The release of a new Pearl Jam album seemed to come a lot closer to reality last year, with the group announcing that they started recording with Brendan O’Brien in March and even releasing a brand new track in September. Fortunately, fan anticipation is rising once again, as guitarist Stone Gossard recently took the time to give an update on how the recording process is coming along.

In an interview with Rolling Stone (via Omelete), the guitarist spoke mainly about his other band, Brad, and their forthcoming LP United We Stand. Obviously, Mr. Gossard was asked about how close to completion Pearl Jam’s tenth studio album is, and the answer was somewhat vague: “We’ve recorded some songs, and we’re going to record and write some more. You never know, it might be that we’re a song away or two, or it might be that we’re going to record six or seven more songs. I think the main thing is that were not in a rush and there’s no urgency to it”.

When speaking about how the record might sound, Stone was more direct, saying that the band wants to “put something out that continues to expand our boundaries rather than trying to follow what we’ve done in the past.” He continued, further stating about the band’s possible foray into new sounds: “I think it’s a good time to hopefully continue to experiment, and continue to shake it up. So that people can go ‘Wow, that’s kind of weird for Pearl Jam,’ and then 10 years later they can go, ‘Oh, that’s my favorite period.’ Which is always kind of what happens. You try something and at first everybody doesn’t necessarily understand it, and then you look back and you go, thank God we tried something new, because it really opened a door up for us to be able to do this and this and this beyond that”.

As mentioned by the interviewer, Pearl Jam’s fourth album No Code was one of their oddest (though among our favorites in their catalogue), and one that amassed a strong following of fans over the years. Stone then compared that album to their current recordings: “No Code kind of came out and everyone was like, ‘uhhh…’ That was the first record where the record company and maybe even some of the press were going, ‘It doesn’t make any sense.’ But this record is refreshingly cool, because it’s just us in the studio screwing around, not taking it too seriously”. He finished his line of thought by saying that “one of the biggest problems in rock is people thinking too much, putting too much emphasis on getting things perfect or completely sorted out,” implying that that problem is unlikely to happen, whenever Pearl Jam decide to release their next LP.

While we await for more details on new Pearl Jam music, Brad’s United We Stand drops on April 24. Watch their video for Diamond Blues below:

Naturally, we’ll update as soon as there’s more concrete news.