Jeff Ament Quotes

When I moved to Seattle, I was hanging out with kids who had done drugs, had sex a million times. I look at them now and realize their childhood was taken away.

There really is a certain magic that happens when you're in the studio. And it's important in life to feel that magic: to feel that there is something greater moving all this along.

It was hard to figure out what were the good causes, the bad causes, even the good politics and the bad politics. So we started taking requests and figuring it out.

With Pearl Jam, everybody is so good at what they do, it's hard to get up the courage to say, Can I sing this part, or, I want to play guitar. I feel like I have more courage to do that.

I have to go someplace where I can soak myself in a creative atmosphere.

Every few years I'll party way too much to remind myself what an idiot I am.

I love sad. Sadness makes you feel more than anything.

Punk rock and skateboarding took the 'school' out of living your life, and I related to learning as I went, doing a lot of different things that I liked, when I liked. Consequently, I'm mediocre at all of the above, but still stoked on being a lifetime student of music, skating, painting, writing, etc.

I'm not going to say no to playing a show in Missoula.

I'm healthy enough to still skate, so I gotta go because growing up I didn't have - I mean, I grew up in Montana so... there was kind of a little half-pipe in my yard, and that was the extent of the skate terrain in Montana. So I've got to go out and make up for lost time.

You go to a show and you know the crowd is there because they like the music, not because everybody else was going. That's a good feeling. You look out there and you know, these are our people.

Right after 'Backspacer,' my best friend got killed tragically. Something happened to me then where I got super motivated. I had a shelf of all this unfinished music... So I just went to work and made a conscious decision that I was going to finish a bunch of stuff. Life's short.

This isn't a mass-produced...instrument. Mike Lull Custom Guitars makes each bass right here in the NW. Over 20 years of collaborating, designing, and building basses has gone into my model.

I've been interested in Eastern religions since I went to college because I was trying to figure out where I stood with Catholicism.

I played djembe, percussion, keyboards and I sang.

Make movies. Don't make videos. Videos are evil.

Where I grew up, I could be a punk rocker and a jock. But in college, it became apparent that those two worlds didn't mix. When I brought my guitar back to school after Thanksgiving break, a friend handed me his bass and said, 'Listen to the Ramones.'

It's great that people are basically spending their two weeks of vacation to come out and be with us in some weird part of the world. And I think we owe it to them to take 'em to some cool places.

Ever since I picked up a bass, I've written songs.