0:15

Pushkin.

0:20

Pearl Jam, Stone Gossard and Jeff Amtt

0:22

are two of the Seattle scenes most foundational

0:24

musicians from the eighties and nineties. Stone

0:27

and Jeff started playing together in nineteen eighty four

0:30

as members of Green River, which eventually

0:32

dissolved, leading singer Mark Arm to form

0:34

Mud Honey. Later, Jeff played

0:36

bass and Stone played guitar in Mother Love

0:39

Bone until their lead singer Andrew Wood

0:41

died of an overdose just days before their

0:43

major label debut in March of ninety

0:46

Reeling from Andy's death, Jeff and Stone

0:48

started recording with soundgardens Chris Cornell

0:51

in a side project called Temple of

0:53

the Dog that featured vocals

0:55

from a then unknown singer from San Diego

0:57

named Eddie Vedder. Later

1:00

that year, Jeff and Stone asked Eddie to join

1:02

their new band with guitarist Mike McCready as

1:04

Pearl Jam. They released their debut album

1:07

ten in August of ninety one. The

1:09

album went thirteen times platinum and

1:11

charted on Billboard for nearly five years.

1:15

Since then, Pearl Jam have released eleven more

1:17

albums and built a diehard fan base,

1:19

thanks in part to their outstanding live shows.

1:22

Last week, they released their latest album, Dark

1:25

Matter, which was produced by Andrew Watt,

1:27

who's recently worked with Miley Cyrus, Iggy

1:29

Pop, Post Malone, and one of

1:31

my favorite projects in a long time from

1:33

Ozzy Osbourne. On

1:35

today's episode, Lea Rose talks to Stone,

1:37

Gossard and Jeff Ament about how Andrew

1:39

watts encyclopedic knowledge of Pearl

1:41

Jam helped inspire some of their best

1:43

performances to date. Stone

1:46

and Jeff also opened up about the inner workings

1:48

of the professional relationship, and Stone

1:50

remembers the first time he met Eddie Vedder, who

1:52

marked the occasion by passing him a handwritten

1:55

poem. This

1:59

is broken record liner notes for the

2:01

digital age.

2:02

I'm justin ritchman.

2:04

Here's Lea Rose's conversation with Pearl Jam,

2:06

Stone Gossard and Jeff Ament.

2:09

When you set out to record the new album,

2:11

did you have a

2:14

feel in mind that you wanted to, you

2:17

know, achieve for the new album something that

2:19

was completely different from Gigaton

2:21

or did it all sort of come together spontaneously?

2:25

Man?

2:26

I mean, have we ever had a plan and

2:28

has the plan ever been what we actually ended up

2:30

doing?

2:31

I think Stone and I have lots of side

2:33

conversations about what we hope the plan

2:35

could be, but it's usually never that.

2:38

No, we didn't know what we

2:40

were going to do. All of us individually have aspirations

2:43

for where we think the band can go or

2:45

how it could kind of be different. You know.

2:48

I think all of us are always aiming for trying

2:50

to expand on

2:53

what we've done in the past. And we

2:56

have the experience of being in the

2:58

band and having flashes of like what's

3:00

possible, and those aren't always easy

3:02

to recreate in different

3:05

scenarios, especially recording scenarios,

3:07

you know. But this was a big time

3:09

flying blind and I think, you know, with Eddie

3:12

having met Andrew and worked

3:14

with him a little bit, it was sort

3:16

of like, we're just going to show up in LA and

3:19

we're you know, this young kid, he

3:21

loves Pearl Jim, he's you know, he's

3:23

a producer, he's you know, he's and Eddie

3:25

had a great experience working with him on his solo

3:27

record, and so we just all said, well, you

3:29

know, we'll show up. That sounds fun, easy,

3:32

and you know, immediately we were we

3:34

were making music and good

3:37

stuff was happening. So we sort of

3:39

we got hooked in pretty quick to

3:41

the process.

3:42

Do you think this setting had anything to do

3:45

with like recording at Shangri Law and being

3:47

near the ocean and being in California,

3:49

Do you think that influenced the music at all?

3:52

You know, I mean we started at Andrew's house

3:54

the first session, so the second session was

3:56

sort of like thrown together last minute.

3:59

And Rick opened up some time for us at

4:01

Shangri La, which was very

4:03

generous. I love that studio

4:05

me right, Like, I love that there's

4:08

like no TV and that had sort of minimal

4:10

and there's like, really the only thing you can do

4:12

if you're not playing music is to shoot pool.

4:15

I love it when like the five of us

4:17

can get in a room and just be focused,

4:19

and it just feels like when

4:22

we can do that, we always hit a vein in

4:24

that session. There's three days where it's

4:27

just that spot that you want to be as a vand

4:29

where it's just like it's just going,

4:31

you know, And that studio had

4:33

a lot to do with us making

4:36

a record really quickly.

4:37

I think I think we got maybe four from

4:39

the very first session, which was in

4:41

Beverly Hills at Andrew's old spot,

4:44

and that was like a year previous

4:46

and we were there for ten days or something

4:49

like that, maybe seven or eight, I can't remember,

4:51

but we hit something that was great,

4:53

but there was also some stuff that we kind of started

4:56

to maybe sort of kind of think too much

4:58

again or get too much on our old

5:00

process. And I think then we had a

5:02

year off and it was amazing to go back

5:04

and then sort of have memories of

5:06

what we did that first time and then really kind of go

5:09

and everyone stayed, you

5:11

know, pretty focused of and it's

5:13

really the focus being whatever

5:16

you're you know, bringing in today or however

5:18

the song starts to go, just be ready

5:20

for it to kind of get ripped open and rearranged

5:24

and touched by everyone. And

5:26

you have to have some courage when it

5:28

comes to that kind of stuff. But also that it

5:31

just makes it so much more of a band thing. Everyone's

5:33

invested. Everybody is like writing

5:35

and thinking about the song at that moment,

5:37

and I mean, we've done it before like

5:40

that, but I don't ever want to go back.

5:42

Honestly. It was like, you know, in terms of

5:44

that process, I loved it.

5:46

You know, how does the band handle when there's

5:48

like little squabbles over parts of songs,

5:51

like if somebody brings something and you

5:53

start playing, and somebody wants to take it in a

5:55

different direction, and not everybody's agreeing.

5:57

What's the communication like and who

6:00

ultimately wins?

6:02

I mean, I think we were trusting Andrew really

6:04

on this record. Because he's a producer

6:07

and we're going to make a record with you, you might as well trust his

6:09

instincts and and go with it.

6:11

So I think that having him there was

6:13

was helpful in terms of just navigating

6:15

that stuff. I think if anything gets too

6:17

squabbly, we just move on to something else,

6:20

and that this gets left behind probably more

6:22

than anything. So I think all of us,

6:24

you know, got to see how

6:27

the group process ended up being

6:29

a better process for almost everything.

6:32

You know, at every juncture

6:34

you'd kind of you know, and it was all

6:36

very quick, which would make it better. It's

6:38

like it's sort of ripping the band it off quick, you know, it's

6:40

like got an idea, throw it down, it's

6:42

already changed. It's you know, it's gone before

6:45

you you know, And it

6:47

was great. And Ed is inspired

6:49

in those situations too. He writes so

6:51

quickly when he's in on the

6:54

process of the writing, as opposed to just

6:56

getting a demo and like sitting

6:58

with it in his room for weeks. You know.

7:00

It's like it's it's much

7:02

more fruitful for him to be there

7:05

saying let's double that, or I don't

7:08

like that part, let me get back to that other thing

7:10

quicker, you know, Or I need a chord here,

7:12

I need a different chord getting me to this, you

7:14

know, to this next bit. And

7:16

then it just becomes kind of a group

7:18

process that's not the same

7:21

as an individual kind of writing a

7:23

song, but it's and that's I think that's

7:25

what's special about this record is that it really is a

7:27

lot of reconstructed,

7:29

sort of quickly ideas, you know.

