John Michael Stipe (born
January 4, 1960) is an American
singer who
is the lead vocalist for the alternative rock band R.E.M. Stipe has become well-known (and
occasionally parodied) for the "mumbling" style of his early career
and for his complex,
surreal lyrics, as
well as his social and political
activism.
Stipe is in charge of the band's visual image, often selecting
album artwork and directing many of the band's music videos.
Stipe's work extends outside of the music industry, and he runs his
own film production companies, C-00 and Single Cell Pictures.
Biography
Early life
Stipe was
born in Decatur,
Georgia
on January 4, 1960. Stipe was a
military brat; his father
was a serviceman in the
United States
Army whose career resulted in frequent relocations for his
family.
Stipe and his family moved to various locales
during his childhood, including Germany
, Texas
, Illinois,
Alabama and Georgia.Stipe graduated from high school in 1978, and
enrolled at the University of Georgia
in Athens, Georgia
, as an art major, studying photography and painting.
Formation of R.E.M.
While attending college in Athens, Stipe frequented the Wuxtry
record shop where he met store clerk
Peter
Buck in 1980. "He was a striking-looking guy and he also bought
weird records, which not everyone in the store did", Buck recalled.
The two became friends and eventually decided to form a band. Buck
and Stipe started writing music together; at the time Stipe also
spent time in a local group named Gangster. The pair were soon
joined by
Bill Berry and
Mike Mills and named themselves R.E.M., a name
Stipe selected at random from a dictionary.
All four members of R.E.M. dropped out of school in 1980 to focus
on the band. Stipe was the last to drop out. The band issued its
debut single, "
Radio Free Europe", on
Hib-Tone. The song was a
college radio success and the band signed to
I.R.S. Records for the release of the
Chronic Town EP one year later. R.E.M. released its debut
album
Murmur in 1983, which
was widely acclaimed by critics. Stipe's vocals and lyrics received
particular attention from listeners. The band's second album,
Reckoning,
followed in 1984 Murmur went on to win the Rolling Stone Critics
Poll Album of the Year over Michael Jackson's Thriller.
R.E.M. traveled to England to record its third album
Fables of the
Reconstruction (1985). The band members found the sessions
unexpectedly difficult, and were miserable due to the cold winter
weather and poor food. [6] Even after the album was released,
relationships were tense within the band. Stipe said of the period,
"I was well on my way to losing my mind".[7] Stipe gained weight
and his behavior became more eccentric; he shaved his hair into a
monk's
tonsure.
Mainstream popularity
With the success of the albums Out of Time (1991) and Automatic for
the People (1992), R.E.M. became mainstream music stars. Around
1992, rumors that Stipe had contracted HIV began to circulate.
According to Stipe, he did not start the rumor and he does not know
who did.
Not that I can tell. I wore a hat that said 'White House Stop
AIDS'. I’m skinny. I’ve always been skinny, except in 1985 when I
looked like
Marlon Brando, the last
time I shaved my head. I was really sick then. Eating potatoes. I
think AIDS hysteria would obviously and naturally extend to people
who are media figures and anybody of indecipherable or unpronounced
sexuality. Anybody who looks gaunt, for whatever reason. Anybody
who is associated, for whatever reason – whether it's a hat, or the
way I carry myself – as being queer-friendly.[8]
In 1994, Stipe officially came forward about his sexuality
describing himself as "an equal opportunity lech"[11] and said he
doesn't define himself as gay, straight, or bisexual, but that he
was attracted to and had relationships with both men and women. In
1995 Stipe was on the cover of Out Magazine. Stipe described
himself as a "queer artist" in Time Magazine in 2001 and revealed
that he had been in a relationship with "an amazing man" for three
years at that point.[10] Stipe was also featured on the cover of
BUTT Magazine in 2003.
Stipe had planned a collaboration with Nirvana's
Kurt Cobain in 1994, but did not manage to
compose or record anything before Cobain's death. Stipe was chosen
as the godfather of Kurt Cobain and
Courtney Love's daughter, Frances Bean
Cobain.[9]
Stipe was once very close to fellow singer Natalie Merchant and has
recorded a few songs with her, including one entitled "Photograph"
which appeared on apro-choice benefit album entitled Born to Choose
and they have appeared live with Peter Gabriel singing Gabriel's
single "Red Rain".
In 1998, Stipe published a collection called Two Times Intro: On
the Road with Patti Smith and worked on Single Cell Pictures, a
film production company which released several arthouse / indie
movies.
Stipe was a vegetarian from 1980 to 2000.
Recent years
In 1998, Stipe published a collection called
Two Times Intro:
On the Road with Patti Smith and
worked on Single Cell Pictures, a film production company which
released several arthouse / indie movies.
In 2006, Stipe released an EP that comprised six different cover
versions of
Joseph Arthur's "
In The Sun" for the
Hurricane Katrina disaster relief fund. One
version, recorded in a collaboration with
Coldplay's
Chris
Martin, reached number one on the Canadian Singles
Chart.
