The heading "Canberra, 'pretty boring place', until..." appeared on the front page of The Canberra Times on this day in 1995.
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Pearl Jam's lead singer Eddie Vedder endeared himself to the hearts of 18,000 Generation X fans at EPIC - smashing a microphone stand, drinking from a shoe that had landed on stage and commenting that Canberra "looked like a pretty boring place until you guys turned up".
Vedder had earlier in the night taken many of the crowd members by surprise when he appeared on the stage hours before scheduled to introduce the opening band, Cosmic Psychos, and sing back-up vocals dressed in a Sloppy Joe, T-shirt and lime tracksuit pants. Later, fans greeted their hero as he led the other Pearl Jam members to the set, chanting his name.
Caught up in the moment, people had their clothes torn from them before being thrown, willingly, over the security barricade into the arms of waiting guards.
Some were chastised, some received first aid and some crowd-surfed their way back from whence they came. The resulting sounds prompted residents in Hackett, Downer, Lyneham and Kaleen to complain to police.
