Jeremy Spoke in class today

Extract from Wiki article

"Jeremy" is the third single from Pearl Jam's debut album, Ten.The song especially gained notoriety by the way of its music video (directed by Mark Pellington and released in 1992), which was put into heavy rotation by MTV and became a huge hit. In 1993, the "Jeremy" video was awarded four MTV Video Music Awards, including Best Video of the Year.

The song takes its main inspiration from a newspaper article about a 15-year-old boy named Jeremy Wade Delle, born February 10, 1975, from Richardson, Texas who shot himself in front of his English class in Richardson High School on the morning of January 8, 1991 at about 9:45 am. Delle was described by schoolmates as "real quiet" and known for "acting sad." After coming in to class late that morning, Delle was told to get an admittance slip from the school office. He left the classroom, and returned with a .357 Magnum revolver. Delle walked to the front of the classroom, announced "Miss, I got what I really went for", put the barrel of the firearm in his mouth, and pulled the trigger before his teacher or classmates could react. A girl named Lisa Moore knew Jeremy from the in-school suspension program: "He and I would pass notes back and forth and he would talk about life and stuff," she said. "He signed all of his notes, 'Write back.' But on Monday he wrote, 'Later days.' I didn't know what to make of it. But I never thought this would happen."

When asked about the song, Pearl Jam frontman Eddie Vedder explained:

It came from a small paragraph in a paper which means you kill yourself and you make a big old sacrifice and try to get your revenge. That all you're gonna end up with is a paragraph in a newspaper. Sixty-three degrees and cloudy in a suburban neighborhood. That's the beginning of the video and that's the same thing is that in the end, it does nothing … nothing changes. The world goes on and you're gone. The best revenge is to live on and prove yourself. Be stronger than those people. And then you can come back.

After "Jeremy", Pearl Jam backed away from making music videos. The band did not release another video until 1998's "Do the Evolution", which was entirely animated.

In 1996, a shooting occurred at Frontier Junior High School in Moses Lake, Washington that left 3 dead and a fourth injured. The shooter, Barry Loukaitis stated that he was influenced by the song.

The song has recurring

Jeremy Spoke in class today
Jeremy Spoke in class today

This soulful song from Pearl Jam remains one of my alltime favourites.
Bow to Pearl Jam