Musicians credit a wide spectrum of influence for their initial creative spark, or for inspiring them to first pick up a guitar. For St. Vincent nucleus Annie Clark, the catalyst was Pearl Jam’s “Jeremy.” As she explained to NPR’s Bob Boilen for his book Your Song Changed My Life:
When I was 10, Pearl Jam Ten came out; the first time I heard it I remember being at my friend’s house and MTV was on. I saw the video for “Jeremy” — that would have been fourth grade, and then it was like, OK, I know what I want to do. I was just completely obsessed with Pearl Jam. When I was first playing guitar when I was 12 and writing my own songs, I was doing an Eddie Vedder impression. Like, that’s how I was learning to sing. I mean, everybody liked Pearl Jam at that time, everybody liked Nirvana, everybody even liked Red Hot Chili Peppers, and it was just like, that was the wave, you know? I always felt like, “Oh, you like Pearl Jam? Oh, well do you know this b-side, do you know this rarity? ‘Cause I do. I have all those tapes.” You know, it’s like, you’re a kid and you finally have something that expresses that which you don’t know how to express, and you have this way to construct your identity.
Mark Pellington, the director of the video, posted the quote Friday morning on his Facebook, marveling at the fact that he was 31 at the time while Clark was in fourth grade.
