By
Hélène Schilders
Pearl Jam's Eddie Vedder and Stone Gossard emerge from seclusion with a new
album- and much to say about their war with Ticketmaster and their distaste for
the press. When asked why he's decided to make himself available to the press
after more than two years of studious avoidance, Pearl Jam's Eddie Vedder allows
himself some nervous laughter before answering, "It gets boring talking to
the same old friends from Seattle." His lighthearted reply notwithstanding,
the media-shy Vedder clearly has more than casual chit-chat in mind. The very
issue of the band's apparent distaste for the media, for example. Then there's
the now celebrated struggle between Pearl Jam's David and the wicked
Ticketmaster Goliath. And there is an entirely more mundane matter: Vedder and
guitarist Stone Gossard are, in fact, actively promoting the recent release of
Yield, Pearl Jam's strongest album since 1993's VS., and an ambitious 40-date
tour of the U.S. later this year. "We're excited about the new record and
we're excited about the prospect of other people hearing it," says Gossard.
"Doing press can be a part of building awareness. We haven't done it in a
long time, so it's a way of doing something different." Gossard cautions,
however, that Pearl Jam's new accessibility may be short-lived. "This is as
much an experiment for us as it is business," he says. "We decided
that we were gonna do some press again. We didn't say that we were gonna do it
for the rest of our lives. Collectively, we thought, 'Okay, we'll try it.' Maybe
it's the last time we'll ever do it."
GW: You've made plans to tour the United States. Here's the obivious
question: Will you continue to boycott Ticketmaster?
SG: So far we haven't worked with Ticketmaster. [In an effort to keep
ticket prices below $20 for their 1994 summer tour, Pearl Jam challenged
Ticketmaster concerning what the band felt were unjust service fees. Since then,
Pearl Jam has toured without using the ticket agency.] Although we just did some
Rolling Stones dates that were Ticketmaster shows.
EV: Yeah, but those weren't our shows, techinically, so we really
couldn't tell the Stones what to do. But generally, we will try to avoid using
them. We've talked about it a little bit. We might make an exception if there
was one city that we haven't played for three or five years...
SG: Philadelphia, for instance. It's very diffcult to do shows there
without using Ticketmaster, and it's one of our favorite paces to play. So
there's always a possibility that we might do a Ticketmaster show there. But we
will do everything in our power to not work with Ticketmaster, and we're
certainly not gonna have a tour sponsored by them.
GW: It is generally perceived that you've lost the battle with them.
EV: We haven't lost anything because we've learned from the experience.
There's no way that we, personally, could have lost. It wasn't a chess game. It
was basically a case of our trying to be responsible to the people who come to
see the shows, in the same spirit as us making sure that we have a good
barricade, to seeing to it that the T-shirts are sold at reasonable prices.
Basically, it's showing respect to the fans. And, it's safe to say, a lot of
these people- those who either run Ticketmaster or the arenas, or the promoters-
haven't attended a show as a regular concert-goer in years. And that's for the
record.
GW: But wouldn't you have liked to break up Ticketmaster's monopoly?
SG: We weren't trying to break their monopoly. The United States
government was investigating Ticketmaster to see whether they were, in fact, a
monopoly. They asked us to come testify, based on our experiences. So we turned
into the poster boys for this struggle, because the media said: Pearl Jam has
this fight with Ticketmaster. We never had any lawsuit or took any legal
action against Ticketmaster as Pearl Jam. The U.S. government did; we just
testified. Ticketmaster will charge an extra five dollars for a ten dollar,
sold-out Jon Spencer Blues Explosion concert, or they'll charge someone three
dollars to get into the Holocaust museum in Washington D.C., which is supposed
to be free. Or they'll add an extra five to six dollars to a 20-dollar Pearl Jam
ticket, because we're selling our tickets cheap and they know we're gonna
sell-out.
GW: Ultimately, the U.S. government dropped the investigation. Does this
disturb you?
SG: It's not over. There are a lot more ticketing companies out there now,
and we certainly have many options in a lot of cities where we can tour. We can
definately go out and do a non-Ticketmaster tour. For us to play all the cities
that we really like to play, we'd probably have to do a Ticketmaster show or two,
but that's a small price to pay for the fact that we can really go out and do
almost an entire U.S. tour without having to deal with them. Maybe at some point...you
never know when a seed you plat might blossom into something worthwhile. So as
far as assessing the overall impact of the whole thing, we'll see what it is
when we're done being a band.
GW: You've been criticized a lot for your actions vis-a-vis Ticketmaster- some say you caused your fans to suffer.
SG: Sure. We probably deserved some of that. Ticketmaster wasn't the only
reason why we weren't touring. There were other reasons within the band. Our own
self-imposed seclusion, or whatever it was, was an element of that too.
