Interview courtesy of Greg Prato. "Ben Shepherd Almost in Nirvana" was originally printed in the Summer 2005 issue of Classic Rock Magazine. 1. Ben Shepherd Almost in Nirvana? Nevermind… Ben once had a tough decision to make - join Nirvana or Soundgarden. With Nirvana readying the material that would appear on their landmark, Nevermind, Shepherd almost found himself as a member of the band. "Yeah, I was supposed to play the other guitar. But I kinda really didn't do anything, except be a friend with them on tour. I was supposed to be another guitar player for them, but I was always like, 'You guys should just stay a three-piece man.' Then it came to us being in Ann Arbor for a couple of days. What happened was I'd rehearsed all the new stuff that they didn't even play on that tour - that was a make up tour, because Jason had quit, or they'd kicked him out. Then they came home for a little while, then I went on the road with them for a little while. And before we left, we rehearsed everything that basically became Nevermind, and never played that shit live. They only played Bleach back then. That's pretty close to how it was. The day before Soundgarden asked me to try out, Nirvana asked me to try out. I said, 'Well, shit, I've got to do Nirvana first you guys,' and they were like, 'Alright, cool.' Because they asked first, or it would have been the other way around - I would have said the same thing. But with Nirvana I would have gotten to play guitar, which was my first love. Hiro made me feel really good when I joined, he's like, 'Man, I'm really glad you're doing it Ben. You're good at it, so go for it.' I was like, 'Thanks brother.' All the rest of the guys in the band were fucking awesome, and made it really cool and smooth. Made it easy, y'know? It could have been really trippy, but it wasn't." 2. You were friends with Kurt Cobain. Despite how the media portrays him…he was a just regular guy, right? Yep. They like to say that he had charisma. Bullshit. He didn't have any…he was just 'Kurt,' and that was that endearing quality. I met him in Olympia, I don't even think he'd started Nirvana yet, or Bliss, they'd change their name all the time. I met him at a party - we were both sitting on the end of a couch - and I go, 'Oh, you're like me, huh? You always wind up at this spot at the party.' And he says, 'Yep.' Everyone else is partying and we're sitting there, being loners on the end of a couch. There was thankfully a guitar, and we'd swap it back and forth. That's how we met, because we were both kind of shy weirdos, y'know? Well, I'm the weirdo, I don't think he was, I think he was more shy. Like even that guitar, he said, 'Yeah, I always find a guitar and then I'll just sit alone and play guitar at a party.' We were just smoking cigarettes, talking, and kicking back. [Through the years] there was always a rumor through our grapevine that we were going to play music together - me, him, and Buzz [Osbourne, of the Melvins]. I'd always hear that from people, because our friendship from touring and everything, it turned into a grapevine.