Better Man

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Lore & Background

The song was written by vocalist Eddie Vedder when he was in high school. He said, "I wrote 'Better Man' before I could drink—legally—on a four-track in my old apartment." In another interview, Vedder stated, "Sometimes I think of how far I've come from the teenager sitting on the bed in San Diego writing 'Better Man' and wondering if anyone would ever even hear it." He first performed it with a San Diego, California–based group called Bad Radio, with a slightly faster tempo but altogether quite similar to the Vitalogy rendition. Vedder later recorded it with Pearl Jam, although his bandmates were initially reluctant to record it and had initially rejected it from Vs. because it had a more mainstream, pop-oriented sound than their usual material. Producer Brendan O'Brien said of the song: "There's a great song we recorded for Vs., 'Better Man,' which ended up on Vitalogy. One of the first rehearsals we did they played it and I said 'Man, that song's a hit.' Eddie just went 'uhhh'. I immediately knew I'd just said the wrong thing." The version of the song released on Vitalogy was recorded entirely in the studio, though it includes a live audience track from a different show.

In Their Own Story

Before a performance of the song at Pearl Jam's show on April 3, 1994, in Atlanta at the Fox Theatre, Vedder clearly said "it's dedicated to the bastard that married my Momma." He was referring to his stepfather, Peter Mueller, a California attorney whom Vedder had long believed to be his biological father and who divorced his mother in the early 1980s. Pearl Jam first performed "Better Man" live at a concert on May 13, 1993, in San Francisco at Slim's Café, almost six months before the release of Vs.. At the time, the song had more of an up-tempo beat attached to it. The band often performs the song live as a medley with the English Beat's "Save It for Later". Vedder has acknowledged that the song's chord progression is largely derived from "Save It for Later" and the two songs are very similar. At the last Vote for Change concert on October 13, 2004, in East Rutherford, New Jersey at Continental Airlines Arena, Vedder made a guest appearance with Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band and sang "Better Man" upon Springsteen's request; the audience sang along.

Reader's Guide

Al Weisel of Rolling Stone called the song a "haunting ballad about a woman trapped in a bad relationship." When Pearl Jam performed "Better Man" on VH1 Storytellers in 2006, Vedder introduced it as a song about "abusive relationships." Although never released as a single, "Better Man" nonetheless became one of Pearl Jam's most-played songs on the radio in the U.S. "Better Man" became the most successful song from Vitalogy on the American rock charts. At the 13th annual Pop Music Awards of the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers, "Better Man" was cited as one of the most-performed ASCAP songs of 1995. Chris True of AllMusic proclaimed it as "arguably the stand out track on 1994's Vitalogy—and equally arguably—[one of] the band's better songs in the whole of their career." In 2021, American Songwriter and Kerrang each ranked the song number six on their lists of the greatest Pearl Jam songs.

Did You Know?

• The song was written by Eddie Vedder when he was in high school, before he could legally drink, on a four-track in his old apartment.
• The version on Vitalogy was recorded entirely in the studio, though it includes a live audience track from a different show.
• Pearl Jam first performed 'Better Man' live on March 25, 1994, in San Francisco, though the song had been soundchecked earlier.
• Vedder has acknowledged that the song's chord progression is largely derived from the English Beat's 'Save It for Later,' and the band often performs the two as a medley.
• At the Vote for Change concert on October 13, 2004, Vedder sang 'Better Man' as a guest with Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band at Springsteen's request.