GW: Why did you choose seclusion?
EV: We were just moving too fast.
GW: How is it that you survived and all those other big grunge names didn't?
SG: That's the big question. You can explore that, and any of those
questions for 45 minutes.
GW: What does it take to survive?
EV: Part of survival is not killing yourself.
SG: Not doing any press, not doing any videos and not touring totally
helped us survive.
EV: What were we doing? We were playing music. That's what you do
together as a band. That's the one activity you do as a band- not all of these
peripheral things that not only take away your focus, but suceed only in kinda
giving you a weird sense of self.
GW: So your "seclusion" helped you to stay focused?
EV: Yes.
SG: We needed the time off. When we started out, we would do anything:
five days of press, three videos and then tour for 200 days. If you give in to
the record company, they'll have you working from dawn until dusk. And if you
don't know any better, you'll just go: "Okay, that's what we do." But
after a while we started falling apart, and at some point we said, "Fuck
'em, we're not gonna do anything, how do you like that?" But in time, we
got to this point where we had to let all of that stuff go and give in to the
realization that we still wanted to play music and make records together. It's
like we're coming out of that storm a little bit, and we can start picking and
choosing the thing we like to do about being in the media and playing shows.
What kind of shows and tours would we enjoy? What would our schedule be like if
we could make it anything we wanted it to be? Keeping a low profile actually
helped us realize that you don't have to play the game all the time to be a good
band.
GW: MAny of your fans felt that your decision to avoid touring or doing
any press meant that you'd turn your back on them.
SG: Not at all. We made a record every year, basically. There are
definitely a lot of great bands that have a gone a few years without touring. We
have gone two or three years without major extensive touring, and we'll probably
never do major extensive touring again. We're gonna do 40 dates in the U.S. this
year.
GW: Earlier, I asked how it was that you survived while so much of
Seattle died-
EV: That's not even a real question for me, because all those people are
still making music. [Former Nirvana bassist] Chris Novoselic has a band, [former
Soundgarden vocalist] Chris Cornell is making music and so are [former
Soundgarden drummer] Matt Cameron and [former Soundgarden bassist] Ben Shepperd.
They're not gone. They're still making music, and if Santa Clause is not dressed
as grunge, because it's no longer the popular thing, then that's good, that's
fine. I'm glad that part of it died.
SG: I think any musical movement is only gonna have so much play with the
media- you're only gonna be able to explore any given musical phenomenon or
enigma so much. Seattle just got so explored that peple are tired of hearing
about it. It's over in terms of the media. In terms of the individuals that are
making the music, Seattle is ffilled with plenty of rocks under which
interesting music can still be found. But the chances of that having the same
kind of impact in the near future is pretty unlikely. There's too much scrutiny.
GW: What has the hype done to and for Seattle?
SG: Who knows.
EV: For people who are involved in music, it probably enlightened
everyone as to how ridiculous things can get.
GW: When I heard Yield, I was surprised that you didn't follow through on
the world-beat explorations that characterize No Code. Yield, to me, sounds less
focused, more searching.
EV: [surprised] Wow!
SG: More searching than the last one?
EV: Well, I guess there are no general themes. The process on this one
was more like, "Here's a song, do you like it? Sure I like it, let's put it
on the record. Okay, here's another one, you like this one? Yeah, this one seems
pretty good. Okay, let's put this one on." That was our process. But, on
the other hand, I don't think we've *ever* sat down and gone, "What kind of
record are we gonna make?" In the past, our *modus operandi* has been, we
want this record to be better than the last one... [laughs]
SG: Or I want to play better, or I want to hear the drums in a better way,
or I want the performances to be be tighter or more cohesive. But as far as the
kind of record we're going to make? We just write songs, and when you run out of
money, you mix.
GW: No Code struck me as being introverted, experimental...
SG: People say that No Code wasn't like a rock record. The big comment
you'd hear over and over again was "experimental record." But then you
hear "Habit" and "Hail Hail" and "Lukin", and
those songs are totally rock. But I see a lot of continuity between No Code and
Yield. Listen to the drums on "Who You Are" from No Code. I don't
think Yield's "Given To Fly" would be the song it is without our
having made "Who You Are" the year before. There are definitely are
some experimental arrangements on the new record. And I think "Sometimes"
has a very bizzare arrangement in terms of how it comes and goes. "Wish
List" is a liitle bit more straight ahead, but it's also weird in its own
way. Or listen to the bridge in "No Way," or the fact that we use some
loops on this record.
GW: This record is not like Ten, and it isn't like No Code. It's
something in between- it's as if you didn't know which direction to go in.
