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BIO >>
R.E.M. played their first concert in Athens, Georgia, USA, on 19 April 1980. Their line-up consisted of four drop-outs from the University of Georgia, including Michael Stipe as lead vocalist. Without the charisma of Stipe and his eccentric onstage behaviour, hurling himself about with abandon in-between mumbling into the microphone, they could easily have been overlooked as just another bar band, relying on the harmonious guitar sound of the Byrds for their inspiration. Acquiring a healthy following among the college fraternity in their hometown, it was not long before they entered the studio to record their debut single, "Radio Free Europe", to be released independently on Hibtone Records. This was greeted with considerable praise by critics who conceded that the band amounted to more than the sum of their influences. Their country/folk sound was contradicted by a driving bassline and an urgency that put the listener more in mind of the Who in their early mod phase. Add to this the distinctive voice of Stipe and his inaudible, perhaps even non-existent, lyrics, and R.E.M. sounded quite unlike any other band in the USA in the post-punk era of the early 80s. The critical praise heaped upon R.E.M. has been monumental, but despite all this attention they have remained painfully modest and reasonably unaffected, and, despite the loss of Berry, still appear united. They are one of the most important and popular bands to appear over the past three decades, and although their commercial heyday appears to have passed they still retain massive credibility. Official Website: remhq.com
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QUOTES >>
"Losing My Religion just kinda came to me. The girl who's being attacked and lets part of herself go, that's where Losing my religion was appropriate. Michael (Stipe)'s idea of what Losing My Religion is, is probably different than mine. I asked him to come to the studio and listen. And he came and sat there and there were tears running down of his face. And that was important to me because I needed to know that he thought that I had honoured his song. I wanted him to understand. We never talked about what his version or mine meant, there were no words necessarily."
-- Tori; "Veronica In Concert" Interview (Dutch), Early 1996
I: But how much of it [the characters in Tori's songs] is fiction and how many of them are real? Like Michael Stipe will write in a character to convey what he has to say.
T: Michael Stipe *lives* in character. And he's a friend and I adore him but really...Wow, it's exhausting being him I'm sure. But the thing is, these are real people, but sometimes a character is made up of a few people. And sometimes the guys are women, sometimes the women are guys. So that you know, I can still have friends.
-- Tori; Musique Plus "Artist Of The Month" Special, Oct 13, 1999
When I [the interviewer] shook his [Michael Stipe's] hand at the hotel that will go unnamed, he remarked immediately, "You have a firm handshake. I'm lucky I don't play piano. I used to have a firm handshake, too, until I met Tori Amos. She just put her hand out there, like she was asking you not to hurt it. Now when people come up behind me in bars and wrap their arms around my neck in a bear hug, I'm like, 'Please. The throat.'"
-- Michael Stipe; Esquire Magazine, Jun 2001
I FOLLOW MICHAEL STIPE TO LOS ANGELES, WHERE HE'S WORKING on music and undergoing dental work. I visit him at a studio where he is recording a song with Tori Amos for "Don Juan De Marco and the Centerfold". We are supposed to spend time talking together, but they are running behind so it isn't possible ("I feel like a bad date," he apologizes), and instead I just watch. Perhaps you have wondered what happens when records are made. Sometimes it goes like this:
"Come in," he says when I arrive. "We were just talking about cannibalism." Tori Amos sends Michael into the vocal booth.
He sings, but too quietly. "I'm stuffed like a pig," he apologizes to her. Then he burps at huge volume.
"Why can't you sing as loud as you burp?" demands Amos. He sings the line again. Silence.
"Tor-eeeee?" he inquires.
"Yes-eeeee," she answers.
"It sucked?" he inquires further.
"No, it didn't suck," she says. "It was great. The pitch was kind of funky, but it should be good..."
He tries a new harmony.
"Was that a third?" he asks apologetically.
"Yes," she says sternly. "It's okay--we're still friends. I won't pee on you." She turns to me. "I hate thirds," she explains.
Michael returns to the control room; they listen to the playback.
"The tone of my voice is so..."--he pauses, looking for the right words--"Grand Canyon."
It is Tori's turn to sing. She adds a new counter-melody to the chorus. "It's Moses parting the Red Sea," says Stipe.
