R.E.M. Stories

This is my first time I’ve written something by request. My friend Justin Bass—whom I’ve known since he booked Blake Babies to play the University of Wisconsin—has a new project collecting personal stories about R.E.M. I said I’d give him one on the condition that I could publish it on my page. Justin agreed, and here we are.

By the way, if you have your own R.E.M. story to share, here’s the link!

The truth is I don’t have one particular anecdote. The music of R.E.M.—particularly the IRS years—is bedrock to me. It’s impossible for me to calculate the influence their music has had on my work. Their records were the soundtrack of my life during my most adventurous years. Their music contains so many memories and the feelings that accompany the memories. R.E.M. is the band I kept coming back to between musical obsessions.

If you listen to early Blake Babies records—especially our self-released debut Nicely Nicely—you’ll notice that I’m essentially emulating Peter Buck’s guitar style. I learned to play from hardcore and blues records in equal measure. Neither of those guitar styles suited Juliana Hatield’s voice. When tasked with accompanying a soft voiced singer, I studied Buck’s tone and picking style. I learned to play every R.E.M. song to master the picking patterns. I forged my own sound over subsequent releases, but I owe R.E.M. a debt of gratitude for showing me how to serve our material.

I remember how R.E.M. first came into my life. My dad’s closest friend to this day is music journalist/author/educator Anthony DeCurtis, a former Senior Editor for Rolling Stone who has written authorized biographies about Lou Reed and Clive Davis. Anthony was a graduate student in English at I.U., where my dad directed his dissertation.

Anthony wrote about music for the Bloomington daily newspaper. He got a lot of promos and press kits, and he’d bring records by for my brother, my dad, and me to check out. That’s how I first heard Talking Heads, Gang of Four, and Van Halen. He brought me a Van Halen press kit with a folder that I used at school until it fell apart. Once the other kids caught up and started to recognize the logo, it won me some points with the metal kids. Maybe that’s where I figured out there’s cultural capital in being early with the cool music.

When Anthony finished his doctorate around 1980, he took a job at Emory College in Atlanta. He kept writing about music and he caught R.E.M.’s earliest shows. He developed a long relationship with the band, which included writing feature stories on the band over the course of their career. Anthony sent my dad a copy of Murmur around the time it came out.

I don’t think my dad was all that interested in Murmur. He’s an English professor, therefore a lyrics guy. He loves stuff like Dylan, Leonard Cohen, Joni Mitchell, Talking Heads, and Lucinda Williams largely because he appreciates the poetry of their lyrics. If he can’t understand the words, it probably won’t hold his interest. Me, on the other hand—I’ve always been more of a vibes guy when it comes to music. If a song makes me feel something, I’ll keep listening.

I ignored the album at first. It came out in the spring of 1983, which was my absolute peak of my hardcore punk phase. I was practically a hardcore and punk supremacist for a couple years. I still listened to Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, and Black Sabbath, but that was about it. I wanted everything to be about 250 beats per minute.

Eventually, out of boredom and creeping curiosity—and probably a review or two—I gave Murmur a listen. I liked it. Then I loved it. Then I couldn’t stop listening. I feel like that album threw me a line, pulled me out of a musical trap I’d set for myself.

In retrospect, the two records that initially pulled me out of my hardcore rut were Murmur and The Velvet Underground and Nico. Those records were my ticket into another world. They made me feel so much. I wanted to write like that, I wanted to play like that, I wanted to be in those bands…or at least have my own bands like those bands.

By the time I moved to Boston I had my favorites. In addition to the Velvets and R.E.M., I found inspiration in Hüsker Dü, The Replacements, X, The Dream Syndicate, The Modern Lovers, and Lou Reed’s solo albums from the 70s. Those records provided the blueprint for the band I wanted to start.

When I met Juliana, we discovered we had a few of those in common—The Replacements, X, and—especially—R.E.M. Sharing those reference points in our musical blueprint made it very easy for us to start a band. We could generally agree in shorthand about the way we wanted to sound, but the challenge was to figure out how to make it a reality. Without those records, it’s hard to know how we would have found a shared musical language.

I went to a group dinner once with Mike Mills, but I doubt he’d remember me. I’ve never met the other members. I consider their longtime manager and attorney Bertis Downs a friend (I think he prefers “advisor”). I met Bertis as a fellow law professor, and he became a generous mentor and pal. I could always count on him to lift me up because we’re not in competition for clients. Bertis has the sort of charmed life whereby he’s only really had one client. He’s only ever needed one client. For people who do what we do in the industry, that is the ultimate dream—especially when the client is as revolutionary as R.E.M. They launched my band, just as they’ve likely launched thousands of bands—a few of which have achieved the greatest heights possible.

I’ll close with a quick anecdote from my early touring days. I remember the date of Blake Babies’ first show in Athens. It was November, 1988, the day after R.E.M.’s Green came out. The day after the 1988 Presidential election. We played the old 40 Watt Club, which later became Caledonia on Clayton Street. We opened for a great local band called Five Eight. To our great disappointment, nobody from R.E.M. came to our show.

Freda and I loved Athens, in part because it’s familiar because it’s so much like Bloomington. It didn’t feel like just another University town, however. We read a deeper mythology into the place. We’d spent so much time listening to R.E.M. records and imagining the world that made those records come to life.

That crisp late fall day, with Stand and Pop Song ‘89 and Orange Crush playing in every shop and blasting from every car, it truly felt like all the energy aligned around those four mysterious dudes. We were mere tourists in their world. We hoped for a souvenir, a chance meeting, a validation.

Later that night, the 40 Watt Club became an after-hours dance club. That’s very much in the spirit of Athens in those days, keep the party going. The B-52s are from there, after all. It’s a party town.

I had a few drinks in me as I wandered around the club, looking for a familiar face. As I walked out to a backyard patio, a bright light blinded me. I could see a person was in front of me, but I couldn’t see their face. I strained as I walked towards the person. I must have looked insane, squinting my eyes and trying to make out features.

Once I got close enough to recognize the person, I realized it was Peter Buck.

Stunned, I said, “Oh, I’m sorry!”

Buck smirked as he narrowed his eyes a little, barely nodding his head.

I left quickly after that, back to my friend Michael’s house where I’d sleep on a couch that night. I kept thinking about blowing the moment with Buck, wishing I’d said something, anything. I ran into a hero of mine, an actual celebrity, and I’d fumbled the ball. Since then, our paths have never crossed.

Maybe I’ll meet the other guys someday. Maybe I’ll go see my friend Jason Narducy’s R.E.M. tribute band and I’ll sing along at the top of my lungs. It won’t matter if I don’t know the words to those early songs, because after all, who does? Have we ever figured out what he was saying? Whatever it is, it’s one of the most beautiful, evocative sounds I know.

These days I have a stock line for when I meet someone whose work I admire. I say “I admire your work,” and I leave it at that.

I used that line this week when I ran into Zach Bryan at Home Depot. I said, “I admire your work.” He replied, “I admire YOUR work.” He doesn’t know who I am and I didn’t tell him. We have friends in common, but why go there? That’s a good celebrity interaction—no need to make it about myself. But even though I do admire Zach’s work, I don’t feel anywhere near the admiration for him as I feel for Peter, Bill, Mike, and Michael. I think Zach would understand.

In the end, it doesn’t really matter if I meet any of the R.E.M. members or if I get the chance to tell them I admire their work. I’m saying it here. I have the music, and the music is part of who I am. For that, I’m grateful.