BANTER OF THE BANDS: JEFF (On the eve of the re-release of Ten, Jeff Ament and Stone Gossard sat down at PJ/10c headquarters and talked about songwriting, skateboarding and surviving in Seattle. SG: Twenty minutes before | got here, | had been thinking about that we were going to do this. | ‘was excited about it, but | hadn't really thought about what | might say — what we would ask each other, Buti’s a great opportunity to ask each other some stuff... JA:Perfect, Idon'thave anything. SG: Or talk about some stuff that we haven't talked about. The first thing | thought about — just thinking about you — was skating. | don't know why, but | can just sense the purity of it, in terms of why it makes you fee! the way it does. It made me think, “how is that, how is skating, what role does skating play in your psychology right now? How large does it loom?” JA: | probably get as excited to skate as | do getting together and. playing music or hoop. | think it's one of those things where especially if | have the ‘opportunity to get together with my friends, or the people | like to skate with, it's almost the same sort of thing. It doesn't happen that often, so when it can happen, it's an incredible thing. | think the thing that drove me ‘out of Montana was the-same thing, the same reason that got me started skating. I was in California and my cousin was a skateboarder. He was into cool music, and he was super creative. We went back there fone summer, and he was totally into skateboarding, He took me to a skate park and gave me a Skateboarder magazine. | think, like music, skating was a way to ‘get out into the world and outside of my own brain. (Laughter) You know it represented something ‘outside of the only thing I knew. which was this little town of Big Sandy. SG: How has it changed? You stopped skating for a while to concentrate on music and you kind of put that behind you, maybe a little bit. Then you rediscovered it? Why? How was that different when you rediscovered it? Or what was about it now that makes it so— you relish it so much? JA: | always had a board around and I'd hit up any ramp that heard about. I think it hit me hard though when I went on aome og A gh pyiod Si ‘to Oregon with Steve A ‘rip down ; ON your face, when you're Turner and Chris Manaras, . skating on the ramp. Dreamland had built a couple skate parks down there with JA: Right big concrete bowls ‘and things | always loved to skate. | was going down there with Steve, who I had this history with, probably around the time that he quit Green River. We were kind of polar opposites. ‘You know Iwas really into Venom and SSD, and anything heavy.... SG: Yeah JA: And he was into the “Milkshakes’ and 13th Floor Elevators’, SG: That was our badge at that point ~ How into the thing that you're into, are you? And he’s 100% committed to his thing... JA: Yeah. SG: He inspired us to imagine ourselves 100% committed to our things too, his unique Perspective, his way of seeing art, and what's cool. JA: To have, an opportunity to get to hook up with him and be friendly with Chris Manaras, who was a kid | grew up skating with in Montana. Those two guys had been skating together for a couple of years since Chris moved out here. It was just a great opportunity, again, to get together with friends and do something that we loved doing, as kids. There's a real purity to it. That feeling you get when you're ona skateboard like you've sorta cheated death, or at least great bodily harm, and then you make it through a corner and you get a gnarly grind... and survived the whole deal...it’s all focus. SG: I've seen you: I've seen the SG: There's a skate ramp here at the studio (warehouse) that Jeff built. I's incredible to witness him. Mike McCready, or anybody that wants to try (Jeff laughs), and the whole office gets to come down to check it out. There are helmets and lots of skateboards so it's a complete clubhouse feel That's cool. The word | wrote after that was just ‘freedom’. | kind of equated that with it JA: yeah SG: That's what it looked like You were free of the weight of the past ...you transformed it or changed it JA: Those trips with all these different guys, a lot I've had a history with, it’s an excuse to hang and talk about other things. You actually get in-depth about shit. We aren't kids anymore and ‘we actually have 40 years each of experience with different things and relationships. How we deal with one another. That's the amazing thing about all this stuff. That's the amazing thing about being able to go back and play Green River songs with you stil tha oS ee a “There’s a real purity to it, that feeling you get when you’re on a skateboard like you’ve sorta cheated death.” Bruce and Alex. Steve. We're all still alive and we all still like each other. I's kind of a miracle in some ways. SG: It’s special. Its really special. | ‘wrote that down, | wrote ‘Green River’ | also wrote ‘Deranged Diction’ cause you just released a new Deranged Diction record, or you're going to release i. I's