Watch Willie Nelson’s Son Join Eddie Vedder for Beautiful Acoustic Rendition of “Just Breathe”

Lukas Nelson, son of Willie Nelson, is a celebrated country artist. He seemingly inherited his father’s knack for songwriting, singing, and playing guitar. Over the years, he proved his versatility by showing that he was just as comfortable performing cover songs as he was his originals. More recently, he took his versatility a step further when he took the stage with Pearl Jam frontman Eddie Vedder to perform “Just Breathe.”

Pearl Jam is currently on their Dark Matter World Tour. Last night (August 22), the iconic alt-rockers played the Washington Grizzly Stadium at the University of Montana in Missoula. During the set, Vedder seemingly dismissed the band and invited Nelson to join him onstage for an acoustic rendition of “Just Breathe.” In the fan-shot video below, the two musicians sit on stools playing acoustic guitars and swapping vocal duties. Nelson looks just as comfortable singing a Pearl Jam hit as he does when covering his dad’s songs and his originals. 

[RELATED: 3 Must-Hear Tracks from Pearl Jam’s New Album ‘Dark Matter’]

Lukas Nelson and Eddie Vedder Cover a Perl Jam Hit

Lukas Nelson likely heard Eddie Vedder singing “Just Breathe” on the radio in his younger years. The 35-year-old singer/songwriter would have been around 21 when Pearl Jam released the song as the second single from their 2009 album Backspacer.  

A track from Vedder’s Into the Wild soundtrack inspired him to write this song, according to Songfacts. The song “uses the first chord from a song called ‘Tuolumne.’ There was a lyric or something that hit me, and I picked up the guitar and played that chord,” Vedder said. “I thought, well, I’ll just go with it and make something different out of it. It was a shorter song and then I wrote a bridge to it while the other guys were working on something else,” he added.

“There’s never a dull moment on the road. Every day it’s something. Maybe that’s why my goal is the dull moment,” Vedder said. “That’s what this song is. It’s saying, ‘Just stop, and be together. Don’t talk now, just breathe and feel each other’s presence now that the kids are in bed,” he explained.

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