Eddie Vedder appeared on SiriusXM’s “The Howard Stern Show” on Monday, Nov. 2, and shared how he reacted to the death of his close friend Chris Cornell, and what advice he gave Bradley Cooper when the actor was preparing for his role as a troubled rock star in “A Star Is Born”.
Vedder and Stern’s conversation lasted three hours and included live on-air performances of Warren Zevon’s tune “Keep Me in Your Heart” along with parts of “Elderly Woman Behind the Counter in a Small Town”, and “Sometimes”.
Speaking of Cornell’s shocking death in 2017, Vedder said he largely didn’t allow himself to feel the grief of his friend’s passing.
“I’ve had to be somewhat in denial,” he explained. “I don’t even feel like I had a choice. I was just terrified where I’d go if I allowed myself to feel what I needed to feel.”
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Vedder’s friendship with Cornell dated back to his move to Seattle in 1990. “We were neighbours. I would hang out with him outside the band more than even the other band guys, and I didn’t know that many people in Seattle,” he told Stern. “We would go on crazy hiking adventures, or we would go mountain biking, or we would chase the dog in the rain while drinking shitty beer—and it was cool.”
On what advice Vedder shared with Bradley Cooper when he was preparing to play Jackson Maine, a character based in part on Vedder, in 2018’s “A Star Is Born”, Vedder said, “We just hung out for a couple days. He just asked me a few questions and I told him things like, ‘Make sure your guitar covers your balls at all times.’ I think sometimes when the guitar gets a little bit high it looks like a bib.”
RELATED: Eddie Vedder Pays Tribute To Chris Cornell In Touching Cover Performance
Vedder also told Stern that he wasn’t prepared to like the movie, saying, “I’m thinking of all the ways I can let him down nicely. I was a little nervous, but I tell you when I saw it I was just f**king blown away.”
Awkward conversation averted!
