Stone Gossard may have helped put the Pacific Northwest’s music scene on the mainstream map after founding Green River, Mother Love Bone, Temple of the Dog and Pearl Jam. But lately the environmentally active guitarist has headed for greener pastures — literally.
He’s recently teamed up with Timberland to plant trees on the Dig It tour, which wraps in San Francisco on Saturday with a full day’s schedule of Earth-friendly work and music. The conscientious collaborations fit Gossard’s think-globally-act-locally worldview well: He also serves as a board member on Portland’s Wild Salmon Center, is deeply involved with Conservation International, spearheaded the Carbon Portfolio Strategy and much, much more. And he’s politically invested as well, headlining a get-out-the-vote concert with Rage Against the Machine guitarist Tom Morello and fellow Pearl Jam ax master Mike McCready on November 3 in Seattle.
Of course, he’s still plenty musical, although he’s gravitated toward more traditional country and folk. Gossard has recently released digital copies of songs from his forthcoming sophomore solo effort, as well as live video performances, on his official Pearl Jam site. Listening Post caught up with Gossard by phone to chat about his new taste for traditional sonics, why Seattle is global warming’s new destination city, and why Ticketmaster had it coming.
Wired.com: Talk about the collaboration with Timberland on the Dig It tour.
Stone Gossard: It’s an intersection between music, philanthropy and opportunity. I’m excited about being in a situation where volunteerism in encouraged, and having a good time doing something as simple as planting trees. Timberland has been doing a good job raising the bar for corporations that pay their employees well and encourage volunteer hours. It’s doing a good job of labeling its products, which is an important marketing mechanism that should be encouraged; same goes for using more recyclable materials. Timberland is not perfect, but it is working hard on being a company with a smaller waste stream.
Wired.com: How about the music you’re playing now? It’s a bit more country and folk than Pearl Jam fans are probably used to.
Stone Gossard: That’s exactly it, folk and country. I’m glad that comes across. A significant event for me was learning Hank Williams, reconnecting with his music’s simplicity, which inspired me to inhabit the same territory. It’s different, because I grew up on Led Zeppelin, The Stooges and punk, so in that sense I’m mutating country and folk more than a few degrees. But the roots remain the same: Folk music isn’t complex or perfect, but it has its rough spots.
Wired.com: Dig It is a pretty folksy event all around. You’re planting trees. The other acts on the bill are folk artists.
Stone Gossard: Right. Originally, I was going to play with Vince Mira’s band, the Royal K Trio. They got a twang to them, and Vince has an incredible connection to Johnny Cash and other traditional folk and country music. He’s a great kid, and I felt obligated to invite him along and have him be part of it. He’s the headliner, and I’m just doing an opening set. But all of the events have been amazing. There have been a couple hundred people planting trees; a lot gets done in a pretty short period of time.
Wired.com: You’re a pretty environmentally involved person, especially in the Pacific Northwest. But are you worried about the global implications of these record temperatures and melts?
Stone Gossard: I have no clue. I couldn’t begin to assess the question. Everyone has their own intuition about it, so I keep going back to the fundamentals: We are in a contained environment. Raising awareness, changing the marketplace, effecting spiritual change — whatever it is that you decide is your thing, go for it. Clearly, awareness of this issue has become huge in the last ten years. But we’re right in the danger zone, so we could have a progression or we could have a death spiral.
Wired.com: What would suggest fans of Pearl Jam do to help out?
Stone Gossard: Get involved in local green issues, whether that is planting trees, integrating with local environmental groups or working towards complete restoration. If you have a lot of nature in your city, it becomes a more enjoyable place. That’s my own feeling about it. I think it’s evident that expensive neighborhoods in Seattle are surrounded by natural beauty. That elevates city life. So if we can make cities more attractive in the long run, we can be smarter about issues like development, zoning and economics.
Wired.com: According to some climate science, the American West is entering a phase of permanent drought, which might encourage migration to the Pacific Northwest and higher. Are you worried about that?
Stone Gossard: I don’t think about it too much, because there are lots of places to live here and lots of restoration to be done. Seattle and the northwest will be a destination, and hopefully we’ll have a plan in place to take care of that growth. There’s surely a better way than our currently scattershot development. Sprawl is ultimately going to hurt us. Thankfully, trees don’t take forever to grow.
Wired.com: Pearl Jam has always been out in front of issues like these, and now other artists are finally joining in. Were you ever concerned about the band’s mixture of pleasure and politics?
Stone Gossard: We’re learning as we go along. It hasn’t always been the same thing to everybody in the band, but in the long run the fact that we looked at these problems early makes more sense now. There’s a downside to having a political issue of the week, as opposed to something more underlying. But in the broader sense, I’m happy that we did get involved. Politics is tricky; it cuts both ways. Every time you make a choice, it has unintended consequences.
Wired.com: You’re doing a get-out-the-vote show with Rage Against the Machine’s Tom Morello soon. Any thoughts on the election?
Stone Gossard: I’m optimistic that a Democratic administration will be more in tune with our environmental issues at the federal level. But the city and state level is where most of this is happening, particularly in regards to zoning and habitat. There are lots of new bedfellows these days, arguing that this stuff isn’t necessarily bad for the economy or people who aren’t environmentalists.
Wired.com: Yeah, it’s a bigger issue than Ticketmaster’s fading monopoly.
Stone Gossard: [Laughs] Do we still let people pay for our shows? I can’t remember! Look, we’re a business too. We’ve kind of navigated beyond Ticketmaster, as I think the landscape has changed a bit since then. But every business wants to succeed; our argument was that Ticketmaster was succeeding in a noncompetitive way. But I think there are more options now, and we are in a better position to cut a deal that we want to cut. We’ve always tried to advance the ball, and I’m happy that we took on Ticketmaster, although it turned out to be more of a media story. But they did get singled out and had to react, so we helped get the ball rolling.
Photo: Courtesy of AP/Diane Bondareff
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