7:32

And I think we learned a long time ago that

7:34

if you're fighting too hard for something, it

7:36

usually even if it ends up on the record, it

7:39

usually I don't think it ends up being

7:41

a joyful memory for the rest

7:43

of the band, and even a joyful memory for you as

7:45

the writer. I think. So I feel

7:47

like as I've gotten older, I welcome

7:49

like ripping my thing open, and

7:52

I think it's far more interesting that way. I think the

7:54

collaborative process to me is like one

7:57

of the most interesting things,

7:59

Like if you can really trust the other people

8:02

in the band that you're collaborating with, it will

8:04

usually come back way more interesting and

8:07

have a different perspective that you can

8:09

have if you're just have tunnel vision, you

8:11

know, for your songs. So you know,

8:13

it's not that different than how we made

8:15

you know, the last couple of records with Brendan really I

8:17

mean moving super fast

8:20

and you know, FAD's not sort

8:22

of latching onto something, moving on to the next

8:24

thing, and so we're I think we're better

8:27

in those.

8:27

Yeah. I think Andrew's enthusiasm,

8:30

his unbridled enthusiasm,

8:32

was an element of it. He never

8:35

he never let us get down on ourselves

8:38

at all individually. For me, like playing in there

8:40

and sometimes being in there and going, you know, I

8:42

don't know what I'm doing. It's like he would no

8:45

matter what, he would just be like, oh that's great,

8:47

no way, go back, you know, like he would just

8:49

have this like you're gonna get You're gonna

8:51

figure this out. You're my favorite guitar player.

8:53

You know.

8:53

It's like just you know what I mean, but not

8:55

necessarily that, but it's just like he just

8:58

just infused you with He wasn't

9:00

gonna let it get you down and he knew

9:02

that that's not where you're going to get a good performance.

9:04

So yeah, it's manipulative on one

9:07

hand, but it also works, you know. And

9:09

so I think, you know, his knowing

9:12

the songs and loving Pearl Jam so

9:15

much and just being a fan it was a

9:17

major factor in sort of keeping

9:19

the thing moving along and him really

9:21

actually, I know how to play all your songs. I

9:23

can show you where you know, you know that

9:26

this should have been a minor chord, but you didn't. It's

9:28

just cool. I'm so glad that you did that, like

9:30

you know, so he was.

9:33

He had a lot of energy for that. So that was

9:35

that was a big factor I think.

9:36

In the record. Yeah, and and and talking about

9:38

those times when you're stuck. He could reference old

9:41

songs. He would be like, yeah, like that thing that you do

9:43

in Hail Hail, or he would reference things

9:45

you'd be like and sometimes that would unstick you

9:47

because it would like pull you out of

9:49

a pattern that you were stuck in and it would make you

9:51

think about it in a different pattern. And you

9:54

know, I never felt stuck for more

9:56

than a minute. Wow, you know when you were when you

9:58

were working on stuff with him.

9:59

So I'm fascinated by Andrew Watt because

10:01

he's now produced albums for

10:03

Ozzy Osbourne, Iggy Pop, He's

10:06

working with you guys, the Rolling Stones

10:08

last record.

10:10

Yeah, he's just going through his collection of childhood

10:12

bands and going, I'm gonna work with this man, and I'm

10:14

gonna work with this man. It's all his reality.

10:17

We're just you know, we're just part of his dream

10:19

right now, which is great. We'll take a

10:21

ride with him.

10:21

It's incredible. And is he like, was

10:24

there anything since he has such a deep knowledge

10:26

of Pearl Jam, was there anything from

10:28

your catalog that he felt like he wanted

10:31

to hear more of from a.

10:33

Fan perspective completely,

10:35

But he wouldn't necessarily tell us exactly

10:37

what that was. But I think he wanted

10:40

us to write more kind of

10:42

collectively and quickly, kind of probably

10:44

more like our earlier process was where it's

10:46

like we didn't have any time or we never even realized

10:49

you could have more time, and so we just stuff was

10:51

just happening quick and nobody had time to

10:53

think about it too much. And then just he wanted

10:55

to make a heavy record. I think he really wanted

10:57

it to be an aggressive Pearl Jam record and

11:00

from the get go, so and

11:02

he he had great sounds right away.

11:05

You know, we just went into the studio and he

11:07

kind of had stuff's kind of set up. You could

11:09

go on and try this amp or try that guitar, but

11:12

it was all kind of dialed in. So we

11:14

were stuff was sounding good like kind of

11:16

immediately. So that was that was good.

11:18

He works fast, kept us interested

11:20

for sure.

11:21

And I had a lot of conversations

11:23

after that first session, you know, like

11:25

phone conversations with him where he would ask about

11:28

how did this song get written? How did that song get written?

11:31

And so he was I think he was

11:33

like trying to mine like, okay

11:35

that whatever the process was

11:37

on that particular song, that's we

11:40

need to revisit that process. Not

11:42

necessarily like a similar riff

11:44

or a similar sound even, but like the

11:46

creative process. I think he was really trying to tap

11:49

into, you know, ultimately,

11:51

I think the best way we work with each other. I mean, I

11:53

think it's we talk about it all the time

11:55

about I think we all have

11:57

strengths that sometimes like if we lean

11:59

into those strengths that it turns

12:01

out better.

12:03

Can you quickly like run down what

12:05

you feel everyone in the band's strengths

12:07

are like who does what the best

12:10

man?

12:10

Well, I mean, we have ed who

12:13

can like if you have a if

12:15

you have two chords or an interesting repetitive

12:17

pattern, he can write a melody

12:19

over that that's like memorable,

12:22

and he can attach words to it that make you

12:24

feel something deeply, which to

12:26

me is one of the most incredible things

12:29

to witness, to be in the room when that's happening and something's

12:31

coming out of the ether and then all of a sudden the line comes

12:33

out that's like this, you know, just this

12:35

beautiful two line piece

12:38

of poetry. Yeah, we have that. We

12:40

have Matt Cameron in the band,

12:42

who can, like you know, play drums

12:45

around anything and make it interesting and has

12:47

such a unique style and such a unique

12:50

way to like accent things

12:52

and places that you wouldn't expect,

12:54

which sometimes turns

12:56

the groove around in a really cool way. We have

12:58

Mike McCready, who fucking

13:01

rips and if you're working

13:03

fast and he's just playing, it's like you

13:05

tap into that thing that you know, you

13:07

have a guy that can really take a song over

13:09

the top. I think Stone and I are

13:11

sort of the lunch pale guys. I think Stone would come

13:14

in with a riff and I might say, hey,

13:16

what if we simplify that little part

13:19

of the riff, or he has a really busy riff

13:21

and I'll just find the three big chords that sort

13:23

of work over that riff. And

13:25

I think sometimes some of the best stuff

13:27

that we've done have been in that, in

13:29

that spirit.

13:30

And then you have Jeff who's ear and his

13:33

listening to kind of the whole picture and

13:35

understanding how where the glue

13:37

needs to be, understanding really

13:39

listening to the vocal, really understanding where

13:41

how the vocal sits in the track and supporting

13:44

that and sort of being this ear

13:46

that has that you know, that big picture

13:49

perspective on sonics and

13:52

music history and you know an

13:54

incredible you know audio file.

13:56

Well, let me say one more good thing about Stone, because

13:59

he's just said such nice things. But Stone

14:01

also plays guitar like a drummer, Like

14:03

his right hand is almost like having another drummer

14:05

in the band, which I think some of the

14:07

best stuff that we've done are when there's sort of

14:09

almost those two kind

14:11

of frenetic rhythmic elements

14:14

happening when the drummer and Stone's right hand

14:16

are sort of battling or

14:18

you know, joining up. And I think there's I think

14:20

there's moments on this record that have kind

14:23

of classic Stone riffage.

14:26

I was just gonna say, I think Dark Matter is a really great

14:28

example of and I think that was one

14:30

of the last, one of the last songs we wrote,

14:32

but that that's a great example of the sort

14:34

of mishmash of what is possible.

