performed on VH1 Storytellers in 2006, Vedder introduced it as a song about "abusive relationships." Before a performance of the song at Pearl Jam's show on April 3, 1994, in Atlanta at the Fox Theatre, Vedder clearly said "it's dedicated to the bastard that married my Momma." He was referring to his stepfather, Peter Mueller, a California attorney whom Vedder had long believed to be his biological father and who divorced his mother in the early 1980s. Reception upon release Although never released as a single, "Better Man" nonetheless became one of Pearl Jam's most-played songs on the radio in the U.S. "Better Man" became the most successful song from Vitalogy on the American rock charts. The song reached the top of Billboard'''s Album Rock Tracks chart, number two on their Modern Rock Tracks chart, and number 13 on their Top 40 Mainstream chart in 1995. The song spent a total of eight weeks at number one on the Album Rock chart. It appeared on Billboard magazine's Hot 100 Airplay chart, reaching the top 20. In Canada, the song reached the top ten on the Canadian Singles Chart on March 6, 1995. At the 13th annual Pop Music Awards of the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers, "Better Man" was cited as one of the most-performed ASCAP songs of 1995. Chris True of AllMusic proclaimed it as "arguably the stand out track on 1994's Vitalogy—and equally arguably—[one of] the band's better songs in the whole of their career." He added, "Vitalogy was, admittedly, the end of Pearl Jam's reign as top rock act and it's because of songs like "Better Man" that they were able to stay there without succumbing to all the traps of stardom and shameless marketing." When "Better Man" was performed on VH1 Storytellers in 2006, Vedder introduced it as a song about "abusive relationships". In 2021, American Songwriter and Kerrang each ranked the song number six on their lists of the greatest Pearl Jam songs. Various performances "Better Man" was first performed live at the band's May 13, 1993, concert in San Francisco at Slim's Café, almost six months before the album's release, and had more of an up-tempo beat attached to it. In Pearl Jam concerts, the slow opening verses and choruses of "Better Man" are frequently sung as much by the audience as by Vedder. The song is often performed live as a