Jeff Ament Quotes

I've seen kids turn their lives around. It's usually a kid who's outside of the team-sport world, or maybe has a darker personality or doesn't fit in. Skateboarding ends up being something they latch onto. It sounds hokey, but finding a focus on something - whether it's skateboard or playing your guitar - can be life changing.

- Jeff Ament

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.

- Jeff Ament

I led the state in defensive interceptions my senior year, with seven in nine games. Then I went to Montana to play basketball and found out quickly that my college career wasn't going to work out how I'd envisioned it.

- Jeff Ament

Kurt Cobain and Courtney Love talked trash about the fact that I hooped. I once stopped to say 'Hi' before a show, and as I walked away, Courtney yelled, 'Go play basketball with Dave Grohl!'

- Jeff Ament

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.

- Jeff Ament

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.

- Jeff Ament

Everybody got away from what Pearl Jam are supposed to be.

- Jeff Ament

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.'

- Jeff Ament

I certainly didn't want to be in a punk rock band, because I had already been in a punk rock band. I wanted to be in a band that could do anything - like Led Zeppelin.

- Jeff Ament

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.'

- Jeff Ament

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.

- Jeff Ament

I had a portable 8-track player under all my ramps, cranking one of my four 8-tracks - Cars/'Candy-O,' Ramones/'Road To Ruin,' Cheap Trick/'Heaven Tonight' and the first Devo record. I don't remember skating without music.

- Jeff Ament

All you have to do is drive by the empty tennis courts and basketball courts and compare them to the skate parks... c'mon people, get with the program - the future is now!

- Jeff Ament

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.

- Jeff Ament

We went to Big Sur about three years ago and hung out at the Esalen Institute.

- Jeff Ament

Our first record didn't come out on vinyl, so I think that might have had something to do with actually being in a position to make sure that it came out in vinyl this time. It sounds way better.

- Jeff Ament

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

- Jeff Ament

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.

- Jeff Ament

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.

- Jeff Ament

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

- Jeff Ament

Everything Ticketmaster stands for is what we're fighting against. They're just a small cog in a machine where the artist is at the bottom.

- Jeff Ament

Unless you're a vegan freak of nature like Tony Gonzalez, I don't think you can play sports much past your early 30s.

- Jeff Ament

I played djembe, percussion, keyboards and I sang.

- Jeff Ament

I just have a serious problem with business for business' sake: this bottom-dollar mentality. I have a serious problem with evil.

- Jeff Ament

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

- Jeff Ament

I'm a big fan of power trios where there's only three instruments.

- Jeff Ament

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

- Jeff Ament

It's hard for us not to be involved with things. When you have so much information and you see so much need, there's too much going on for us not to get involved.

- Jeff Ament

We just finished making a record. Everybody wants to play shows, so we're going to after that.

- Jeff Ament

I feel like in a lot of ways I can relate to the fans, just being a fan of music myself.

- Jeff Ament

We've always been a band that stood up for what we thought was right.

- Jeff Ament

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

- Jeff Ament

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

- Jeff Ament

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.

- Jeff Ament