14:36

And it started out with Matt Cameron stepping

14:39

in the day before and just warming

14:41

up on his drums, getting ready to record that day,

14:43

and just starts playing this beat, which

14:45

is the beat that's in Dark Matter, but it was he

14:48

was kind of playing it on his snare and it wasn't like as

14:50

aggressive as that, but it was like that beat

14:52

was there, and we all just looked at each other and

14:54

went, that's what he does every day. It's amazing. It comes

14:56

in he plays that thing. It's like, how is that not a song? And

14:59

we just rolled tape and we grabbed

15:01

that beat and we looped it, and

15:03

Jeff and I took that same loop poem

15:05

that night and both of us wrote different parts

15:08

that ended up being the verse and kind of the chorus

15:10

melody parts and The

15:13

next day, we had a song that was

15:15

this weird combination of

15:19

everybody's sort of you know, being

15:21

there, but not anybody being in charge

15:24

of what happened. And I just

15:26

I live for that stuff. Now. It's like, I

15:28

want to make a whole record where it's just like, don't

15:30

bring anything in, or bring

15:33

in only bits and pieces. You know, if

15:35

we need a bit or a piece, be ready

15:37

for it. But that that group arrangement

15:40

is just a it's brilliant, and it's I

15:42

think it's less common now. There's just more

15:45

individual songwriting efforts and brilliant

15:47

songwriting efforts. And I love that

15:49

our place in rock right now might be more

15:52

of like, hey, we do it as a we do

15:54

it in a way that you can't replicate

15:56

because you can't, you know, five different

15:59

states of mind are attacking it from

16:01

a different point of view. So I think

16:03

that's a great example of what's

16:05

possible when you write as a group.

16:07

Yeah, and that Stone, how would you

16:09

describe how you and Mike McCready play off

16:11

each other and how you come up

16:13

with your parts together? How does that process

16:15

work?

16:17

You know, we just we just kind of feel it out. I think

16:19

the less we talk about it, the better it is

16:21

in general. But you know, I think,

16:24

you know, as you play in a band, you kind of look

16:27

for the spot where nobody's playing, or

16:29

maybe there's a point in the musical phrase

16:31

whereas it needs some support or

16:33

it's something sagging or you need

16:35

to So I kind of usually

16:38

head for that spot and that accent, and

16:40

I'll start just figuring out maybe

16:43

it's a one note thing, or maybe it's like just a two

16:45

note climb into that note, or you know, you

16:47

just start kind of going through your little process

16:50

of taking little building blocks

16:52

and stacking them up and kind of seeing if it feels

16:55

like it supports the

16:57

architecture of the song or whatever. And

16:59

I think Mike comes from a place of very

17:02

much just needs to feel it

17:04

and then just needs to play and winds

17:07

his way through, you know, a

17:09

track, and just finds

17:12

his malady or his feel

17:15

that makes him feel good.

17:16

You know, Jeff, you

17:18

mentioned that there wasn't anything to do at

17:20

Shangri La other than to play pool.

17:22

You know, in between recording Hanging

17:24

Out, I noticed on the

17:26

intro of the first song, Scared of Fear,

17:29

it sounds like it builds to a pool break.

17:33

Yeah, was that inspired by

17:35

Shangri Law. And I'm just curious

17:37

how you guys have thought traditionally about

17:40

the album openers, like those little

17:42

intros to the albums.

17:44

Oh well, that was a piece that I sort of came up

17:46

with. It sort of felt like the pool break

17:49

right at the start of the record didn't feel like it,

17:52

I felt maybe too abrupt, and

17:54

so yeah,

17:56

I recorded most of that in Montana,

17:59

like just kind of going back and forth

18:01

with Andrew, like you know, him saying like, yeah,

18:03

it should be twenty five thirty seconds, and

18:05

so I gave him like a minute with

18:08

a bunch of ambient loops and yeah,

18:11

a bunch of music. And I love

18:13

making that sort of stuff, and which we you know,

18:15

our very first record, the Master

18:18

Slave Pieces, was sort of

18:20

a very early sort of version of

18:23

that kind of piece of music. And some

18:25

of it was me taking the actually

18:27

the little melody at the end of the record

18:30

and sort of changing I actually took

18:32

that little three chord melody

18:34

that Ed's playing on guitar at the end of the

18:36

record, and I sort of transposed

18:39

it to fit a key lower than the

18:41

beginning of the key that that scared

18:44

of fear starts so just to just to make it feel

18:46

like there was a little boost when when

18:48

Stone comes in with that riff.

18:50

Very cool.

18:51

That is the That is the pool Table from Yeah,

18:54

yeah, that's recorded there. And was

18:56

it Sean Penn?

18:57

A couple of annoyments.

18:58

I think it was maybe Sean Penn that.

19:00

Broke the seems like a solid break.

19:02

Yeah, it looks like the I bet the balls

19:04

spread around the table. It wasn't the.

19:07

Fanciest MIC's ever on pool

19:09

Table.

19:09

How many takes did they get though? It's like two

19:12

hours of like, let's do it again, but I'm.

19:14

At most after

19:17

quick break, will be back with more from Leah Rose,

19:19

Stone Gossard and Jeff Ament. We're

19:25

back with Stone, Gossard and Jeff Ament.

19:29

I'm curious about the song Wreckage,

19:31

which I love so much. It's so pretty.

19:34

How did that song come about? What do you remember

19:36

from that session?

19:38

The main thing I remember is Ed sitting down

19:40

the guitar and sort of playing the

19:42

basically the chords to the verse, and

19:45

then we just kind of moved through that. Ed

19:47

kind of kept adding parts. I

19:50

mean that song, I mean, from my standpoint,

19:52

it felt like it was getting written on

19:54

the move, you know, like as he was adding chords,

19:57

then another vocal melody happens

19:59

and we got the

20:01

bulk of that song down I think in

20:03

a few hours.

20:05

Yeah, man, I think that there's an open

20:07

G tuning which is Andrew kind of coming

20:09

along with that sort of a distinctive

20:12

It sort of breaks it out of what might

20:15

be a little bit more of a straightforward song

20:17

and it sort of adds some harmonic

20:20

and rhythmic variety to it. So

20:22

I think that's a pretty distinctive part of

20:24

that track, as well as that sort of

20:27

openg strum that he's got going.

20:29

On there, and also upper Hand.

20:32

That's one of these songs that it sounds like

20:34

it's going to be so incredible

20:36

live. Do you think about

20:39

how the songs are going to translate

20:41

to the stage when you're recording

20:43

them or before you go in or is

20:46

that a consideration?

20:48

I don't think I do. I think there

20:50

was something about when they created that piece.

20:52

I mean that was Ed, and Andrew and Josh that

20:54

sort of created that pre instrumental piece.

20:57

I can imagine like when you're creating that

20:59

that you're setting a

21:01

mood and a tone for the song that's about

21:04

to come, and we sort of

21:06

got into that yesterday and rehearsal, just trying

21:08

to recreate this sounds of that of that piece. It's

21:10

gonna be it's gonna be a fun one just because it's gonna

21:12

it's gonna create such a mood live. I

21:15

think, you

21:17

know how the outro is. It's it's

21:19

sort of a wide open outro,

21:21

you know, it's sort of a place where again

21:23

where Mike and Matt can really shine.

21:26

Yeah, it's a nice it's nice that we that

21:28

that opening piece really gives it more

21:30

room to get to that sort

21:33

of crescendo. You know, Without

21:35

it, I think it would be it's almost too short,

21:37

like you wouldn't be in the song long enough before you're

21:39

at the crescendo. So this is sort of gives that nice

21:43

runway to kind of ease you into it. And

21:46

it's a beautiful it's a beautiful piece.

21:48

It is beautiful.

21:49

Josh Klinghoffer really sort of wrote the chords.

21:51

I think to that.

