Wednesday, March 16, 2011

Pearl Jam: New album in the works

Pearl Jam have a lot on their plate this year, as they mark the 20th Anniversary of the band, but they’re an ambitious bunch.

Beyond reissues, a film, a book, side projects, and creating their own festival, bassist Jeff Ament tells Billboard that Pearl Jam have plans to record a new album.

"We did a whole bunch of demos and everybody's got a disc of 25 [songs] right now," Ament says of Pearl Jam's plans to hit the studio next month. "April will be the time where we get together and learn to play all these demos and figure out which 12-15 of them float to the top. Hopefully we can get something done this year."

"There's been so much focus on the past,”
added Ament, “that I think all of us are really excited to make a new record and have something to look forward to because we've been digging in the boxes in our basement a lot the last year or so."

The digging produced a bunch of material for the PJ Twenty documentary, directed by Cameron Crowe, which should be out late summer/early fall.

As far as the Pearl Jam festival goes, Ament says that the band is looking to finalize the location and the other bands on the bill by the end of March, and announce everything in April. "We've reached out to a few [other bands]. It's mostly people that we're friends with. I don't think that anybody's fully signed on yet. We're not 100% where we're going to have it yet, so it's a little bit tricky... If it's Labor Day, that's three or four months; that should be plenty of time for people to make reservations."

Pearl Jam Pearl Jam

Pearl Jam – Even Flow
Pearl Jam’s live debut
Off Ramp Café – Seattle WA – October 22, 1990


See also:

Pearl Jam: Hear new Eddie Vedder single
Pearl Jam: Eddie Vedder voices new promo for Live On Ten Legs
Pearl Jam to celebrate 20th Anniversary all year long