The two songs Michael Stipe said shaped his career: “An entry to a universe”
Rock and roll was never a genre meant to be populated by only the cool kids. The whole reason this music existed was to rebel against the standards of what was deemed acceptable at the time, and some of the greatest tunes in the genre’s canon have been about subverting the status quo and making something new out of it. Although Michael Stipe practically carved out an entire lane for where alternative rock could go, he couldn’t have reached that height without David Essex and Elton John helping him along.
Because when going through all of REM’s greatest material, they were never meant to be anyone’s number-one favourite rock band. Their songs still had pop melodies behind them, but their underground reputation always made them slightly under the radar compared to everyone else coming out in the age of MTV.
Despite them becoming larger than life in the 1990s, Stipe was never quite comfortable in his own skin as a singer. He never fit exactly into the same mould as the Jim Morrison-type of frontman, but looking at someone like Elton John, Stipe knew that he didn’t really have to, either.
When listening to ‘Bennie and the Jets’, Stipe found someone just as willing to let their freaky side out whenever they got behind the microphone. It wasn’t what anyone expected, but John knew that it was okay to be different and still find a way to reach the top of the musical world if you had the right songs.
And while David Essex’s ‘Rock On’ was a bit more pop-flavoured than what traditional British rock was supposed to be, Stipe still knew he had a confidante listening to the tune. Aside from throwing in callbacks to it on the Automatic for the People song ‘Drive,’ Stipe’s knack for painting surrealist images is descended from the same kind of glam-rock aesthetic that Essex built his career on.
Right as rock music was about to enter the underground world of punk rock, Stipe clung onto both of those initial pop hits like a liferaft, telling NPR, “David Essex’s ‘Rock On,’ Elton John’s ‘Bennie And The Jets’ were two songs that just blasted right into the core of my being as a 13- and 14-year old I think, and presented to me this kind of set up for what Patti Smith, CBGB’s, Television — the punk rock scene in New York in 1974 and ’75 would offer me. It was an entry into a universe that accepted me for who I was.”
Especially coming after the machismo of acts like Kiss and Led Zeppelin beforehand, Stipe finally understood what it meant to be himself whenever he took to the stage. Even when no one could comprehend a word he was singing, no one could really argue with the fact that it was haunting as hell whenever tunes like ‘Perfect Circle’ or ‘So Central Rain’ came on.
And isn’t that what music is all about? Sure, the business side might be centred around the sales figures, and whether or not an album is going to sell, but from the beginning to the end of REM’s career, Stipe never forgot the freedom that music gave him after listening to ‘Rock On’ and ‘Bennie and the Jets’.
