Pearl Jam Meet King's X

After fifteen years of talking the talk, Pearl Jam bassist Jeff Ament and King's X frontman Doug Pinnick are collaborating on a project they hope to finish this year.

Ament and Pinnick met in 1988 when Ament was a member of the groundbreaking Seattle grunge act Mother Love Bone. But according to Ament, they got together for the first time "a little over a year ago," when, along with drummer Richard Stuverud, they recorded ten songs in one week.

"We just locked ourselves up in Montana in Jeff's house and wrote music," says Pinnick. Pinnick describes the sounds as "a little mellower, not as heavy" as King's X, and "atmospheric" and "Pearl Jam-ish."

"We had talked about making music together often," says Ament. "When our schedules free up, we will continue with the project." The bassist is currently on tour with Pearl Jam, with dates set through at least mid-July.

King's X are also on tour, behind Black Like Sunday, which features songs the band wrote as many as twenty years ago. "We decided to take songs we played way before we were signed, songs we just loved, and put them on an album," Pinnick says. "They're the same songs, but they're done the way we do things now, fifteen years later."

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Song Stories

“Help Me”

Joni Mitchell | 1974

Joni Mitchell wrote and recorded this song for her album Court and Spark, but she had to switch from her regular band to make the song sound exactly the way she wanted. "I had attempted to play my music with rock & roll players," she told Rolling Stone. "They’d laugh, 'Awww, isn't that cute? She's trying to teach us how to play.'" Mitchell switched to a jazz band, Tom Scott’s L.A. Express, and scored the biggest hit of her career in the process.

More Song Stories entries »

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