Cameron Crowe‘s Pearl Jam Twenty, a documentary about the rock band Pearl Jam, will premiere in September at the Toronto International Film Festival before making its way later that month to select theaters.

A 384-page hardcover book will be released on September 13 in conjunction with the film, as well as, of course, a 2-disc soundtrack, which will include 29 unreleased tracks (see full track listing here below). The soundtrack comes out on September 20, 2011, but you can take a listen to one song from it, “Crown of Thorns,” right now in the player below.

You can also check out the trailer for the film here below. The doc is said to contain tons of rare video, interviews, and music of the Seattle band, who’s now celebrating 20 years together, as well as many hours of recent footage shot by Crowe. If you’re a fan of the band, this is going to be a real treat.

The MP3 album deal of the day over at Amazon today is Into The Wild Motion Picture Soundtrack, from Pearl Jam singer Eddie Vedder, for only $3.99.

Vedder played all of the instruments on the album, which includes nine original and two cover songs.

The album is also available on CD for $9.54.

Note, this deal is valid only for today, Wednesday, June 15, 2011.

Long live rock, be it dead or alive…

While on a flight recently, I caught an airing of VH1 Rock Honors – The Who, a 2008 tribute concert to the British classic rock band that featured performances by Incubus, Pearl Jam, Foo Fighters, Flaming Lips, Adam Sandler, and Tenacious D. The surviving members of The Who — singer Roger Daltrey and guitarist Pete Townshend — also performed their hits “Baba O’Riley,” “Who Are You,” “Behind Blue Eyes,” and “My Generation.”

The entire concert is actually online at VH1, and you can watch it all here below.

Continuing with the twentieth anniversary celebrations for grunge-lords Pearl Jam, this year will see the release of the documentary Pearl Jam Twenty.

Director Cameron Crowe, who burst onto the movie scene with his brilliant indie debut Fast Times At Ridgemont High and also directed award-winning movies Jerry Maguire and Almost Famous, was given full access to the band. Pearl Jam‘s Mike McCready said the director would have free reign over “….all our footage, with all of our existing footage that we have.”

There will also be a book and soundtrack album to accompany the documentary.

Pearl Jam
Live On Ten Legs
Monkeywrench
Released January 17 (UK) January 18 (U.S.: CD | MP3) 2011

I hate Pearl Jam. I’ve spent many hours on my guitar trying to sound as good as Stone Gossard and Mike McCready. I gave up a long time ago trying to play the bass like Jeff Ament and I have as much chance of being a better drummer than Matt Cameron as I have of finding a voice like Eddie Vedder in my armpit. I find them sickeningly good and I can barely stand it.

Of course, I am joking about my ‘hatred’: I adore Pearl Jam. This year Pearl Jam has lined up a list of surprises to coincide with the 20th anniversary of its debut album, Ten. To kick things off comes the release of new live album, Live On Ten Legs. Recorded at various concerts during 2003-2010 and at 18 tracks long it’s a good collection of Pearl Jam songs with at least one track from all of its back catalogue (with the exception of No Code).