Seattle is chock full of music fans who know their way around the whole scene — never mind epically big Rock & Roll Hall of Fame legends like Pearl Jam.

Not one of ‘em? You’ve got company.

The only Pearl Jam songs Evergrey director Mónica Guzmán knew she knew before she managed to snag tickets to tonight’s show were “Alive,” “Better Man,” and, of course, “Jeremy.” It’s not that she wasn’t around for the grunge explosion. She just spent more time listening to Billy Joel. [Insert joke here. 😏]

So while Moni looked for ways to study up, local music writer and big Pearl Jam fan Travis Hay wrote her this handy Pearl Jam primer. It’s a nice beginner’s sum-up of how a couple friends in Seattle built a global music sensation. Did you know, for example, that…

• …“Even Flow,” one of Pearl Jam’s biggest hits, is written “from the POV of a homeless man that [frontman] Eddie [Vedder] would pass by while walking in Seward Park”?
• …bassist Jeff Ament and guitarist Stone Gossard were in a Seattle band called Mother Love Bone before they built the core of Pearl Jam? “If there’s one Mother Love Bone song you must know as a Pearl Jam fan it is “Chloe Dancer/Crown of Thorns,” Travis wrote. “Technically it’s two songs, but they are absolutely beautiful.”
• …Pearl Jam’s debut album, Ten, is a diamond-certified record? “What that means in non-music geek speak is that it has sold more than 10 million copies,” Travis wrote. “There are only 92 diamond-certified albums since the RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America) started tracking sales, so that’s a huge deal.”

For more quick notes on Pearl Jam’s ten studio albums, top songs, and some memorable Seattle concerts, check out Travis’s full primer here. Want to dig deeper? Travis, who writes the Guerrilla Candy music blog, also co-hosts “The Anywhere Shows,” a limited series podcast “for Pearl Jam fans by Pearl Jam fans about the experience of being a Pearl Jam fan and what exactly that means, if it means anything at all, in 2018.”

And if you’re free at 11 a.m. today, join us for a Facebook Live at MoPOP! Senior curator Jacob McMurray will be giving us a sneak peek of its brand new exhibit — “Pearl Jam: Home and Away” — before the big opening this weekend. Got questions you want to ask? Leave ‘em here. We’ll see you then. 🤘

The results are in. The first batch of ’em, anyway, and yesterday’s primary election is narrowing the field of candidates headed to the ballot in November. Here’s what we know so far, via Crosscut. Meanwhile, columnist Danny Westneat called out a “blue wave” across the state as Democrats “dramatically outperform the norm.” (Crosscut, The Seattle Times)

Grab a sweater. ‘Cause our pipin’ hot housing market is cooling down. Housing prices are still way out of range for a lot of people, but inventory is up, prices are down, and if you’re worried about how crazy expensive buying a house has gotten around here, there’s hope. One stat to look at: The number of homes for sale is up a whopping 60 percent from a year ago in Seattle, and 44 percent in King County. “I think we’ve hit a bit of a plateau, pricewise,” broker Allie Howard told real estate reporter Mike Rosenberg. “We’re starting to see what the ceiling looks like.” (The Seattle Times)

Awesome Seattle parks you’re not visiting. A lot of locals hang out at Gas Works Park and Discovery Park — and for good reason. But there are more than 485 parks across the city, and they could all use a little love. Curbed Seattle rounded up 14 of their favorite underdogs, including Mt. Baker’s Bradner Gardens Park for its year-round veggie gardens and Me-Kwa-Mooks Park in West Seattle for those neat tide pools. 🌲 (Curbed Seattle)

Our history with orcas. Puget Sound orcas are in big trouble right now, and our fraught relationship with the animals the Lummi Nation calls “the people that live under the water” goes way back. Local historian Knute Berger recently visited the remains of Namu, the first live, captive orca exhibited on our waterfront in 1965. While many ooohed and ahhhed at the whale, others protested its captivity in a small pen where he eventually died from a pollution-related infection. “The irony is we sort of set Willy free,” Knute says, “but into an environment where we’re impacting their very existence.” (Crosscut)

BONUS FOOTAGE

Way back in 1992, Pearl Jam did a free show at Gas Works Park for 30,000 people. It was called “Drop in the Park,” and it was amazing. Photojournalist Jan Kuwahara interviewed the band members there and KIRO just published his clips  — a lot of which no one else had ever seen — yesterday.

Rock on, folks. — The Evergrey