During an appearance on Let There Be Talk, Pearl Jam guitarist Stone Gossard talked about the band's debut album "Ten," singer Eddie Vedder, gear, and more.
You can check out "Ten" here via Amazon.
When the interviewer said, "You're coming off 'Ten' and you're the biggest band in the world all of a sudden, and it does seem to change Eddie [Vedder, vocals] a little bit. If you look at the early interviews of him, he's very playful and almost kind of goofy and fun. And then by then, he becomes a whole other animal," the musician replied (transcribed by UG):
"I think we thought we had sold a lot of records, but I don't think it had registered in terms of the bigness. I remember that place as beautiful.
"And for me, personally, having gone through the Green River and Mother Love Bone, and all of that, to me, I was probably feeling more confident, and a little bit more relaxed, a little bit more figured out.
"I think for Ed, it was a completely different experience in terms of the psychology of him not being able to walk around without people coming up to him or whatever. It was a big, huge shift for him."
What about your Sunburst Les Paul? Let's get a little story on that. That seemed to be your main ride for years, right?
"Yeah, I think I broke that down in Australia. I was having a consistently bad... I finally got wireless so I wouldn't get tangled up in my cords, which I'm now not using anymore, but my wireless pack had gone out for the third show in a row, and I think I just finally smashed the guitar.
"Mike McCready smashed the guitars all the time, he was like, 'Man, you'll smash a guitar...' I never smashed them, I don't have any tattoos either, but I did smash one and that was one that went.
I would like to have that one back..."
What was that - like a '70s Les Paul?
"Something like that. I'm not a crazy guitar freak, I have some good ones but some of them are just these Gibson reissues that are just great. They play great."
Mike McCready has got some insane ones!
"Oh my god, Mike McCready's model reissue is one of my favorite guitars."
I want that Strat so bad, a '60 Strat! I love McCready because the two of you guys are just so underrated, it makes me angry sometimes.
"No, no, no... it's better."
It is better because you can walk down the street, I get it.
"Or just Mike McCready is a good player. I'm a decent player but there are so many good guitar players out there it's crazy.
"If you look at YouTube, you can see freaking eight-year-old kids playing the shit out of freaking Beethoven and stuff like that. That's not what we do."
I remember when I saw Temple of the Dog - it was like the second time you guys ever did a show. And I watched McCready play that solo on 'Reach Down,' I just got goosebumps - I was there, two feet away, and I was like, 'I can't even believe how good this guy is!' And those last Temple shows are some of the greatest shows I've ever seen in my life. 'Achilles Last Stand,' which is my favorite Zeppelin song of all time, it's gotta be one of the hardest songs ever to play, and you guys destroyed that!
What was the decision on that? Was that Chris [Cornell], like, 'Let's do this!'?
"I don't think it was Chris, I think it might have been me. He was so open to anything. That was such a fun tour, and it is such a joy to practice for that - and try to get good for it.
"We were all so excited because of him and his crazy talent, and us making that record with him, and it being such a good record, and us again rehearse for fucking one week and go in and make one of the great records of our entire career.
"Why? Well, because you have an incredible singer-songwriter in Chris Cornell who knows how to do it, and he knows how to let you be you, and you have Matt Cameron, who fucking needs one drum take to make it.
"Both of those guys at the peak of their powers and inviting us to be part of the process, and we brought something that was special to those guys because Soundgarden was pretty rigid.
"And we just have a little bit of smear that we brought in that was just like a little that Stones-ness, a little bit more bluesy-ness that ended up being such a nice touch to that record. It's one of the highlights of my life, for sure...
"In my mind, it's all about Chris' generosity. He wrote a song about his friend who died [Andy Wood], and then he invited his friend's band, who was in a band with him to play on the record. I think when you start with that kind of generosity, everybody is present, everybody understands that it's not about being an all-star band.
"This is something special, this is bigger, this is like what they did in the '60s when people were sharing music with each other.
"I really do think that it's the motivation of where the songs came from and then sharing it with other people that loved Andy. You got a spirit there that is just gonna help it along."