21:52

When it comes to writing songs

21:54

that end up being anthemic, are

21:57

there any like tricks or

21:59

anything that you can always

22:02

rely on or is that not even a

22:04

consideration when you're making

22:06

music?

22:07

What do you mean by them just

22:10

like something that.

22:11

Will soar on stage

22:13

in a live setting.

22:16

I think, I mean if usually the

22:18

kinds of things that translate and that are

22:20

allowed to sort pretty simple in

22:22

terms of their presentation. I

22:25

think the more detail you get, you

22:27

know, as you if you're writing a song in your

22:29

house and you're sort of starting to add on more parts

22:31

and you're kind of your acoustic part is getting

22:33

more complex, all of that stuff tends

22:36

to not translate when it comes

22:38

to a room where two big

22:40

chords and some space, yeah,

22:42

and one riff where everybody's kind

22:44

of playing together at one point, and then maybe

22:46

it opens up and does something else. But I

22:48

just think, you know, it really is primary

22:51

colors to start out with, you know, and

22:53

a change that feels

22:55

good or that has impactful

22:58

you know, chord change or a rhythmic pulse

23:00

change or a tempo change

23:02

or whatever it is. So yeah, but I think

23:04

simplicity is probably the key, you know, and

23:07

I think that's that's a good place for us to be, is

23:10

not getting too into the detail

23:12

of all the different

23:14

ways you can play the same chord.

23:16

Before we move on from the

23:19

new album, are there any songs, any stories

23:21

about recording the songs that you want

23:23

to talk about, anything that really

23:25

stands out.

23:27

I love the story of How We Got

23:29

Won't Tell, which started

23:31

out with Jeff Amett having a dream. And

23:34

I've been telling this and I'm not sure i've been I'm

23:36

not sure I'm telling the story right.

23:38

Yeah, I mean without going I mean it's kind

23:41

of a long story. But I had a fairly

23:43

realized dream of a song that I woke up,

23:45

which I occasionally do and you

23:47

sort of lay down and usually when

23:49

you listen to it again, it's like nonsensical and

23:52

bad and whatever. But this thing actually

23:54

was like when I listened to it, I was like, Wow,

23:56

there's something in there, and even the lyric.

23:59

I think we were like, you know, probably

24:01

three quarters of the way through the

24:03

last session, and I

24:06

was there early, and Andrew had said, hey,

24:08

hey, you got something, and so I played him and he goes,

24:10

man, that's awesome, and it was a complete

24:12

song, and he said, what if we just

24:14

give Ed the lyrics and

24:17

the band can learn the music and

24:19

let Ed sort of interpret the lyrics.

24:23

And it took a couple of a

24:25

couple of rounds for Ed to sort of, like

24:28

I think, come up with something that he was super

24:30

happy about. But he ended up coming

24:32

up with like almost as like a dream

24:35

of a dream. You know. It's

24:37

like me telling him and then him sort of interpreting

24:40

it in this almost like kind of a psychedelic

24:43

way, which the dream was pretty psychedelic.

24:45

So it was just a brand new way to

24:47

write a song. Yeah, and it was. The

24:50

song was written on a baritone

24:52

guitar. Josh Klinghoffer had bought us

24:54

all these baritone guitars, and I had

24:56

it in this open tuning and

25:00

had kind of written the piece in that because the dream

25:02

involved an electric dulcimer

25:06

that sounded kind of like Neil Young,

25:08

but it was a woman playing this electric

25:11

dulcimer. So you're not.

25:12

Talking about Joni Mitchell. I don't

25:14

know. But is it Joni Mitchell's

25:16

in the dream, isn't she? That's the thoughts like, yeah,

25:20

yeah, Joni Mitchell came to him in this

25:22

sleep.

25:23

We had a we had a we had a Yeah,

25:25

we had a conversation in the dream.

25:26

Wow, what did you guys talk about?

25:28

It was about a song that she and Neil wrote together,

25:31

and this is that song. Wow, this

25:33

is the song.

25:34

But we're not going to share publishing or something about

25:37

it.

25:37

So have you guys

25:39

ever played with Joni?

25:41

We haven't. We did share

25:43

an airplane ride with her, like in about ninety

25:46

three in Canada, and and then

25:48

when we got on the plane, she was I was sitting in the

25:50

aisle seat and she was sitting in the aisle seat right across

25:52

from me, and I, I mean, this is

25:54

this might come off as stocker ish, but

25:57

I was listening to a lot of Joni Mitchell the time. So

25:59

I reached into my CD wallet, which it was nineteen

26:02

ninety three, so and I put in Blue,

26:04

and I put in my headphones, and during the flight,

26:06

I would just look overever every once in a while and go

26:09

wow, like.

26:10

You just like stare at her in mouth.

26:12

I didn't stare at her. I didn't stare

26:14

at her, but I was I sort of felt like I'm in Canada

26:17

and I'm listening to Blue and I'm sitting across

26:19

from Johny Mitchell. So there it is crazy

26:22

reverence. I mean, she's like one of my favorite

26:25

just artists because she's I

26:27

think as much because she's a great painter

26:29

as a great musician. I love

26:32

that in her feel her right

26:34

hand and just her how she tells

26:37

stories, like, you know, I think it leans

26:39

on jazz, but it's so her because

26:41

she small town Canadian girl.

26:44

You know, I think I think I relate to that part

26:46

of it too, because she she sort of grew up

26:48

not too far from where I grew up, just across

26:50

the border.

26:51

So oh, that's so cool. After

26:55

ten took off in the beginning and

26:57

all of a sudden, you guys started playing with

26:59

other like really huge artists.

27:02

Was there anybody who you found yourself on stage

27:04

with where you were just like, what is going

27:06

on?

27:08

Everybody?

27:09

I mean, I mean we felt I felt that

27:12

a way about the Chili Peppers right off the bat, when the Chili

27:14

Peppers took us out just watching John

27:16

Feschanti every night in Chad, and I mean there was the

27:18

way those guys played. It was so much

27:22

bigger than anything we'd ever heard in

27:24

terms of like, oh that's how you like, that's how

27:26

your stage can sound, that's how they play the

27:28

whole sound. And

27:30

I think we were still in our you

27:33

know, all the vibrations were very fast,

27:35

we were we weren't tuning

27:37

into each other in the same way that we've learned

27:40

more now to be able to do. But that

27:42

was an amazing experience, you know, seeing

27:45

you know, seeing Neil Young play with Booker

27:47

T and the MGS and Jim

27:50

Keltner. That was like never

27:52

done. Yeah, I mean, never heard of pocket like

27:54

that deep before. It's like everyone was

27:57

out pocketing each other. It's like you

28:00

know what I mean, like the one was somewhere,

28:02

you know, incredible. So I

28:04

mean, but we've had that over and over again, you know, seeing

28:07

you two play and all all the

28:09

early opportunities

28:12

to see bands go on.

28:13

That the show we played with Keith Richards and

28:15

Steve Jordan and Charlie Drayton, that show

28:18

was also just witnessing

28:20

bands play with so much space. I think that's

28:23

I do remember on those Neil Booker T. I

28:26

remember just sort of listening to a

28:28

conversation that Keltner and Duck Dunn were having

28:30

about like, yeah, we keep Duck

28:32

would say like, yeah, well keep asking Neil, we're

28:35

playing the groove. Doesn't feel like we're playing the groove in the right

28:37

place. And because it sort

28:39

of helped make Neil's

28:41

songs, they just sounded

28:44

different. Those Crazy Horse songs sounded different with Booker

28:46

T and those guys, it

28:48

just swung differently, but the

28:50

space, the space like watching Duck

28:53

and Keltner play together was like, I

28:55

mean, there was four or five shows where I remember I was just sort

28:57

of sitting between them, like fifteen

28:59

feet from them, taking

29:02

basically a masterclass and rhythm section, you

29:04

know, and going like that's how you play on a

29:06

mid tempo song, like right there. I

29:08

mean, my chi. I think my playing changed

29:12

overnight from playing in those ten shows.

