A few weeks ago I saw Pearl Jam at the Xcel Center in St. Paul, MN. Pearl Jam rules... and its not only their music.

Before I went to the show, I went to http://www.tenclub.net, and puchased the "show" CD. Basically, make a CD for each show. This is great! Although "non-commercial" PJ bootleggers are nortoriously nice (when I started collecting PJ bootlegs around 1994, someone offered to start me off with 5 shows if I would just send the blank media), there have been occasions where I paid $25 for a good show. Now I pay about $14, and they get some of it too!

Anyway, about 36 hours after the show, I was re-living the concert, because in addition to sending me the concert's 2-CD set, they sent me a URL where I could download the entire concert in MP3 format (each song was its own MP3.)

Perhaps the most interesting part of this is that Pearl Jam recently left Epic (part of Sony Music). I hope everyone buys a few shows, and helps prove that this type of distribution (who says they have to ship you the CD?) works for the artists.