Jeff Ament
Pearl Jam’s Jeff Ament on Bill Simmons’ Podcast: 5 Things We Learned
Pearl Jam bassist Jeff Ament was a guest today (May 6) on The Bill Simmons Podcast, where he discussed the band’s long-awaited return to touring, his enduring NBA fandom, how he hopes the experience of recording the score for the new FX on Hulu show Under the Banner of Heaven will rub off on Pearl Jam and much more. Here are five things we learned from the conversation, which was taped the day after Pearl Jam’s tour-opening performance in San Diego on Tuesday. The band is back on stage tonight and tomorrow at the Kia Forum in Los Angeles in support of its 2020 album, Gigaton. Ament wants Pearl Jam to make shorter records and release them more frequently: Riffing on a Simmons question about how to keep an audience’s attention in the age of ephemeral TikTok memes, Ament said he and his bandm...
Pearl Jam’s Jeff Ament Scores Under the Banner of Heaven TV Adaptation
FX on Hulu’s new adaptation of Jon Krakauer’s best-selling book Under the Banner of Heaven has fans buzzing as much for its content as for project star Andrew Garfield’s recent revelation that he would be taking a hiatus from acting. Now, music fans will have added reason to check out the show, with the announcement that Pearl Jam’s Jeff Ament has crafted its soundtrack. Ament has been working on the music at his home studio in Montana since last October, in tandem with Pearl Jam touring member Josh Klinghoffer and longtime band associate Josh Evans, who produced Pearl Jam’s most recent album, Gigaton. John Wicks, Ament’s collaborator in his side project Deaf Charlie, was also involved in the sessions, according to a tweet from Ament on Pearl Jam’s account. Each episode features 25 minutes...
5 Albums I Can’t Live Without: Jeff Ament of Pearl Jam
Name Jeff Ament Current city Missoula, MT Really want to be in Essaouira, Morocco Excited about Top secret soundscape scoring gig. My current music collection has a lot of EG Records stable, US hardcore 1978-1984, NY avant, Windham Hill. You wouldn’t expect me to listen to Marillion’s Misplaced Childhood. Preferred format Vinyl by far, but I’m lazy so MP3s in the car. [embedded content][embedded content] 5 Albums I Can’t Live Without: 1 Discreet Music Brian Eno I just get lost in these pieces and hear different rhythms and melodies every time I listen…perfect companion for a fella by himself on an island. 2 Bitches Brew Miles Davis So many layers, incredible shifts and colors. Bill Laswell remix is stunning. 3 Agaetis Byrjun Sigu...
30 Artists Reflect on 30 Years of Pearl Jam’sTen
The story has been told thousands of times, but it bears repeating: Pearl Jam should never have happened. The ’90s had just begun. In March 1990, the promising Seattle rock band Mother Love Bone was about to unveil their debut album. But on the eve of the release, the band’s lead singer, Andrew Wood, died tragically of a heroin overdose. His band members, guitarist Stone Gossard and bassist Jeff Ament were blind-sided, devastated, and decided to end the band. Over the next few months, Gossard slowly found his way back to music. He made a few demos that landed in the hands of a surfer from San Diego via Chicago who got them from ex-Red Hot Chili Peppers drummer Jack Irons. The surfer’s name was Eddie Vedder. The songs he sent back? “Alive,” “Once,” and “Footsteps.” Pearl Jam formed around t...
Pearl Jam’s Jeff Ament Talks Anniversaries and I Should Be Outside
When I spoke with Jeff Ament a little over a year ago, he was as bummed as the rest of us. The pandemic was in its early stages, and Pearl Jam was one of the first bands to make the smart decision to indefinitely postpone their 2020 tour. That meant not playing shows in support of Gigaton, their first album in nearly seven years. The Pearl Jam bassist said, from his hideout in Montana, that he was in “Bob Pollard mode.” He’d been writing and writing and writing. Ament wrote about 70 songs during the lockdowns. The first result of channeling his angst into music was the hardcore-infused American Death Squad EP, a solo project released last July. Now? He’s onto his fourth solo effort, with a title so perfect that it echoes how most (if not all) of us feel: I Should Be Outside. Being hom...