29:14

Neil seems like he's so energized when he's

29:17

playing with you guys. Has he ever

29:20

articulated to you like what it is about

29:22

Pearl Jam that gets him like so pumped?

29:25

You know? He called me last summer

29:28

they were mixing Mirror Ball and at

29:30

Most, and he was just so he

29:32

was so generous and so kind, like in

29:34

terms of he just goes man like, you know, your

29:36

guys is playing on this is so great. And I

29:39

think I moved so fast from record to record.

29:41

I don't really I don't really

29:43

get a chance to listen back, but I'm really

29:45

listening to how you guys chose

29:47

to play, and I appreciate it so much and I

29:49

hope we get to do it again and of course you're like, oh,

29:52

can we please do it again because we'll be even well,

29:54

we'll give you more space and we'll be so much better

29:56

than we were in nineteen ninety five.

29:58

After him playing, he plays the song once for

30:01

us. We learned the chords and he's like, okay, we're going to

30:03

record it, and then you record it and it's like done, great.

30:05

You know, it's like I was just you

30:07

know, warming up. Mostly we were just trying

30:09

to remember the chords, you know, which, of course

30:11

he loves because that's how he is.

30:13

He's like, oh, that's great. You know, it's like, which

30:16

is fun. But playing with Neil is

30:19

you know, that's such an honor. It's

30:21

just like incredible, you know.

30:23

Yeah.

30:23

He seems so just like open

30:25

and connected to whatever it is that

30:28

sends him information and inspiration.

30:31

Yeah, and then he just loses his

30:33

mind and then you get to lose your mind too. You know.

30:35

It's just like playing you know, three chords,

30:38

which is there's nothing

30:40

more satisfying than being having transcendence

30:42

in three chords where it's like it's not you

30:45

know, it's not all the years of your

30:47

studying music and it's not you know, any

30:49

sort of science or any kind of you know,

30:52

anything that is rigor you

30:54

know, it's just literally joyful

30:57

play with three notes.

31:01

How long does it take you, guys to get comfortable with

31:03

somebody like that in the studio? Like do

31:05

you go in there super nervous

31:08

or or like is there a period

31:10

of time where you have to sort of settle in?

31:14

I remember that session. I remember sweating

31:16

a lot, and then

31:18

and then I got crazy sick, like the

31:20

fourth or fifth day, like I think

31:23

that was the day they recorded that

31:26

many days I did it, It was it

31:28

was five days total, but it was four days of recording

31:30

the Neil songs, and then the fifth

31:33

day they went in and they

31:35

recorded that version of I Got id Okay, which

31:37

I but I had I had the flu like

31:40

for two days, so it might

31:42

have just been like pushing down the

31:44

pressure and the anxiety and just trying to

31:46

you know, in the focus, and you're in

31:49

the studio with like one

31:51

of your favorite if not your favorite artist ever

31:53

and not wanting to let him down

31:55

and let the whole session down.

31:57

So none of us are studio musicians. I mean there's

31:59

people that can come in and like chart things

32:02

out in two seconds, like play by ear

32:04

in such a way that you know, lots and

32:06

lots of people can do that that's never been certainly

32:08

not ever in my you know. So

32:10

you know, you're kind of trying to find the basic

32:13

chords and then quickly find something

32:15

that helps those chords. And it

32:17

was nerve wracking for me for sure

32:19

too.

32:20

I mean half the record, I because

32:23

I listened to that most mixed after he said

32:25

that they mixed it, and half the record,

32:27

I'm like, I don't remember playing that at all. Wow, Like

32:29

you know, there's places where I'm moving a lot, and I'm like, man,

32:32

I don't remember playing that at all.

32:33

Do you like it when you hear it back?

32:35

Oh? Yeah, It's probably one of my favorite

32:37

things that we've ever done. And I think it's partly

32:40

like that. It was largely

32:42

like a dream. It felt

32:44

like a dream because he would come in, well,

32:47

he had two songs at the start, he had Active Love

32:50

and Downtown, and then

32:52

he would go stay on his boat at

32:54

night and come in and I remember like the second or

32:56

third day came in with the ocean and it was like

32:59

it was like six pieces of paper taped

33:01

together and it was like just you

33:03

know, like Bob Dylan verse, you know, just like

33:06

twenty verses and kind

33:08

of going like, oh shit, like this

33:10

is going to be a lot. But

33:12

it was essentially three chords for

33:15

eight minutes.

33:16

Yeah, he was just going back to wherever he was

33:18

staying on his boat. Is that what he was saying. Yeah, he was just going

33:20

back to his boat and like, you know, smoking

33:22

weed and fucking writing new songs.

33:24

And then he'd come in and go, Okay, here's his next song, you

33:27

know. So we were just experiencing

33:29

it with him in that moment. So

33:31

he was he was just happy to have to

33:33

turn into something, and we were just

33:35

kind of on for the ride.

33:37

Since I have both you guys together, is it okay if I ask

33:39

you a little bit about Green River?

33:42

Sure?

33:43

How do you feel about like talking about the old stuff

33:45

in general? Is it a drag?

33:47

Fine? No? No?

33:48

Love it?

33:49

No?

33:49

Okay? Cool? How did you guys

33:52

even meet? How did you start playing together?

33:55

Well, it's it's I think it's like almost forty

33:57

years to the day, like somewhere March

34:00

April, four years ago. We met

34:03

at the Metropolis, which was a

34:05

sort of communal punk rock club that sky

34:08

Hugo opened up up and

34:10

I'm not even sure if there was a band playing that night,

34:12

but I was hanging out with Mark and

34:15

Stone, and Stone was

34:17

with his friend Chris Pepperd and Stone

34:20

and Chris represented a very youthful, sarcastic

34:24

Pacific Northwestern energy

34:26

and I had sort of a farm kid Montana,

34:30

not like serious energy,

34:34

and I think it was like it was like an odd

34:36

you know, it was a little bit of a weird first

34:39

meeting. And then like within

34:41

a month or two, Mark

34:43

and Steve were like, hey, we want our friends

34:46

Stone to play and I was like Stone the guy that I met,

34:48

Like, I was like, ah, not

34:50

sure.

34:51

You know about that guy?

34:53

And then I remember Steve, which is which is

34:55

this is crazy because when you think about the how

34:58

that band sort of worked, and even part

35:00

of the reason that maybe Steve didn't want to be in the

35:02

band anymore because we got too heavy. Steve

35:05

was selling me on Stone, saying like he's got

35:07

a Marshall and a Les Paul, And

35:09

in my mind, I was like fantastic, like

35:12

like two guitar, you know, two guitars, it'll be

35:14

you know, because Steve was playing really

35:17

super clean guitar. Yeah,

35:19

yeah, he had a super twin

35:21

that was like really loud but just so piercingly

35:24

clean, and so I was like distorting

35:26

my bass more and more just trying to like make

35:29

it into whatever I thought

35:31

that the band should be. And so the idea

35:33

that there was going to be a less pollent of Marshall

35:36

that convinced you that that won me

35:38

over.

35:40

What do you remember Stone about your first

35:42

meeting.

35:43

Just like a flash of like kind

35:45

of outside talking, you know, outside

35:47

the metropolis, you know, having a conversation,

35:50

and you know, but this is this

35:52

is at a time where I probably have been playing guitar

35:54

for maybe a year and just

35:56

like kind of you know, dinking around on it,

35:58

like I wasn't a guitar player. I

36:00

mean I could play a barcord

36:03

maybe at that point. So but the

36:05

idea that you know, that that was

36:07

cool and that and that we

36:09

all kind of just decided to be

36:11

in a band together, and that it's gone on

36:14

in this way that it has. It's one of

36:16

the great mysteries and you

36:19

know, phenomenons obviously

36:21

of our lives, but just like it just

36:24

goes to show that you just you

36:26

don't know where something's gonna

36:29

go, and you have to kind of follow it and Jeff's

36:31

and I's journey with each other I think

36:34

symbolized by that first encounter

36:36

that we didn't we haven't always understood

36:38

each other, and we haven't always I think

36:41

that we see the world in different ways,

36:43

and I think we're in our like you

36:45

know, late honeymoon right now where

36:47

we're just like, well, you know, we get to see each

36:49

other and we're kind of like, wow, this is still going, this is

36:51

pretty good. How did this work out? You know, because

36:54

it's it's really phenomenal.

