Pearl Jam: Their World. Censored.

That is, according to Salon's Machinist blog. Read the article - which details how a certain largest phone company in the entire planet removed political content from Pearl Jam's set at Lollapalooza from the webcast that the company did of the festival here.

A quick summation of the controversy given by the article:

Anyone who was at Sunday's Pearl Jam show closing the Lollapalooza festival in Chicago would have seen the band in a political mood.,,(i)n the middle of a performance of "Daughter," Vedder sang "George Bush, leave this world alone" and "George Bush find yourself another home" to the tune of "Another Brick in the Wall."

But if you were at home listening to the show on the Webcast...you would have missed those lines..(They) say its monitor did so by mistake -- what a strangely precise and politically convenient mistake!

I don't doubt that mistakes happen - heck, how could they not, considering the scope of a festival the size of Lollapalooza and the technology required in order to webcast it. That said, if you take into account the dubious actions that AT and T (by the way, what's the deal with Blogger not allowing the "and" character?) has made as a company - here, here and here - then the censorship charge is much more plausible.

But enough political talk and on to the political music. Here are some live Pearl Jam MP3s, a track from b-sides collection Lost Dogs and a few songs from last year's self-titled set. All the songs on this playlist are politically charged, to some degree:

Download: Pearl Jam - "Whale Song"
Download:Pearl Jam - "Insignificance"- Live In Jones Beach, 2000
Download: Pearl Jam - "Rival" - Live: Jones Beach, New York, 2000
Download: Pearl Jam - "Green Disease" - Live: Chicago, Illinois, 2003
Download: Pearl Jam - "Bu$hleaguer" - Live: Denver, Colorado, 2003
Download: Pearl Jam - "Know Your Rights (The Clash)" - Live: Las Vegas, Nevada, 2003
Download: Pearl Jam - "Gimme Some Truth (John Lennon cover)" - Live: New York, New York, 2003
Download: Pearl Jam - "I Am Mine" - Live: New York, New York, second night, 2003
Download: Pearl Jam - "Whipping" - Live: New York, New York, 2003
Download: Pearl Jam - "Glorified G" - Live: New York, New York, second night, 2003
Download: Pearl Jam - "Dissident" - Live: New York, New York, second night, 2003
Download: Pearl Jam - "Fortunate Son" (with Sleater-Kinney) - Live: Mansfield, Massachusetts, 2000
Download: Pearl Jam - "World Wide Suicide"
Download: Pearl Jam - "Comatose"
Download: Pearl Jam - "Unemployable"
Download: Pearl Jam - "Grievance" - Live: Seattle, Washington, second night, 2000
Download: Pearl Jam - "Soon Forget" - Live: Seattle, Washington, second night, 2000

(Jonathan Graef)