Jeff Ament to Release New Solo Album I Should Be Outside
Last year, Pearl Jam bassist Jeff Ament released a rapid-fire, five songs in seven minutes EP last summer in a flurry of creative energy that overtook him after Pearl Jam’s Gigaton tour was pushed due to the pandemic. He told us at the time that he was working on a lot of music back then, in particular, that five songs on American Death Squad were written in the first week of quarantine when Ament says he got into “Bob Pollard mode” and just cranked out tunes. It turns out he wasn’t kidding. Ament is set to release the soon-to-be post-COVID appropriate I Should Be Outside, his fourth proper solo, album on August 10. In a lengthy statement shared through Pearl Jam’s Ten Club newsletter, Ament explained the origins of the album. You can see that letter in full below. CREDIT: Ten Club As...
Pearl Jam to Release 1992 ‘MTV Unplugged’ Session
Pearl Jam’s iconic 1992 MTV Unplugged session, previously only a special 2019 Record Store Day release, will be available on vinyl and, for the first time, on CD as well. The live session lands on the band’s 30th anniversary — Pearl Jam formed in 1990 from the ashes of Mother Love Bone, a band featuring Chris Cornell’s former roommate, singer Andrew Wood. Pearl Jam’s Unplugged will be released Oct. 23. Preorder both formats here. Unplugged was recorded a mere three days after completing their first American tour. Pearl Jam traveled to New York to record the stripped-down versions of their Ten album. All seven songs featured in the MTV Unplugged broadcast — “Jeremy,” “Even Flow,” “Alive,” “Black” and “State Of Love and Trust,” “Porch” and “Oceans” — are included. In other news, Pe...
Eddie Vedder on ‘Democratic Process’ While Recording Gigaton, Admiration for Bandmates
Eddie Vedder opened up on a variety of topics — including working on new music during the global pandemic, why he finally joined Instagram and why the “democratic process” of recording Pearl Jam’s Gigaton makes it one of his favorite records — on a special fan-driven Q&A session with SiriusXM, Faithful Forum with Eddie Vedder, on Wednesday (Sept. 3). Vedder has been deemed Pearl Jam’s frontman, but he points out how PJ co-founders Jeff Ament and Stone Gossard’s longtime musical partnership has paved the way for the foundation of the band. “I think at some point we functioned without a leader,” he said in the interview. “If I ended up in that situation, I think it was reluctantly. It was by no means a hostile takeover. It was their world that started all this. It was Green River. A...
Pearl Jam Launch Voting Rights Sweepstakes
Pearl Jam and their Vitalogy Foundation have teamed up with online fundraising platform Omaze to not only raise funds to help ensure voting access this November but also to give one lucky fan and their guest the opportunity to hang out with Eddie Vedder and Jeff Ament in their native Seattle. Pearl Jam is asking all their fans—if able—to join the band in pledging to vote by mail in the 2020 election. In addition to meeting Vedder and Ament, you’ll also get a private after-hours tour of the Pearl Jam: Home and Away exhibit at the Museum of Pop Culture and tour London Bridge Studios, where Ten was recorded. You’ll also get to ask all your big fan questions as well as potentially partake in some beers if you’re over 21. “We would answer all your questions,” Vedder said in the promo video belo...
Pearl Jam’s Jeff Ament Announces New EP American Death Squad
It’s been a topsy-turvy year for Pearl Jam, to say the least. Gigaton was released to rave reviews in March, but the band hasn’t been able to tour behind it due to the coronavirus pandemic. While in quarantine, though, bassist Jeff Ament channeled his energy into writing and recording a solo EP, which was announced today (June 26). American Death Squad features four new songs, including the moody and melodic “The Divine Perfume.” “In the days following the postponement of our tour, I found it necessary to find an outlet for the energy we had created going into the tour. Pivot was the word of March. So, every morning, I retreated to the studio with the goal of writing a song every day, no matter how shite. Days of isolating and watching the news of the destruction c...
