For Pearl Jam chords & lyrics, CLICK HERE!

By Chris Moore:

Hello and welcome to a very special edition of the Laptop Sessions.  This is Chris Moore writing for the first Monday — the first day, for that matter — of June.  And June 1st is a special day for entertainment, as this is the date of the very first Tonight Show hosted by Conan O’Brien on NBC.  As I type this, I’m watching the beginning of the episode and loving every moment.  For me, Conan is the ultimate late show host, and I truly hope that he will establish himself as a primary late show host in the minds and hearts of viewers throughout the nation.  I wasn’t sure what to expect tonight, as I haven’t watched an episode of Late Night for years.

I haven’t been disappointed.

As I’m watching the first segment with Conan’s “run to California,” his opening monologue, and his “tram tour” video, I’m remembering why his late night show was one of my favorite reasons to stay up past midnight in college.  Well, that and late night Burger King chicken fries and burgers, of course.

My song choice tonight is directly inspired by Conan’s first night on the Tonight Show.  His first musical guest — a band which he said he was delighted “to the bone marrow” about — is Pearl Jam.  Thus, although I was planning to record and post the first Relient K Laptop Session, I decided instead to record a Pearl Jam song.

As a special treat (I hope), I’ve recorded a Relient K song to tide you over until I can get back to the one I wanted to record.  In fact, this is probably for the best, as I started to work out the chords for “At Least We Made It This Far” and found that all online sources for Relient K chords were terribly inaccurate.  So, I’ll keep working on that one and get back to it soon.

Tonight’s session is my cover song version of Pearl Jam’s “I Am Mine” from their 2002 album Riot Act.  The first single off the record, “I Am Mine” is a great track that tackles existential issues.  My favorite line is “I know I was born and I know that I’ll die; the in between is mine.”  What a great line.  When I’m stressed out, I sing this line in my head to remind myself that I’m in control of my life, at least to a certain degree.

Although I like the music and vocals on this song, to be fair, it is not perfect.  Case in point: I’m not so crazy about the line “The oceans are full because everyone’s crying.”  There’s something about that line that cheapens the overall impact for me, kind of like the line “It sucks to grow up” turned Jim off to the Ben Folds song “Still Fighting It.”

Regardless, this is a great song, and I worked very hard to do my absolute best to record an enjoyable cover session for you.

I can’t believe that I actually stayed up late enough to watch the entire Tonight Show, but here I am.  This leaves two truths:

1)  I will be setting at least a couple extra alarms for tomorrow morning.

2) I got to see not only the Will Ferrell interview, but I’m about to watch the Pearl Jam performance, which is supposed to feature material from their new album.  Can’t wait!

So, that’s it for me tonight.  I wish you a great week, and hope you’ll come back to enjoy new videos all throughout the week.

See you next session!