36:56

But you know, I think us sticking

36:59

it out with each other in certain

37:01

ways has been one of the It's the biggest

37:03

thing that's happened in my life for sure,

37:05

in terms of all the things that I've learned

37:07

from Jeff and

37:09

and that we've learned together in

37:12

our just by having our relationship

37:14

work, all the other the community that's

37:16

connected to Jeff and I through the years,

37:19

it's it's crazy, it's incredible. Yeah,

37:21

it's weird.

37:22

I saw an interview that you guys did in nineteen

37:24

ninety right after it seemed like maybe

37:26

a month or so after Andy Wood

37:28

had died, and you

37:31

were sort of like stuck with the album with

37:34

the Mother Love Bone with the Apple album, and

37:36

I guess it was time to promote it. And

37:39

there's one point, Jeff where you're like, yeah, like

37:41

who knows, like what we're even going to do

37:43

next, And it was I don't know, like how

37:46

soon before that was that Pearl Jam

37:49

came together, but it was just such a crazy

37:51

moment to see captured on video. Do

37:53

you remember that time?

37:54

Well, yeah, I and I think about

37:56

that time a lot because I

37:58

think how we both

38:02

reacted to Andy passing.

38:05

We both handled it really different ways.

38:08

You know. Our relationship has been this slow

38:10

reveal of each other and understanding

38:13

each other. And I think there's a there's a point

38:15

when like you come from such

38:17

different backgrounds and have such different

38:19

sort of chemistry, you

38:22

know. I feel like it probably took ten fifteen

38:24

years into our relationship where I was like where

38:26

I really like trusted

38:29

and really respected

38:32

Stone, you know. And I think you

38:34

say the same thing. But I think

38:36

that's been the why the journey

38:39

has lasted this long. I think I think

38:41

like a part of me feels like why did

38:43

it take me that long? And I

38:45

think some of it's like you're in your twenties and I

38:48

think even moving through Andy

38:50

passing, like to be honest,

38:52

like I didn't have much of a safety

38:54

net at that point. So I was like I felt

38:56

a teeny bit of desperation, like, how

38:59

am I going to pay my rent? I'm twenty

39:01

seven years old? Do I need to go back to

39:03

school? You know? Does lightning

39:05

only strike once? Is that over? And

39:08

so it was probably the first time in my life

39:10

where I felt pressure. I felt real,

39:12

real pressure on. Like I sort

39:15

of felt like I lost my

39:17

my will or my you know, the strand

39:19

that I was sort of on that you know, it

39:22

was a little bit haphazard, and you're sort of

39:24

living paycheck to paycheck and you're just playing

39:26

music and having fun with your friends and

39:29

whatever. But then there's a point you're twenty seven, twenty

39:31

eight years old, and this thing that you've sort of been working

39:33

on for you know, three years with Yeah,

39:36

and you.

39:36

Guys had gotten a deal that would probably was like super

39:38

exciting and like felt like you were in some real

39:40

traction.

39:41

Yeah, I just quit my job. Was the first time in my life

39:43

I didn't have a job, you know. So yeah,

39:46

and you know, and Stone like hit

39:48

the ground running and wrote a bunch of beautiful

39:50

tracks that ended up you know, I mean black,

39:53

you know, I mean arguably the best

39:55

song that we've written as a band. And

39:57

Stone came up with that music that right off

39:59

the bat, you knew that there was like this beautiful

40:04

energy behind it, and that the melody

40:06

and the outro that he wrote, like

40:09

you know, that was how he responded to

40:11

Andy passing. And whereas I was like, I

40:14

was scrambling. I didn't know. I didn't know if I was gonna play

40:17

music anymore. I thought maybe I'll go back to school

40:19

and be a teacher, you know, back

40:21

home, work on the farm. I didn't know. So thank

40:24

god that Stone wrote those songs.

40:26

And I was hanging out with Mike

40:28

a bunch. He worked right across the street from me, and they

40:30

were playing together. And so Mike was working me

40:32

and Mike was working Stone, and it's sort of

40:35

like we ended up playing together.

40:36

Luckily, I live with my parents, so I didn't feel the same

40:38

kind of pressure that Jeff felt as far as

40:42

I was twenty four years old living with my parents,

40:44

So that just shows you where I was at.

40:47

But I look back at that summer

40:49

as being like, you

40:51

know, just one of those moments in your life

40:53

where it's like it's just raw and

40:55

real and yeah, you

40:58

know they the way that things fell into

41:00

place. After that we started playing together. We

41:02

recorded Matt Cameron, which is like also

41:04

just like dream like like we'd all love Matt

41:07

so much, but we're like, did a couple of rehearsals,

41:09

went in the studio with him, sort of knocked

41:11

out these six seven instrumental tracks,

41:13

and then you know the process

41:15

of like you know, Stone had the idea like, hey, let's ask

41:17

Jack Irons to play with us. We're like, we don't even have a band,

41:20

Like it was so bold, you know, and

41:22

then him suggesting, like he

41:24

goes, well, I know this guy crazy Eddie, Like you

41:26

know he's not a drummer, but you know, and

41:29

so and how

41:31

fast that all happened, and like playing

41:33

with Dave Cruising and Dave Cruising

41:35

like you listen to what he played on ten

41:38

and those early songs, like it's

41:41

it informs our sound

41:44

more than I think we thought at the time, Like

41:46

Dave really brought a really interesting

41:48

element to the band and the groove, and but

41:51

it happened so fast, it's like it's it's

41:53

nuts, you know, less than a year

41:55

of us meeting ed we

41:58

were touring with your readout Chili Peppers. I

42:00

mean that's like had a record out of It's nuts.

42:02

It's nuts.

42:03

That's dreaming. That's like saying dreams

42:06

can still happen. You got to just like see

42:08

it and like, you know, take a chance,

42:10

jump off a cliff, like you know, imagine

42:13

that there is things conspiring

42:16

to make things work out, you know, like believing

42:18

in that process, you know, and it's that's

42:21

a that's something that you get. You know, you land

42:23

on your face eighty percent of the time,

42:25

but then you get those twenty percent

42:28

where oh shit, well that worked out, you know, like and

42:31

it's it becomes you know, it

42:33

becomes ingrained. And I think we've been like

42:35

that ever since. It's anything could happen. I mean

42:37

we're we've we've been living a dream for

42:40

you know, for a long time. And I think now

42:43

we really are recognizing how

42:45

lucky and how fortunate we are to kind

42:47

of every day like be like

42:50

we could think of weird art

42:52

projects or side projects or anything we

42:54

want, you know, like I'm going to go, you know, paint

42:57

for a year or whatever. All of that's possible,

42:59

you know, what I mean. So it's

43:01

it's it's good. We're still in

43:03

the dream.

43:05

After last break, we'll be back with Stone

43:07

Gossard and Jeff Amen, We're

43:13

back with the rest of Leo Rose's conversation with

43:15

Jeff Ament and Stone Gossard.

43:18

You talked about when Jeff, when you and Stone

43:21

met, and you sort of felt like you were

43:23

coming from two different worlds when

43:25

you guys met Eddie and he was from

43:27

San Diego. Did he feel

43:30

like culturally super different from

43:32

you guys, And were you guys

43:34

sort of like, oh, were music vets

43:36

in Seattle And was there like kind of like a

43:39

hazing period at all when he came

43:41

into the fold.

