It's really it's a very interesting photo.

Well, I mean, they're two peas in a pod, you know, I mean, yeah.

I mean, I spent a fair amount of time after Andy died with Chris, and he was like a daredevil.

It was like riding our bikes through Discovery Park, like these crazy trails with headlamps on, where you could only see 10 feet in front of you.

And Chris and Eric Garcia and me, somebody was wrecking every five or 10 minutes, and it was just lots of laughter.

And Ed has that same thing in him.

So the fact that they... not only became friends just like through the music and the creative artistic process and also being like a front man and all that stuff, but also just like how they wanted to live, you know, like they really wanted to live.

That's how you connected on those calls and letters, I guess too.

Did you see his departure coming? Like, was that a surprise to you?

No, I, you know, we've...

I mean, there's been talk for, you know, s- six or seven years and, and, you know, it, it started a little bit once, when Soundgarden sort of started up again.

And there, and there was a, there was a year or two in there where, where he was burning the candle at both ends.

He was like, you know, he's probably away from home for three-quarters of the year or something, you know, which that stuff's hard.

And, and, and, and they, and he and I even joke sometimes, like, we would say like, "So what, we got, like, three more years left, right, Jeff?" You know? And he'd be like, "Yeah, yeah, that, that sounds about right.

Three more years." Like, "So we'll both be 60." "Yeah, that'll be perfect." And I think it would maybe make the other guys a little bit nervous.

Like, that, that's how you connected on those calls, and letters I guess, too.

Da, da, da, da.

That's his decontrol.

I used to every once in a while get a copy of Boston Rock for some reason, and in the back of Boston Rock it said...

This is like 1984.

It said, "SS Decontrol looking for a new bass player," blah, blah, blah.

And I guess, like, Al and Jamie had a fight for a week, and so Al put a ad in the Boston Rock that he was gonna get a new bass player.

But I answered it.

You gotta get out there.

Like, did you guys all discuss that before you went out that night?

Well, we, we'd been talking about, you know, what Bruce had been saying, and Bruce was so eloquent and, you know.

I, I think he was just reminding everybody.

I mean, it's...

You know, it's, it's, it's happened a lot over the 30 years we've been a band, you know.

Like, the...

It happened a little bit, um, you know, during the Bush years.

Um, what, what right now gives you the, the biggest pause, um, moving forward?