I just picked up a copy of Water magazine today, took it home and only then realized that a Vedder interview was one of the cover stories and not only that but the interviewer was Kelly Slater. It's pretty good, anyone know if I'm allowed to scan it and put it on here or is that illegal?

I say scan away! lets see it.

I don't have time today, i'll do it tomorrow

You better not do that I'm sure that someone will alert the magazine and you will be promply detained.


Lets get a look at that shall we.

Here it is. It kinda seems more like just two stoned surfers talking than an interview, pretty insightful though, but sometimes it seems like Kelly Slater's trying to interview himself. Enjoy!


DON'T SWEAT THE EDDIE THINGS by Kelly Slater
Eddie Vedder on Surfing, Music, and Saving the Earth.

The opportunity to interview a legendary musician like Eddie Vedder is very rare. So when Kelly Slater said he had a story that WATER magazine might be interested in, that was and understatement as cool and low-key as Eddie himself. Pearl Jam has long been an all-time favorite of surfers everywhere, and Eddie has enjoyed years of traveling to play live shows as well as surf, mixing the best of the worlds. Dig these thoughts and theories as Kelly and Eddie get philosophical. Take it away Kel...

I think Eddie grew a little tired of fame, familiarity and notoriety back in the 90s and has sorta' been layin' low, making music and gettin' to surf a bit more now. We've know each other for about nine years and have the occasional surf or wiffleball game. Eddie's a huge baseball fan, loves to surf, but music is his first love and what he does best. He's got one of those voices that everybody recognizes and it was amazing to get a chance to sit down with him. Recorded in the spring 2006

KS: Tell me what's going on with Pearl Jam right now?
EV: We've been in the studio finishing up our new record, and this feels like one of the best we've ever made. We've spent more time than ever on this one, more than a year now and it's been a harder record to produce. There's a lot of stuff in the atmosphere and a lot of things to write about....it's trying to figure out how to communicate with people. The lyrics kind of surf the music, you know...if the meaning of the lyric is kid of intense it almost needs a bigger wave, a faster song.

KS: We first met in '97 and a year later we got to know each other in Australia. We went surfing at Snapper, you, me, Rob Machado and a couple of the guys. We saw you play in Brisbane. You invited me on stage to play but I got too scared...then you asked me to draw a wave. Everyone you met, you got them to draw a wave in your diary or something, true?
EV: I've got these notebooks I always draw waves in. When I got to meet you guys, some of the best waveriders, who had a big connection with waves, I was really curious to see how you would draw waves. It was really interesting 'cause somebody like Rob Machado would draw one a certain way, and Kalani Robb's was different, and yours I didn't expect at all, kind of thick and angular, and kinda' mean. Then you sent me a photo and you were doing a front-side cutback and you wrote, "You asked me once to draw you a wave. I'm better at drawing on them." Ha!

KS:When I met you, it seemed you had a strong passion for surfing but never went consistently. You've been surfing a lot more since we've got to know each other.
EV: Yeah, I got some priorities straight. There was a time when I was in San Diego and I got to know the ocean pretty well. Such an incredible connection to nature, and even waiting for waves is just a great thing, you know just waiting, it's just a great excuse to be out there. And then actually riding the waves...

KS: I think even the idea of getting bitten by a shark is exciting. It's not what I'd want to happen, but I've had this fantasy for a long time that I'd be attacked by a Great White. Probably since I saw Jaws in the 70s. My first board had a picture of Jaws on the bottom. I would MUCH rather die from a shark attack than walking across the street and getting hit by a car. There's so many bad ways to go, that's almost a good way. You're actually serving a purpose in world, if that makes any sense?
EV: And then if you could get at peace with it real quick, which it seems like you already are.

KS:Maybe you'd still have time to flash on all the great things you love in life as you're being chomped away, it might just lead to a peaceful death.
EV: Who knows what you see in the shark's eye at the last living moment.

KS: You could realize that it was your grandfather or something.
EV: It makes you ponder that if you did get hit by a bus, could you put in you will that immediately after being pronounced dead, they'd get you on a fishing boat and...