43:42

No, I mean I remember, I remember

43:45

having four or five phone

43:47

conversations with him before he came up, and all

43:50

we were talking about was like not

43:53

wanting to be in a band with people who

43:55

were slackers like

43:58

he. I remember him talking about, like I want

44:00

to hit the ground running, and like I'm you know,

44:02

I make T shirts and I do this, and I was like, I

44:04

make T shirts and like just sort of

44:06

like before I even

44:09

really hung out with him, I sort of felt like, Wow, there's

44:11

going to be another guy in the band that's going to like be

44:13

as excited about this peripheral

44:15

stuff as I am. So I

44:17

think before he you know, I mean we had

44:20

those three songs that he had sang

44:22

over at that point, but I was as excited

44:24

about just him talking

44:26

about how serious he was about it,

44:28

you know, like that he that he you know,

44:31

and that was what he said when he flew up,

44:33

He said, I want to fuck around, I want to go straight to the rehearsal

44:36

and I want to start playing. I don't want to go get coffee

44:38

or I don't want to And so there

44:40

wasn't a lot of time, like we didn't really sit around

44:42

talk about what it was going to be or I

44:45

mean that first week we

44:48

rehearsed and wrote for four or five days.

44:50

We went in the studio on the fifth day, sixth

44:53

day we played a show at the off Ramp, and

44:55

the seventh day we went inside the Bulls and the Sonics

44:57

at the Kingdom. We really didn't talk about

44:59

what it was or and he even

45:02

says like he when he flew home, he's like,

45:04

I wonder if I'm in the band, you

45:06

know, Like at that point, there was no we

45:09

just weren't communicating about it so pretty

45:11

awesome.

45:12

I think maybe I picked him up at the airport,

45:14

was that right? Yeah, So I picked him up at the airport,

45:17

and I think the we we said high or whatever.

45:19

And I think I'd talked to him maybe once or twice on the phone,

45:21

not not as much as Jeff, but just a little bit or whatever.

45:24

And I think he he handed

45:26

me something and I opened it up and it's like he had drawn

45:29

me a picture and I maybe a little poem or

45:31

something, but I was just like I was totally

45:33

touched. And that was one thing that also was

45:36

evident about him. He was a He had a very

45:38

sweet demeanor that was very you

45:40

know, I mean, you know, we're so used

45:42

to like the back of the van

45:45

and just you know, fuck you whatever, like

45:47

you know, that sort of low grade you

45:49

know, competition meets

45:51

you know, jokes or whatever. And

45:53

he was a serious person who was

45:55

really thoughtful and very like sensitive,

45:58

and so he was a huge breadth

46:00

of fresh air to kind of just

46:03

be around somebody who was just very

46:06

He just seemed very thoughtful about his process

46:08

and about people around him and what he was

46:10

doing and conscientious.

46:12

You know, that is so sweet. Yeah,

46:15

do you think that because you both went through

46:18

sort of a tumultuous start with Green

46:20

River and with Mother Love Bone that once

46:23

Pearl Jam was established, did

46:26

it feel more solid

46:28

and stable.

46:31

No, I mean, I mean it felt

46:33

I felt like the first three or four years

46:36

or five six years it felt I

46:38

don't think it ever felt stable.

46:40

It feels stable now, Yeah,

46:42

pretty stable right now. But like literally,

46:45

like so much, you

46:47

know, years of moments

46:50

of greatness, moments of like

46:53

thinking, oh this was awesome and had you know, always

46:55

good shows, always like transcendent

46:58

moments, and you know, but also just

47:01

it's just a lot of stuff and

47:03

a lot of things coming together that always

47:05

that have to kind of everyone's got to be

47:08

humming together or it's sort of

47:10

there's always something to worry about.

47:13

Yeah, I think too. I think the moment that

47:15

I stopped caring about

47:17

like, you know, the

47:20

importance of me in the context

47:22

of the band, or that as soon as I gave

47:24

up that like I need to get songs on the record

47:26

or I need to my vision or whatever. As soon

47:29

as I gave that up, which was probably fifteen years ago

47:31

or something, that's when it felt stable

47:33

to me. That's when it felt like this

47:36

is all icing, and like, I'm just going to keep

47:38

working hard and hopefully I can like

47:41

have some weird little idea that I can pull

47:43

the band over into my little weirdness. And

47:46

I have had those moments like where you're

47:48

like, oh my god, I can't believe, like the

47:50

band recorded this idea that I knew

47:52

was on the edge of what we would want to do.

47:55

But it's also going into those situations

47:58

without any expectation, just

48:00

going like it's like, hey, I got a couple

48:02

of things here, if there's anything here that works, or

48:05

I got this weird idea to a couple

48:07

of shows, or this artwork or

48:09

this whatever this project is. As soon as you don't

48:12

put any gravity on it,

48:14

it's like and when it happens,

48:16

it's just like so joyful and the

48:19

stability comes with a joy I think,

48:21

really.

48:21

But it's true. You this is a band where

48:23

you just have to let go of expectations

48:26

about it, you know. And Ed is our band leader, and

48:29

he's been an amazing band leader. I mean,

48:31

given the variety of ways

48:33

that band leaders can organize

48:36

the band. I mean, Ed's written, We've written

48:38

lyrics. All of us individually

48:40

have written whole songs lyrics everything.

48:43

He's always been this person who's

48:45

like, I'm open to it. You know, you don't

48:47

get to do it by right, you know, you don't

48:50

get to say when you get to do it. But it's

48:52

all happened, you know, and it's all

48:55

of us have sort of asserted ourselves at different

48:57

times and know what that's like

48:59

and know that that's a It can be satisfying

49:02

and then kind of a dead end at the same time, you know, like

49:04

because you know, there's always a

49:06

reaction to every action, you

49:09

know. I think, like Jeff said, the more

49:11

you let go of expectations,

49:13

the more stuff kind of just shows up on

49:16

your plate or somebody says, hey, I know you got

49:18

something. You know, like let's do it. Or

49:20

like this record, like all of us, you

49:23

know, even though a lot

49:25

of these songs have been kind of bastardized and kind

49:27

of reimagined and you had to let go

49:29

of a lot of stuff, I think all

49:31

of us individually feel like we're represented

49:34

on this record better than we have been

49:36

maybe ever in terms of at least for me, when

49:39

I listen back, it's like I can hear parts

49:41

I didn't write the song, but my part that I loved

49:43

and it figured out. I'm hearing it. I can hear it

49:45

in the you know, it's making an impact

49:48

in the song. So it's a marathon

49:50

and we're sort of we're

49:53

in that spot now where we can really enjoy

49:55

it more because you

49:57

once you get used to letting go and seeing

49:59

why that is satisfactory

50:02

or why that works, you do it

50:04

more often, you know, because we

50:06

could take two years off fine, you know what

50:08

I mean, like, you know whatever. Nice, Yeah,

50:11

but.

50:11

It's almost like feels like you need that just to kind

50:13

of reset and live life and come back

50:15

and you have this like special thing that you can come

50:17

back to. Oh my god, it feels

50:19

like the creative itch well.

50:21

And just like seeing your old friends and going,

50:24

wow, we still have this song which is like

50:26

literally three chords, and we go into a

50:28

room and everyone sings it back

50:30

to us and we just experience

50:33

that moment of like, oh, yeah, we wrote this song

50:35

and I like it more now than

50:37

ever. And I never actually knew what it

50:39

was about, but now I do, you know, twenty

50:42

years later, you know or whatever.

50:44

Yeah, that's interesting how songs can change

50:46

over time.

50:47

Oh my god, totally.

50:49

Now the new tour, I think you've

50:51

said that you're going to be playing a lot more

50:53

of the new material. Is

50:56

that sort of feel like a challenge where you have

50:58

to win people over again?

51:00

You know, we've done such variety

51:03

and such a collectic set list for

51:05

so long that I think our

51:08

audiences read to follow

51:10

us and be part of the journey of whatever

51:12

we're going to try to do. And I think the material

51:15

that we just wrote is really strong, don't.

