If Eddie Vedder had never become a rock star as the lead singer of Pearl Jam, he might've been able to carve out a career in the music video industry.
Comic book creator Todd McFarlane, who co-directed Pearl Jam's animated "Do the Evolution" clip, recalls Vedder had a knack for video editing.
Speaking with Rolling Stone, McFarlane remembers when Vedder first pitched him on the "Do the Evolution" video by sending him a VHS tape editing the song together with clips recorded from his Spawn HBO animated series.
"It was really quite impressive, so I phoned [Vedder]: 'That's pretty cool. Who did that?'" McFarlane shares. "He said, 'I did.' I went, 'Who did the editing?' And he said, 'I did' ... he was good."
In fact, Vedder even asked if he could accompany McFarlane in the edit bay while he was working on the video.
"He sat there with us all three days while we edited that music video," McFarlane says.
McFarlane also remembers Vedder bringing a locked briefcase every day during the editing process that he never opened. When McFarlane asked what was in the briefcase, Vedder opened it to reveal a baseball and two gloves, and invited him to play catch.
"I liked Ed's enthusiasm on all fronts: music, sports, editing, all of it," McFarlane says. "He was ... super involved in a way that was not impeding anything that we were doing."
In the Rolling Stone piece, McFarlane reflects on working on other videos, including Korn's "Freak on a Leash," Ozzy Osbourne's "Patient Number 9" and Disturbed's "Land of Confusion."