“A really special kind of song”: The song REM were born to write
In life, we often think of our experiences as uniquely our own. But really, they’re about as unique as footsteps on a dirt road—the imprint might reflect the differing weight memories impress upon us, but they all came from the same place and heading in the same direction. Rather than being a despairing blow to our individuality, these shared connections are what bond us. There is a magic to them that exists in the mercurial sound of REM.
They formed in Athens, Georgia, back in 1980 as simply friends in a garage having some fun. But as frivolous as they were with the whole thing, they couldn’t deny the sense that their music had a power to it and the feeling that they had just stepped onto some new unknown road with no direction home. “We weren’t thinking about making records or even playing in a club,” singer Michael Stipe recalled. “It just kind of happened. It’s just really been an interesting series of mistakes.”
However, the first pivotal piece of happenstance unfurled in the separate childhoods of Stipe and guitarist Peter Buck. Their bond has always given the group an alchemical quality, which aggrandised the humble agenda to be a “good band, kind of” into something more powerful. Simply put, they not only liked the same kind of music, but they also shared the same musical experiences.
One song typified the outlook for the group that was prognosticated decades early when the duo were still kids. The classic standard ‘Moon River’ moved them towards a melancholy they could barely reconcile when they were young. The song, in whatever form it reached them, was the first that quietly proclaimed that there was more to music than pleasant noise to fill silence; it had a near-tangible ability to change things.
“Even as a little boy, it made me kind of want to cry or be by myself for a while,” Stipe told Creem. “I think it’s a really special kind of song that can do that.” Even though he was effectively an infant at the time, this has always been the type of song that REM have strived towards no matter what guise they are playing. They have even covered ‘Moon River’ on a good few occasions, always honouring their shared musical heritage.
Perhaps the closest the group ever got to mustering the spirit of the old Johnny Mercer and Henry Mancini-written classic from 1961 is their 1993 single ‘Nightswimming’ from Automatic for the People. Once again, the moon is out, and things are serene as Led Zeppelin’s John Paul Jones provides an arrangement that floats over the delicate waters of Mike Mills’ meek yet mighty piano.
Throughout the song, Stipe has the sort of voice that could haunt an empty house. His vocals might add adrenalised topline melodies to full band bops, but when stripped back, his chalky tones express a vulnerability that could stop the stride of Usain Bolt and render a cicada speechless for an alluring moment of vocal striptease.
With a melody played so naturally by Mills that it seems you could whisk the piano away mid-performance and the music would still come out of his fingertips, Stipe throws a well of emotions into the welter of the song. Is it nostalgia that proves so stirring? Is it some lakeside memory that you’ve never even lived? Lord knows, and that, in short, is the beauty of the song—one bound by shared memories within a band who seemed almost fated to write the track.
