Even if it doesn't sell like the upcoming Pearl Jam album, the third effort from guitarist Stone Gossard's side project Brad, Welcome to Discovery Park, is a classic contemporary rock record. Equal parts loud guitar rockers and piano ballads, the set reflects what happens when four old friends -- Gossard, vocalist Shawn Smith, drummer Regan Hagar and keyboardist Mike Berg -- just get together in the studio and have a good time. Everyone writes, everyone plays everything, and out comes an album. "That's always been our style," Gossard says, "Just sort of wing it. Just believe in the nature of that and its rough edges and unprofessionality." Gossard, for his part, contributed "Sheepish," a wide-eyed, lilting reverie that equals the best of his debut 2001 solo set Bayleaf -- and anchors Discovery Park.

How do you know when it's time to make a Brad record? Who's the guy who writes songs and then calls everyone else and books studio time?

I see Regan or Shawn around town [Seattle], and if the timing seems right we do it. Everyone had a bit of a break last year, so we got together in the studio. We all do parts of the writing: I wrote a couple songs, Mike Berg wrote a couple tracks, "Arrakis," "All Is One," and Regan wrote "Revolution" on guitar, the first song he's written that way. We showed him an open tuning, and he could just move his finger around. He said, "This is what you guys have been doing all these years, and I thought this was hard?" We opened a huge can of worms there. Suddenly he's a genius: He'll write a new song everyday.

After three albums, has Brad taken on its own momentum and character, or does it still feel like a side project?

I've known all these guys for fifteen-plus years. We're old friends. We've made lots of records together and played music together for ages. It's like an old girlfriend. Or maybe I shouldn't put it that way. And we all just enjoy making Brad records -- it's just an excuse to get together and work on something together. Collaborating on a project is much different from just going over to someone's house for dinner. You really get to get into people's heads and create something together. It's such a gift and such a blessing to get an opportunity to do that.

For those reasons, are you more relaxed in the studio with Brad than with Pearl Jam?

It's always just making records. People are bringing songs in and working them out. Brad works as spontaneously as any band I've ever worked with. Shawn will bring something in in the morning and we'll have it recorded by the afternoon. Pearl Jam works very quickly too, but of course it's made up of different personalities. We haven't rehearsed for a record since . . . I can't remember when. We go in there and learn songs and, you know, as far as songs being written, they might be more worked out before they get to the studio.

How has Brad changed since your first time around together?

I hear those first records a lot better five years after we did them. It certainly seems like in this record we've embraced some of the raw and loose feel from the first record, trying to be too self-conscious about trying to create songs for the radio. We got a little tight making the second record, and I think this record definitely displays the original looseness we had. We covered a lot of ground: There's funky stuff, there's some rock stuff, there's some ballads.

Did you tighten up because the first album did well, and created some specific expectations?

I think there was some of that, and just because we hadn't made a record in so long. We felt if we're only going to make a record every four years, we should make one that gets played on the radio and that we can get some success going. And then we kind of let go of that, because you never know when you'll have success and we should just be ourselves, and let it all hang out a little more. I think this record represents that.

Did you write "Sheepish" for Brad in particular, or did the song just land on this record?

I wrote it in the sessions for Brad, but if I had written that song during a Pearl Jam session, I might have played it for those guys. Whether either of the bands are ever going to be excited about my material is always the question, and just because I write it doesn't mean it'll end up on a record. I don't have as much control as sometimes I wish I did. Why anything ends up being with either band is always a mystery to me.

Did you enjoy making your solo record? That's total control.

Yeah, I liked it. It's a bit nerve-wracking. I think it would be a lot more fun if I do it again or when I do it again. The whole time I was making it, I was wondering if it would end up good enough to put out, if I was just jerking myself off or not. And now that I know that it's just whatever it is, and I have it out and the mountains didn't collapse and no one gave two shits about it anyway -- why not do another one? I think that I could make it without hemming and hawing about whether it is good enough and just being excited about the process of putting together the kind of record I would do on my own.

Are those insecurities partly about your vocals?

Totally. Not just vocals but artistic doubts. Feeling like you've got enough juice to create a whole record that has enough energy to sustain a listener. So that's really jumping off a cliff, when you're not a singer and never have been a singer, but you're coming up with a melody and you have to make a decision about how to sing to it, if at all. Am I supposed to throw those away and not use them or should I try to get someone else to sing? What is the process of trying to do that? Fraught with dangers. At some point you say, "Well, good things have happened by taking some chances, so fuck it." If you have an idea that keeps coming back to you, sometimes you're better just going with it. And if it's an embarrassment, maybe you were due for one of those.

Well, do you like singing?

I do, I do like it. Particularly when I write a song that I really feel like I can sing. It's so obvious when you get a song and the melody comes and it's just the damn simplest melody you've ever sang, and it's really easy to play and sing at the same time, and it's like, "I can do this." And it gets a little bit more complex when you write a song and put a melody over top of it, and think, "Wow, I could never really play this and sing this at the same time. If it wasn't for this auto tuner and some help with the background vocals, this thing would kind of suck."

AUGUSTIN SEDGEWICK and BENJAMIN FRIEDLAND
(August 13, 2002)