"Yeah, it's _exactly_ that," says Amos dryly. It's a Charlton Heston in a fright wig," he continues, unbowed.
Stephen Dorff arrives.
[...] Tori goes off to sing some more. Michael instructs her to try an octave higher.
"Are you serious?" she says. "You'll say I'm a new-age Druid."
"I'll allow it," he says. "Enya has left the building." She sings it again.
"More balls," he says.
"More balls? Like I care about you?"
"Be a redhead."
She tries to follow these instructions.
"I think it's a little precious," he says. "Push the same amount of air but make it a little wilder, and we're on the way to Zaire." This time she not only follows these instructions to everyone's satisfaction but sings the words "on the way to Zaire." If it makes the final cut, it will be just the thing for generations of Stipeoplogists to over-ponder for months at a time.
Tori suggests that it is time to break out the Guinness. Bottles are passed around, and the entire song is played.
"Would you fuck to this, Chris?" she asks me. "I would."
Maybe I would, I say.
"We'll put it on a loop for you," offers Michael.
"I'll wear my rubber dress," she says.
-- Tori; Details Magazine, Feb 1995
How did your collaboration come about?
A: We'd met a few times. Then Michael came to my show in Atlanta.
S: I was completely mesmerized. And jealous. Seeing Tori made me want to perform again.
A: I think I'm Metallica. I play like them on piano.
S: She doesn't play piano, she melds with it.
Are you enjoying working together?
A: With Michael it's almost like certain parts of my brain have been blown open. It's like you're in your own little buggy going gown a dirt road, then all of a sudden you're in a briar patch. You didn't know you could drive in the briar patch, but he's shown me that you can.
S: It's like you wake up from a nap and a total stranger is standing there, saying don't stretch like that, stretch like this.
So no fights so far?
S: No, we're on the same page. I mean, we both write with invisible ink. It's like the Name of the Rose. You gotta have lemon juice to be able to read it. But we're writing on the sam page.
A: You kind of just dig the way each other smells, or you don't. I love the way he smells.
S: It's like two satellites eclipsing each other.
A: And a bit of shoe trading.
S: And lots of snake oil.
Have you used the film for inspiration?
S: This has little or nothing to do with the movie.
A: We saw a three-minute trailer and said let's go eat.
S: Then we went to an exhibit of Dorothea Lange photographs. These are the things that feed a lyric. Not the movie.
A: Basically, it was like, the movie had sand in it, which makes me think of Kashmir, which makes me think of Morocco, which makes me think of Robert Plant's promises that he hasn't fulfilled to me.
S: Nor I.
A: But I've turned (Plant) down in marriage, so it makes me feel good (laughing). Anyway, sand, Kashmir, Morocco, spicy food, spicy yogurt.
S: Unshaved.
A: That's been our motto through the whole thing: Spicy yogurt unshaved.
-- Tori; Entertainment Weekly, Dec 5, 1994
"We wrote a song together called "It Might Hurt" but it kind of took a vacation. Maybe I'll resurrect it sometime, I don't know. We were put together by one of the film guys at Atlantic Records, and we got along like a house afire. He's very special."
-- Tori; I Guide
T: Yeah, we're recording it in two weeks - it's for the Johnny Depp/Marlon Brando thing.
I: IS IT GOING TO BE INSTRUMENTAL OR VOCAL?
T: No, it's a song. We're writing it together. We were talking on the phone
earlier tonight, trying to put it together. The music's written, we've
written the music. He was in Madison with me when that happened.
I: HE'S GOING TO END UP IN AUSTRALIA ABOUT A MONTH AFTER YOU...
T: Yeah. That little dog. He's following the sun, that's what he's doing. No he is - you look at his tour schedule, he's not going to be in anywhere horrible if he can help it. He's a smart boy, that boy.
-- Tori; Phone Interview, Nov 2, 1994 (Melbourne, Australia)
"Michael Stipe said to me once, 'Hey, can I borrow your audience?' I said, 'You'll have to ask them.' I'm very lucky. Most of them, 98.9 percent of them, would give you a ride, give you something to eat and you'd be fine. There's a mutual respect there."
-- Tori; Blender Magazine, Nov 2002
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