Several Man on the Moons ago I was in a cafe in Palmerston North as a poor (ha!) student reading the magazises the cafe had - one of which was Q Magazine. Inside was a rip out sleeve note which has the inside commentary on the REM album Green. It's been inside my version of Green since then ....
Green's frustratingly brief sleeve notes mention three session musicians: Jane Scarpantoni of the Hoboken band TIny Lights, described by Litt as "cello player by appointment to the American alternative rock scene"; precissionist Keith LeBlanc whom Litt befriended while hanging out in London with Tackhead; an Memphis steel Guitarist Bucky Baxter. The division of the two LP sides into Air and Metal (a ruse banjaxed by the CD format dates from an acoustic/electric demarcation early in the sessions.
Green was released on November 8, 1988, the day America elected George Bush it's 41st President. There were initial plans to take out huge magazine ads juxtaposing a photo of Democrat candidate Michael Dukakis (whose campaign R.E.M. had supported financially) and the sleeve of Green with the slogan: "There are two things you need to do today". These never materialised.
The political stance of Green was awarded unprecedented scrutiny, and the band members divided in typical style. Stipe, batting more and more for the little man, called it "a very uplifting album". Buck with pithy discursiveness , pointed out that R.E.M.'s embrace of Green issues was fairly inevitable since "the environment is one of the few things we can save in America". Berry, most poignantly of all, announced simply that he and his wife were afraid to have children in the current world climate.
One query, though, popped up time ad again in R.E.M. interviews: why, people wanted to know, was the numeral "4" printed beneath the "R" on "R.E.M." and "Green" on the cover? Stipe cited an essay called Metaphor as a Mistake by one Walker Percy, which argued that human error (mishearing lyrics, misreading words etc)
had a vital role to play in the creative process. In other words, Stipe typing the information for the cover, hit the wrong key, had left the mistake as a valid art statement. That he considered this error as worthy of respect, as say, the lyrics to Orange Crush, spoke volumes about the endlessly thought-provoking, crazily tuneful conundrum that is R.E.M.'s Green.
David Cavanagh
Randomly as, this Greenworks lawn mower doesn't play any music when you mow the lawns with it.
Part One Here
Part Two Here
Part One Here
Part Two Here
2 REMarks:
Thanks for posting the notes! I had always wondered about the four, thinking that it would be a reference to Document's number 5, serving as a kind of continuum where three more albums down the road they would hit zero and... something would happen. Some big change. Disbanding of REM, or whatever.
Thankfully that never happened.
BTW, R.E.M. in Helsinki yesterday night was ... excellent. See my reactions on my bog as soon as i get the broken hyperlinks fixed :)
What a great article! Green found me at my most R.E.M.-obsessed (I was a high school senior in '88) and reading this brought back all the anecdotes I thought I'd memorized.
The album holds a special place in my heart and memory, and hearing it again recently after seventeen years(!) found me just as impressed and moved by this underrated masterpiece.
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