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Stone Gossard Readies His Moonlander

June 25th will see the release of the sophomore solo album from legendary Seattle guitarist Stone Gossard. For nearly 30 years, the 46-year-old father of two has been a crucial staple of the Jet City music scene as a key member of such influential groups as grunge forefathers Green River, proto-glam giants Mother Love Bone, alt-rockers Brad and, of course, modern AOR kings Pearl Jam. But with Moonlander, his first album by his own accord since 2001’s understated Bayleaf, Gossard delivers a collection of songs that brings him out from the shadows of his prolific resume. Working alongside such names as Pearl Jam/Soundgarden drummer Matt Cameron, fellow Brad member Reagan Hagar, singer-songwriter Pete Droge, Zombi keyboard wizard Steve Moore and Seattle-based horn arranger Hans Teuber among others, Moonlander finds Stone expanding the base of his trademark guitar groove.

In the weeks leading up to Moonlander’s release, a different track from the album will stream on Pearl Jam’s web site accompanied by one of the eleven pieces of art created by Gossard himself that coincide with each song.

This week’s track is the slow-building burner “Battlecry”, easily one of the highlights of a record filled with them.

Were the songs on Moonlander anything you had brought to the table for Pearl Jam or were they written exclusively for a solo record?

Once I start writing lyrics and vocals, I think there’s a tendency for me to say, “You know, Pearl Jam is going to put a record out every two or three years and I might write a couple of songs on that album. But for the most part I’m gonna want Ed to write lyrics because he’s one of the greats. He really is a fantastic poet, and I think him understanding the words and really feeling them is a big part of why a song is successful. Having said that, he’s sung other people’s lyrics in our band and he’s done it quite a bit so any of these songs could have been taken to Pearl Jam. But I think it’s more of a gut feeling of when you write a song and you basically just say, “OK, I love this song and I need to do this song. What this song is saying is something that I need to do personally as opposed to something I need to say in Pearl Jam.” It’s really just a gut instinct and so far there’s never been an issue with it.

What inspired the direction of Moonlander?

I think it was just a matter of the right songs over a long period of time and then choosing which ones will make the cut. These songs were written between 2003 and 2011 and came from a pile of demos and half-baked ideas, and as I listened through all that stuff at one point I felt I needed to finish this record. I had four or five songs basically done and I wanted to wrap it up so I began combing through all of it. As you listen to stuff you haven’t heard in a few years you quickly identify the songs that still make you go, “Oh wow I forgot about that” or “Oh yeah, that’s why I didn’t finish it, cause it’s not that great.”

In the end, I put together about 12 or 13 that sounded right and I started to close the door on finishing them, which means making an edit here or there, changing a lyric here or there, resinging something, adding a guitar, putting percussion on stuff. Pete Droge helped me a ton with additional instrumentation and background vocals. A lot of the background vocals are Pete, who is just a fantastic singer and he was the executive producer on the record. It’s almost like an art project you haven’t worked on in a while. You gotta take it out and blow the dust off and then take a look at it again to start fresh. That’s a good way to work, I think. Doing something and then getting away from it and then coming back to it gives you a great opportunity to identify what really was special about it and knock away some of the stuff that was unnecessary. My favorite part of Moonlander is hearing your guitars bolstered by additional instrumentation. The horns, the synths, the clarinet…

That’s all Hans Teuber, who is this fantastic Seattle musician who I’ve gotten to know over the years and he’s just one of the most wonderful people and has such a good ear for music. He can play flute and saxophone and clarinet and piano. I always have loved horn stabs and I love how the clarinet is almost like a keyboard part but has that human quality to it which makes it so nice to listen to. He’s great.

Pearl Jam never had brass on any of its albums…

Nope. We did have a couple of shows where the Syncopated Taint Septet horn section played with us when we covered The Who’s “The Real Me”. So we have played with a horn section before but we’ve never used horns on a record.

Could horns be a possibility on a future Pearl Jam album?

I knew that it made sense for me to do it for Moonlander and if the fellas listen to the record and go, “Wow, that’s a great use of horn” I guess certainly I’d help them figure out how to do that on a PJ record but I don’t see that coming yet.

What prompted you to call this record Moonlander?

The song “Moonlander,” as I was thinking about titles, that word jumped out at me. I just thought it was a cool title, no big story there. But writing the lyrics to the tune inspired that.

What do you think of the conspiracy theory that Stanley Kubrick secretly filmed the Apollo 11 moon landing?

I love a good conspiracy theory and I’m always open to them. I rarely believe them completely but I always enjoy the possibilities. And every once in a while there are one or two that somebody pulls up that I believe 90 percent of the time are BS.

This one, however, is particularly heartbreaking to believe. Especially for kids who dreamed of space exploration in their youth.

They landed on my birthday. July 20th, 1969. I was three years old.

Are there any plans to do a reissue of No Code as part of the 20th Anniversary commemoration series?

Yea, I think all that stuff is going to be reissued at some point and No Code is next on the list, maybe.

I love that record. I feel like it’s your Led Zeppelin III.

I like it, too. That’s a funny one, because when we made that record it came out with not necessarily a bang. It was sort of an oddball album for people, and I’m really happy that it’s managed to become a favorite for some of our fans. It shows you that even the ones that don’t seem like they are a success right off the bat in the long run can find a little life. Which is what I’m excited about for Moonlander. I don’t expect this one to sell a bunch or to have a big hit, but I’m glad it’s a record that can be released and be appreciated over the next ten or twenty years.

dvi2702 a écrit :King of the Junkies https://soundcloud.com/pearljam/king-of ... kies-stone

nono_thing_man a écrit :est-ce qu'on sait quand ça sort en CD?

dranx a écrit :ben le décalage sans doute, non ?

Stone Gossard releases his sophomore solo album, Moonlander today in digital, CD and limited edition vinyl formats as well as limited signed and hand numbered art prints via Monkeywrench Records.