SG: I think it's more balanced in terms of our knowing what we do well
and what's familiar, and also in terms of taking exploratory chances. I think if
all we had done was try to explore territory that we'd never gone to before, it
would be a very frustrating record to listen to.
GW: There's nothing wrong with that.
EV: That's right.
SG: No, there's not necessarily anything wrong with that, but from my
perspective, when you hear a band and you know what they can do collectively,
you want them to do some of what they do naturally. But at the same time you
want them to take chances. So I think this record is a really great combination
of those things.
GW: Eddie, to many, you're the voice of the Nineties...
EV: It's written above my bed.
GW: Could the fact that so many of your fans have grown up and left you
asking yourself where the band should go now?
EV: I've never bought into that from the word go. Everything is still the
same.
GW: You've given many interviews in the past in which you said you hated
superstardom. Are you any nore comfortable with that now?
EV: Yeah. It's gotten a lot better. But it's kind of hypocritical to
complain about stuff via the media. But, truthfully, I don't know, I wouldn't
mind if this was the last interview I ever did. I don't mind talking. It feels
normal, but I really don't care about participating in the media at all, besides
putting out records. I don't care if my photo ever gets taken again.
GW: No Code didn't sell well. Was that the reason you chose to do press
again?
EV: If that was the case... The fact that it didn't sell well really
balanced things out a little better. It's been a great, great year. We make
music because we want to. And we don't have to make it to sell. I'm thrilled
with what No Code did, it's fine. Any band would be happy with those sales.
GW: You've said that those sales gave you "the chance to be normal
again."
EV: Yes, so...?
SG: [interrupts] I looked at those sales and went, Maybe that record
wasn't as good as it could've been; maybe we didn't really work on that record
as hard as we could have.
EV: [annoyed] Or maybe we weren't wagging our asses on TV as much as
other people, and that's why their records are selling. If that's how you sell
records, those people can do that. That's how I feel. I'm not gonna keep up with
that kind of shit. I'd rather have my dignity.
GW: It almost looked as if you guys were trying to sabotage your success.
EV: Not really. It just happened naturally, which is great. [laughs]
SG: I think we could've played better on No Code, could have sounded
better; I think we could have written better songs in some ways. I always want
to play better and sound better. That's just me. Any other person in the band
will give you a different opinion about what they care about. The fact that the
record wasn't as widely accepted as our other record made me go, "I'm gonna
do better this time, I'm gonna write better songs, I'm gonna demo more things
and have more ideas to choose from."
GW: You were frustrated that it didn't sell well.
SG: It didn't frustrate me. Living through a record that was perceived by
the media as selling poorly was a good thing for this band to experience. If No
Code has sold only eight million copies, we'd probably be humming on this record
and playing ukuleles.
GW: It's interesting that where No Code's relatively poor sales led you,
Stone, to wonder whether or not it was as good as it might have been, Eddie says
that it gave him peace of mind.
SG: Well, we both appreciated it. But for different reasons. It made me
want to do more, while he appreciated it because it allowed him to step away.
EV: He realized that- I didn't have to say anything.
GW: In November 1996, Rolling Stone ran a clearly unflattering cover
story which portrayed you as ambitious and calculating. How did you react to
that?
EV: I didn't read it.
GW: I'm sure other people told you about it.
EV: Not even that. I just read letters that my friends wrote in my
defense. We were in Istanbul.
GW: Even Courtney Love defended you.
EV: Yeah, so I thought, "My God, it must really be bad." Three
weeks ago I read it off the computer. I don't know, it was kinda funny. Just
kinda funny.
GW: Rolling Stone implied that you've always wanted to be famous, a
notion that contrasts sharply with the things you've said in past interviews.
EV: I think there's a difference between wanting to be famous and wanting
to be successful working in the arts. What does successful mean? It means being
able to make art for your living or participating in art. That would be great,
as long as I don't have to go back to another job or that midinght shift. I
worked hard to get to that point. And I'm so glad I did. My life is just
unbelievable sometimes, how it's turned out. Boy, do i ever get to make art and
get paid for it. And have experiences. Now I don't even care anymore about
getting paid. I'm so fortunate that way. Now, beyond getting to do this for a
living, I'm actually able to share with my peers. Like Ron Wood in the living
room the other night, playinh "Havana Moon" or aomething. And some
other friends. This is great, this sis about music im it's purest sense. All
these things happened because we worked really hard. Everyone has worked really
hard. And things like the cover of Time magazine, any of those things, that's
not what you think about as you are working really hard, struggling.
GW: And you don't think Ron Wood is playing with you because you've been
on the cover of Time?
EV: No, I don't think he knows about any of that stuff. Time, on Ron
Wood's table? I don't think so. Besides, that cover was back in 1993.