just incredible. It's real hardcore — it's so pro and tight in a way. It’s so much better than Green River ever was in terms of what you guys were doing and how well you could do it musically. However musical it was, 1 think Green River had ‘a real point of view that made you pay attention to it. Also, | was thinking. Green River is going to play a show, maybe with the Melvins, is that happening? JA: Yeah, | think so. SG: Two shows in Seattle. | was. thinking we should lobby for Deranged Diction to play a few songs on our gear. JA: That'd be great. SG: So — I'm making that official lobby happen. JA: (Lughs) SG: | think that has to happen, That would be great. It would put pressure on the River to fuckin’ up their game a little JA and SG: [Laughter] JA: Fly Sergio out, Held be Pumped. It'll be good to get together with the Melvins too. Just because I've seen Dale a few times, but I haven't seen Buzz, .. Ldon't know how long, i andfor sure, That peri ‘of time — and what they were “doing (pause). We lost each _ other in terms of the friendship, rybedy “Kind of had their begap catatend just struck out on af ir Own, and | think there was ‘of me, in terms of my own natural. _instinets. It's not so much looking jing that we lost there. Its nice that they are reaching ‘out now and asking us to do this show. | think it's going to be great cept it and cherished such an enormous -e.on me. | think the wh: F "perspective “has been ted. Certainly mine has, ise it's kind of the opposite way you've it. It’s been -infly back or being in — it’s about being out. Somehow it’s different. It's "to be able to see how their music a little alien. Having witnessed it “has evolved and changed. JA: Cause they never quit. SG: I hear there’s something » going on right now with double ‘drummers? 1A; Have you seen Big usiness before? _and haying learned to understand it. It's completely opened me to relish some of the similar things. Words in particular. In terms of how powerful they can be. SG: You've done so much. It will “You just released SG: Nope : JA: Oh my God. It's crazy. Cody, from Murder City Devils, the drummer and this bass player, who is jane, he plays through like five amps. I's the biggest. fucking sound youve ever heard. You add that to the Melvins, and... or SG: Right JA: Ie’s going to be cool | ‘think ‘SG:1 see. ..wow. Cody's the other drummer? JA: Yeah... SG: That's really interesting. He's a. different kind of drummer, which is cool. | was thinking about you, your documentation, your books and your writing that you've kept over the years and how much that has been a seeping influence in terms ‘of opening my perspective to a completely different way of thinking about life, about art. Just ‘a quiet thing you do... so | wanted to say that. a new Deranged Diction record, you’re going to release it. It’s just incredible. It’s real hardcore.” be exciting for you to sift through it all over the course of the next part of your life. Looking back and re-imagining what all those things mean to you like Green River, the bands and skating. What some of those moments you set aside for everybody in terms of being able to pay attention to them — to say I have to snap this picture. | have to recognize something about this moment. JA: | haven't really been terribly ‘organized about any of that stuff, until the last year. It’s just throwing those little journal books and photos in a box, Moying them around when | moved. With putting out the four days organizing this stuff and | actually started remembering things. I don’t know if | “have remembered them'lfl hadn't taken pictures. Writing down “This show was great” or “Ate really bad curry here,” etc... writing little notes and stuff. For me, | started keeping track of things when | went away to college. A lot of it was due to a humanities course that,| took on comparative religion — that was the beginning of writing things down when I thought ofchem. The teacher had this giant list of books that we could choose from, and I would just keep notes about the books and the group discussions and everyone's different .perspective. Probably because the _ biggest question in my life, at that point, was whether I believed in God or not. ‘SG: Yeah. JA; 1am still at the same place that | was when | was 18. Mostly | would write down a question about myself, and somehow that would help me figure out a litele bit better who | was. SG: That's amazing — the fundamental sort of question ‘is there God?" Particularly due to where you grew up and what and how religion plays a role in’ everybody's life in small rural towns where it’s serious business That your first way of enacting a thought process about jit, your first overt reaction, was to begit to write for yourself, and say, have something that Ineed.” There is a way to look at this. There is some way to communicate with God. You know what are the big questions and how you challenge those, That is really cool that, that’s what led you to it. That's probably typical of how a lot of