KS: Have a shark eat you!
EV: Just kinda troll you along in a Great White area.

KS: To me it's like serving a purpose for nature, you know? And if you actually think about it, it's amore humane on some level than just rotting in a box.
EV:Yeah, part of the cycle, I mean eventually. Well, I don't know if it's actually all part of the cycle.

KS: I'm gonna get hate mail for those comments I just made.
EV: Yeah but just think of all the support you'll have from the shark community!

KS: Describe the ocean's effect on your song writing. In a lot of your songs throughout the years, you have talked about waves or the ocean in some ways like it's a love.
EV: I think even beyond it being in the songs, in order to write, that's the place that allows me to kind of meditate. It's not lost upon me that I'm a very fortunate human being to be able to find my way to the ocean and get out in it...but to have that connection, and maybe it's a part of knowing about or having the theory of evolution kinda' deeply implanted in my mind and my heart at this point, it feels like going back to the place where it all began, you know? Just stepping off the shoreline into the water, all of a sudden I'm in another world. Getting my daughter into the water now and having her respond to the ocean, I'm absolutely high off her acceptance and excitement over the ocean.

KS: The more you interact with the ocean, the more you have to respect it and the less you do, the less you think you do.
EV: It's interesting, it's almost like a good parent, a big wave demands respect and humility.

KS: Maybe you do already.
EV: I don't know I never really had a problem with humility.

KS: We all have our moments (laughs).
EV: I'm sure somebody else has had a problem with my humility or lack of, but...in general I think aggresiveness is rewarded in male American society and I don't know if it's necessarily healthy for our planet.

KS: Yeah...Let's jump into the favorite live jam you've have ever had?
EV: Well, at the end of the Vote for Change tour, right before the last election, I was invited to play with (Bruce) Springsteen at a New Jersey gig that was his final show. We played a few songs together and then with the E-street band. It was really great energy.

KS: Does anyone call him the Boss?
EV: They might. Bruce is great. I got him a ukelele when he passed through Seattle on his acoustic tour. I just thought he'd like to have it in his arsenal, and I was in this ukulele shop the other day in the islands, and they said, "Hey brud-dah, you give Bruce ukulele?" and I thought, "How did they know that?" and I was like, "Oh in ukulele world, news travels fast" (laughs). Bruce had never played a ukulele before, and we sat and talked, it was before the show, (mimicking Bruce) "Oh Eddie, I never had one before you know. Isn't this great?" He played it the whole time we were talking about the kids and being a dad and he didn't miss a note.

KS: You saved me a lot of trouble by introducing me to the ukulele, 'cause I used too carry around a guitar, with surfboards, my golf clubs, and I had all this shit you know and I couldn't carry it. But now I just sit in myseat and play the uke.
EV: So you got rid of the guitar, but you still have your golf clubs? Apparently I have some more work to do (laughing).

KS: I don't even use a case for my uke, I just carry it on the plane, no worries. That's my ultimate travel partner.
EV: This one trip I went down to Australia and had a Martin tenor, it was just after the 2000 tour and except for my first real guitar which was a Telecaster when I was 16, I never felt so close to an instrument as this little ukulele. I mean it really became like a friend.

KS: You wrote some of Riot Act on it right?
EV: Just one song ended up on the record, and all the other songs I kept to myself and shared 'em with a few friends. I think I played 'em live a few times. It's a great instrument for melodies and it came at a time when I wanted to play more melodically, or have the melody create the song and be more important...rather than a few chord changes and then slapping some paint on it as far as the vocals. I actually wanted to create a thorough line with the music and the vocals. I think that was from knowing Johnny Ramone and his approach to songs. His brother Dee Dee wrote most of the Ramones tunes on an acoustic with only three strings.

