, and Best Direction on the MTV Video Music awards in 1993.