[32239]. Also in 2006, Stipe appeared on the
song "Broken Promise" on the
Placebo
release
Meds. Continuing his
non-R.E.M. work in 2006, Stipe sang the song "L'Hôtel" on the
tribute album to
Serge Gainsbourg
entitled "
Monsieur
Gainsbourg Revisited" and appeared on the song "Dancing on the
Lip of a Volcano" on the
New York
Dolls album "
One Day It Will
Please Us to Remember Even This".
In 2008, Stipe collaborated with
Lacoste to
release his own "holiday collector edition" brand of
polo shirt. The design depicts the view of a
concert audience from the view of the performer on stage.
Musical style
Stipe's role in the songwriting process for R.E.M. is to write
lyrics and devise melodies. While each member is given an equal
vote in the songwriting process, Peter Buck has conceded that
Stipe, as the band's lyricist, can rarely be persuaded to follow an
idea he does not favor. Stipe sings in "wailing, keening, arching
vocal figures" that R.E.M. biographer David Buckley compared to
Celtic folk artists and
Muslim mujahideen. Stipe
often harmonizes with Mills in songs; in the chorus for "Stand,"
Mills and Stipe alternate singing lyrics, creating a dialogue.
Early articles about the band focused on Stipe's singing style
(described as "mumbling" by
The
Washington Post), which often rendered his lyrics
indecipherable. Stipe commented in 1984, "It's just the way I sing.
If I tried to control it, it would be pretty false."
"That voice. It's an extraordinary voice," said
U2's
Bono in 2003. "I often tell him
I think he's a
crooner, and he doesn't like
that very much. But it is sort of one part some sort of
Bing Crosby '50s laid-back crooner, and one part
Dolly Parton," he added,
laughing.
Stipe insisted that many of his early lyrics were "nonsense",
saying in a 1994 online chat, "You all know there aren't words,
per se, to a lot of the early stuff. I can't even remember
them." In truth, many early R.E.M. songs had definite lyrics that
Stipe wrote with care. Stipe explained in 1984 that when he started
writing lyrics they were like "simple pictures", but after a year
he grew tired of the approach and "started experimenting with
lyrics that didn't make exact linear sense, and it's just gone from
there." In the mid-1980s, as Stipe's pronunciation while singing
became clearer, the band decided that its lyrics should convey
ideas on a more literal level. Mills explained, "After you've made
three records and you've written several songs and they've gotten
better and better lyrically the next step would be to have somebody
question you and say, are you saying anything? And Michael had the
confidence at that point to say yes . . ." After what Stipe has
referred to as "The Dark Ages of American Politics [The Reagan/Bush
Years]", R.E.M. incorporated more politically-oriented concerns
into his lyrics on Document and Green. "Our political activism and
the content of the songs was just a reaction to where we were, and
what we were surrounded by, which was just abject horror," Stipe
said later. "In 1987 and '88 there was nothing to do but be
active."[19] While Stipe continued to write songs with political
subject matter like "Ignoreland" and "Final Straw", later albums
have focused on other topics. Automatic for the People dealt with
"mortality and dying. Pretty turgid stuff", according to Stipe,[20]
while Monster critiqued love and mass culture.[19]
Film and television work
In early 1987 Stipe co-founded C00 Films with Jim Mckay, a
mixed-media company that was "designed to channel its founder's
creative talents towards the creation and promotion of alternative
film works." Stipe and his producing partner,
Sandy Stern, have served as executive producers
on films including
Being John
Malkovich,
Velvet
Goldmine, and
Man on
the Moon. He was also credited as a producer of the 2004
film
Saved!.
Stipe has made a number of acting appearances on film and on
television. Stipe appeared in an episode of
The Adventures of Pete &
Pete as an ice cream man named Captain Scrummy. Stipe has
appeared as himself with R.E.M. on
Sesame Street playing a reworked version
of "
Shiny Happy People" called
"Furry Happy Monsters", and appeared in an episode of
The Simpsons titled "
Homer the Moe", where R.E.M. was tricked into
playing a show in
Homer Simpson's
garage.
Discography
- Albums
- Singles
- Compilation albums
- Production
References
- Buckley, David. R.E.M.: Fiction: An Alternative
Biography. Virgin, 2002. ISBN 1-85227-927-3
- Platt, John (editor). The R.E.M. Companion: Two
Decades of Commentary. Schirmer, 1998. ISBN 0-02-864935-4
Notes
- Buckley, p. 24
- Buckley, p. 50
- Buckley, p. 29
- Buckley, p. 39
- Buckley, p. 43
- Buckley, p. 87
- Buckley, p. 131–32
- Michael Stipe Holiday Collector's Series at
Lacoste.com
- Buckley, p. 85
- Fricke, David. "Living Up to Out of Time/Remote
Control: Parts I and II". Melody Maker. October 3,
1992.
- Buckley, p. 180–81
- Sasfy, Joe. "Reckoning with R.E.M.". The Washington
Post. May 10, 1984.
- Platt, John. "R.E.M.". Bucketfull of Brains. December
1984.-
- The South Bank Show, May 12,
2003.
- Buckley, p. 88
- Buckley, p. 143
- Buckley, p. 144-45
- Buckley, p. 296
- Saved! (2004) - Full cast and crew
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