KS: Where's the best place you've ever been surfing?
EV: It was a secret spot, and there was no one around, and it was big...the way the wave hit it, the slope of the shore came off of an intense mountain so it just went deep in the water. We had to take a boat to the spot and even though we were fifty yards off shore or less, it was like a thousand feet deep. When the wave finally jacked up it hit the boulders, not reef, it was breaking on boulders! It was probably the thickest wave I've ever been on. The thickest wave I've ever seen though was at Teahupo'o, when I saw you surf.

KS: It makes you wonder why we need oil when you see a day like that. If somebody could learn how to tap that energy...if somebody could learn how to tap that ass!
EV: You just called our Mother Ocean, ASS! How Beavis of you.

KS: There's so many different ways to have free energy in the world. Everybody's big on hybrid cars now. Can't you argue that electric cars are actually worse for the environment or as bad as gasoline cars, because what is creating the energy? We burn coal and fuel to create energy, potentially some of that is coming from wind energy or solar, but only a small percentage at this point in America...but we're not using the coal 100% efficiently when we plug the car in and get energy. I could be totally off, but that's my guess.
EV: Without having heard that theory before, I think that you might be absolutely right, but hopefully the future of enery consumption in the United States is turned into more wind energy than solar energy, if we get these big corporations to kind of see this as a profitable venture, which it is. We need the hybrids to take seed and let people feel like it is a viable option, it's almost the transition phase. I'd be careful to bad mouth the hybrid 'cause ultimately we need that transition to take place.

KS: I guess ultimately then the argument I am making is that we, as a society, need to look at where our energy is coming from in the first place.
EV: Exactly.

KS: What would you do if you knew you couldn't fail?
EV: This is not 'cause I'm sitting here with you, but I would actually go for the biggest wave I could. I'd go the rest of my life just riding that. I would come in for food and hang out with my family and all...I guess that's the selfish answer. And then the less selfsh answer would be something on a larger scale. I'd rather make sure that the ocean is vibrant. I'd think about our planet and what we are doing to it and how many resources are left before we strp the earth and humans are no longer able to sustain themselves on this planet, you know, we are on a road to destruction.

KS: Road to nowhere...
EV: And we're driving fast, and look who's driving! So we've got to command the wheel and take this thing another way or else our kids, and grandkids, are not going to be able to experience the beauty of this planet the way we have.

i dont like kelly slater after that article

Thanks. Nice interview, good read

Nice read. Thanks for posting. I'm not against Kelly Slater now, but it does seem like he is trying to take on more than he can handle when he talks about certain issues.

Yeah, i've never really liked him, but this article just kinda deglorified him some more, IMO. It just seems like he's trying to interview himself and like most things are going over his head. Oh, and the article was copied word for word, so all those grammatical errors you may have caught were in the mag and all 100% Slater. Ok, enough ripping him apart.


Funny.

Some nice stuff in there. I like Eddie's beavis line and the springsteen stuff was sweet.

I like the interview ... I generally always prefer it when interviews are done not by journalists, but by someone who knows the person already ... kinda like Ed's interviews of SK and visa versa

And I don't think Kelly S. was self promoting or trying to interview himself, I think it was just more of a conversation than anything

BUT I did have a problem with Ed telling Kelly that he needed to stop packing his golf clubs. I mean, golf rules almost as much as Sonic F'n Reducer for God's sake.

Now here's the real question for all the golf fans on the board, what would be better, playing 18 at St. Andrews or Pebble Beach vs PJ performing 18 songs of their choice ... now THAT'S a tough call ...

nice interview.

it´s just a transcript from that awful radio interview earlier this year...

yeah thats what i thought, it was more a conversation, that's why Kelly talks so much, Eddie is pretty full of himself as well so i don't see why people are bitchin' about Kelly where Eddie is acting the same.

stupid surfers

I have yet to see what's wrong with any of that.

I have no problem with Kelly being full of himself. Actually I don't think he even sounds full of himself. I just think he sounds really, really dumb. Like a dumb guy trying to sound smart. Harsh but true.

Wow...Eddie got to surf with Rob Machado...that's awesome.

He has to be a really good surfer if these guys surf with him.