Songfacts®:

• Running a tight 1:46, "Soon Forget" was written by Pearl Jam frontman Eddie Vedder and is just his voice and ukulele. The song happened spontaneously when he was trying to shake off a case of writer's block during the sessions for the Binaural album. To change things up, he refused to pick up a guitar, his songwriting instrument of choice. He tried piano, but then he looked over and saw a ukulele in the studio.
  
  "I looked over and saw this ukulele, and I said, 'Well, that's not a guitar,'" Vedder said in Pearl Jam's book Twenty. "So I didn't finish my assignment as prescribed, but I opened things up a bit. 'Soon Forget' probably took me 20 minutes, and it was done. And it has some merit to it."
  
  The song got Vedder's creative juices flowing again and he was able to complete the rest of the lyrics on his docket, including for the songs "Grievance" and "Insignificance."
• The song is about how money can't buy happiness. It tells the story of a rich man who spends his time counting his money, but every day is one he'll soon forget.
• Listen to this one with headphones on. It was recording using binaural techniques (this is where the album title came from) that make it sound like Vedder and his ukulele are in the room with you.
• Want more Vedder on ukulele? Check out his 2011 solo album Ukulele Songs.