51:17

I think that there's not going to be any you

51:20

know, let down between the

51:22

material, and you know that on any

51:24

given night or any given tour, it's like there's

51:26

always another one. So we've had plenty

51:29

of not great shows. We've had plenty

51:31

of nights where we were flat and you

51:33

just pick yourself up and do a better job

51:35

the next day and something good happened. So

51:38

you know, at this point, I think

51:40

we're all confident that we can go out and kind

51:42

of have fun. And we're not out that much.

51:44

We don't play that many shows, so it's it stays

51:47

fresh and it's going to be fun.

51:50

Do you have any pre show rituals? Do you listen

51:52

to anything before you go on stage? Do

51:54

you eat something specific?

51:57

Do you have to like do a certain

51:59

warm up, Like what are you doing to get

52:02

yourself psyched up for the night.

52:04

I mean, I think I think everybody has a different

52:07

routine and a different diet, and

52:09

I certainly do. I certainly feel like I

52:12

if I kind of you know, if

52:14

I eat before soundcheck and then I soundcheck,

52:16

and then if there's some there's usually

52:18

two or three songs on this on the set list

52:20

that we haven't played or we maybe we haven't

52:23

sound check, so then there's like some

52:25

woodshedding going on, and then there's

52:27

you know, a little you work out, a little

52:30

bit, a little stretching, But we all have

52:32

different sort of patterns as far as that

52:34

goes, So sometimes that part can

52:36

be tricky because the space is tight.

52:38

But so you're all together

52:40

in like one room.

52:41

Pretty pretty much, Yeah, pretty much.

52:43

I mean Ed has a room that he can sort

52:45

of that he can go get away from

52:48

us and and sort of craft the

52:50

you know, fine tune the set list. But

52:52

then there's a you know, there's like a little workout

52:55

meditation room that we sort of can

52:58

go in and out of. Yeah, you know, I

53:01

can't. I can't really go on stage with a full stomach,

53:03

and you know, it's like, I don't want to be like burping

53:05

up onions like in the middle

53:07

of a song or so. And

53:10

I think the I think the older you get to, like the

53:12

I don't know, the more ritualistic

53:15

that you are about it. It's like you

53:18

you know it works, and you know it doesn't work. And

53:21

you know, I think I heard did you interview Duff?

53:23

Yeah I did, Yeah, yeah, yeah.

53:25

Yeah, I heard you talk about he

53:28

was talking about you know, it's like like being

53:30

an athlete or whatever.

53:31

Totally ice is his legs

53:33

with ice buckets after.

53:34

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I do all. I mean, I've done all that stuff

53:37

like ice baths for twenty years or

53:39

something afterwards or whatever. But

53:41

but but also waking up early the next morning,

53:43

getting to the gym and just moving and you

53:46

know, it's like in the days that you don't do that,

53:48

you kind of pay for it. You get end up getting

53:50

on stage and you can't move the way

53:52

you want to because you're fifty something years old my

53:55

case sixty one. Yeah, you know, I mean,

53:58

I think Duff just got off doing like you know,

54:00

probably a couple hundred shows in the last three years

54:02

with guns and roses, so he's three more than

54:04

that. Right, Oh my god, they worked

54:07

played Missoula, Montana. I mean that's so the

54:09

dutiary they got.

54:12

What about you Stone? What's your pre

54:14

show? Right?

54:15

You know? I don't. I don't really have any

54:17

pre show. I think, uh, it's I

54:20

need one. I need some more pre show stuff.

54:22

I think that's right. Jack Blocks Year

54:24

one I'll watch on

54:26

repeat. Me and Mike sort of can't

54:29

stop watching it. I'm not sure it's the

54:31

something about that movie. I just can't stop watching

54:33

it. But I just try to stay

54:35

light and try to not get

54:38

to in my head about worrying about

54:40

it or you know. And

54:42

I think that's for me the biggest you know, Uh,

54:44

if I start to kind of think too much or

54:47

get to inside my own head about it,

54:49

that's when usually things aren't going wrong.

54:51

So just having some lightness and

54:53

just sort of easygoingness about it and

54:55

feeling like it's just playing

54:58

our songs and you know, and just go

55:00

out there and be ready. And I'm I'm

55:02

looking forward to this tour. I want to even

55:04

be lighter about it all, you know, because

55:06

I think I've spent a lot of time worrying about it

55:08

and not feeling kind of worthy of a lot. You

55:10

know, like there's nothing worse than having

55:13

a you know, a place go ballistic

55:15

when you and your mind feel like you're

55:17

sucking or the band is just totally laying

55:19

there and not really doing anything, but the crowd

55:22

is you know,

55:24

to have like all these people pay money and be

55:26

excited. You know, it's like if you're if you're feeling like

55:28

you're not really giving them that. So

55:31

I feel good about this new material for sure.

55:34

Is there a spot in the tour that is

55:36

ideal to see Pearl Jam? Like should

55:38

you go see the band in the beginning of the run, middle

55:40

or near the end?

55:43

A little Rock Arkansas? Oh no, we're not playing Little Rock

55:45

this year.

55:46

I was second. Second markets are always

55:48

you know that to me, it's like that's where kind of where

55:50

we aren't the pressure is off, so good

55:53

things can happen.

55:53

You know, you don't have any like

55:56

family or friends at the show.

55:57

It's not like you know the best Yeah,

55:59

and you never know it goes you know, it's

56:02

a natural cycle. We'll have some good nights and

56:04

some nights that are a little bit whatever, not as

56:06

good, and you can't

56:08

predict them. Yeah, you know, the

56:10

old adage is great soundcheck terrible show.

56:12

You ever heard that before? That's oh yeah.

56:15

You got to be careful when you go out there and just like smoke

56:17

a sound check and you're just like, oh shit,

56:19

this tonight is going to be just so

56:22

good. It's like watch

56:24

it. Just when that happens, it's good

56:26

to watch out.

56:27

Is there anything else? I know, you guys only have an

56:29

hour. Is there anything else you

56:31

want to talk about about the new album? I know

56:34

I skipped like thirty years

56:36

of your career.

56:37

No, this was great. It was such a nice

56:40

It was nice to visit with you and to visit with you

56:42

too, Jeff, Yeah, yeah, this is our first interview

56:44

that we've done together on this album cycle. So oh

56:47

you've done a lot of these together over the years,

56:49

though.

56:50

But it's it. This is my favorite part.

56:52

Like when you do the first couple with at

56:54

least one other person in the band, it's it's

56:57

when you start to understand

56:59

the record because at this point,

57:01

it's just you listening to your parts

57:04

and listening to the songs and you you interpreting,

57:06

and so when you do it with somebody else, you just

57:08

get this other perspective

57:11

and sometimes your unique

57:13

perspective is completely wrong. So

57:16

it's nice.

57:17

Well, I hope you have a ton of fun on the tour.

57:19

It sounds like you're super into the album and

57:21

everyone's re energized. Yeah,

57:24

thanks so much for doing this. I appreciate you.

57:26

Thank you very much.

57:28

Yeah, nice talking to you.

57:32

Thanks to Stone, Gossard and Jeff Ament for going

57:34

deep on their legacy in Pearl Jam's new

57:36

album, Dark Matter. You can

57:38

hear it along with our favorite Pearl Jam songs on

57:40

the playlist at broken Record podcast dot

57:42

com. Will also include some other songs from

57:44

Stone and Jeff's career. Subscribe

57:46

to our YouTube channel at YouTube dot com

57:49

slash Broken Record Podcast, where you can find

57:51

all of our new episodes. You

57:53

can follow us on Twitter at broken Record.

57:56

Broken Record is produced and edited by

57:58

Leah Rose, with marketing help from Eric Sandler

58:01

and Jordan McMillan. Our engineer is

58:03

Ben Tolliday. Broken Record

58:05

is a production of Pushkin Industries.

58:07

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58:25

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58:27

app. Our theme music's back Anny Beats.

58:29

I'm justin Richmond,