PJ Music Factory

It Simply Has Been Moved

· Statetheatre · Kalamazoo

The handbill and the newspaper ad both said Wings Stadium; then a newspaper notice told Chili Peppers fans not to despair, because the Kalamazoo show had simply been moved to the State Theatre. Two sources give two reasons for the move, and the one list printed for Pearl Jam's part of the night, five titles, is marked incomplete.

Setlist

Pearl Jam Concert Chronology

incomplete setlist: Black, Even Flow, Once, Alive, Deep

No separate printed encore line; this does not prove no encore occurred. Any inline encore description remains in its printed position.

Retain incomplete/partial/ellipsis qualifiers. Order is printed order only; a no-order qualifier prevents performance-order inference.

incomplete setlist

  1. Black
  2. Even Flow
  3. Once
  4. Alive
  5. Deep

On Wednesday, November 20, 1991, Pearl Jam played the State Theatre in Kalamazoo, Michigan, supporting the Red Hot Chili Peppers, with the Smashing Pumpkins on the bill, by the Pearl Jam Concert Chronology's listing. Five Horizons lists the Pumpkins alone, calls the room The State Downtown Theater, and prints nothing else for the night. Neither chronology gives a figure, and the first prints five titles under a heading that calls its list incomplete. Most of what survives is paper about where the show would be, because it had been advertised for another room, Wings Stadium.

The show

At the State Theatre

The entry before this one is Columbus, Ohio, which the two sources date a day apart; it is told in These Seven People. The plan had been an arena: the run's tour book, reproduced by the Pearl Jam Concert Chronology, has Wednesday the 20th in Kalamazoo at a room it prints as Wings Arena.

The Pearl Jam Concert Chronology reproduces three printed pieces about the room. A yellow handbill prints the Red Hot Chili Peppers with special guest the Smashing Pumpkins and Pearl Jam, Wednesday, November 20, at 7:30, at Kalamazoo Wings Stadium, a Ritual, Cellar Door, and Blackie production. A newspaper ad in the same design puts the special guests in the plural, pairs that date with a Saturday in Detroit, and also has Kalamazoo at Wings Stadium.

Then the room changed. A newspaper notice, its paper and date not on the clipping, told fans of the Chili Peppers not to despair: the November 20 appearance had not been canceled. "It simply has been moved to the State Theatre in Kalamazoo to avoid a scheduling conflict at Wings Stadium," the notice went on, with general admission seats on sale at $20.

The Kalamazoo Public Library's history of the arena, compiled in 2022, gives a different reason. Its table of the arena's concerts lists the date, the three bands, and a ticket at $18.50, marks the arena date canceled, and adds: "Show moved to State Theatre due to slow ticket sales." A scheduling conflict in the notice, slow ticket sales in the library's table: each reason is its source's, and nothing else in the record settles the matter.

The Pearl Jam Concert Chronology's own note is a single line, that the show was originally scheduled for Wings Stadium; it names the room the Kalamazoo State Theatre. The State, by Wikipedia's account, is a Spanish-styled atmospheric theatre designed by John Eberson and built for W.S. Butterfield Theatres in 1927.

The Performance

What Pearl Jam played is printed only in part. The Pearl Jam Concert Chronology gives five titles, "Black," "Even Flow," "Once," "Alive," and "Deep," under the words incomplete setlist. After "Black," the four that follow are the first four of the Columbus list, in the same order. Five Horizons prints no list, and neither entry has a note on the performance.

The Next Step

The next entry in both is Thursday, November 21, at the Blind Pig in Ann Arbor, Michigan, a club night under the band's own name. The tour book marks the day as a day off; the night is told in A Real Band.

Recording & sound

What the Record Preserves

The two entries share the date, the city, a theatre named two ways, and the Pumpkins on the bill. The first adds the Chili Peppers, the five titles, and the note on Wings Stadium, and it reproduces the handbill, the ad, the notice, a newspaper feature, and twenty-seven photographs, credited, as it credits them, to a photographer.

The feature, Diving for the Pearl, by Scott Sterling, is filed by that chronology under this date; it is datelined Lansing, and the scan carries no paper's name and no date. A listing box at its end has Pearl Jam playing the Blind Pig in Ann Arbor tonight, which would put its printing on the day after Kalamazoo. In it Eddie Vedder talks about playing "Alive" and watching people sing the words back: "seeing what it means to them, is really intense." "Even for me," he told Sterling, "the song has so many different interpretations."

What the record preserves of Kalamazoo is a show that had simply been moved, as a newspaper notice put it: advertised for Wings Stadium, listed by both chronologies at the State Theatre, with two reasons from two sources. Of the night itself it keeps five titles from a list its own chronology calls incomplete.

Other Media (0)

Other accounts

No further accounts of this show have been added.

Sources & thanks (9)
  1. Pearl Jam Concert Chronology — 1991 page
  2. Five Horizons — Concert chronology 1990–91, entries for 11/18/91, 11/20/91 and 11/21/91
  3. Pearl Jam Concert Chronology — Handbill for November 20, 1991 (image linked from the November 20, 1991 entry, captioned Ad)
  4. Pearl Jam Concert Chronology — Newspaper ad for Kalamazoo and Detroit (image linked from the November 20 and November 23, 1991 entries, captioned Ad)
  5. Pearl Jam Concert Chronology — Newspaper notice of the move (image linked from the November 20, 1991 entry, captioned Ad; the paper and date not on the clipping)
  6. Kalamazoo Public Library — Wings Stadium (local history page written by Keith Howard, Kalamazoo Public Library staff, July 2022, updated October 2024; the concert table's row for 11/20/1991)
  7. Pearl Jam Concert Chronology — Diving for the Pearl, by Scott Sterling (newspaper feature, scan linked from the November 20, 1991 entry; the paper and date not on the scan)
  8. Pearl Jam Concert Chronology — Pearl Jam tour book for the Red Hot Chili Peppers run, fall 1991 (scanned pages linked from the Red Hot Chili Peppers tour heading)
  9. Wikipedia — State Theatre (Kalamazoo, Michigan) (general reference, September 2026)