Several Man on the Moons ago I was in a cafe in Palmerston North as a poor (ha!) student reading the magazines 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 ....
R.E.M. Green - The Q Sleevenote Part Two (Part One of Green Here)
"A working day gradually took shape," recalls Litt, We'd go in about noon and work through till about dinner. Ideas would be thrown around by the three musicians, and now and again Micheal would say something like, Yeah, play that chord for a while, now play a minor chord, I feel like writting something sad. That's how songs got written. There was a Mexican restuarant next door, which we soon learned served pretty sublime Margaritas."
The flexibility about who played what, possibly fueled by margaritas - meant that Peter Buck played Mandolin and Mike Accordion on You Are The Everything, Bill Berry Mandolin on The Wrong Child; and for a truly rhythm-free finale, Peter Buck played the lopsided drum pattern on Untitled.
As a card-carry FX apologist, Litt suggested the military cacophony on Orange Crush and the introductory crickets on You Are The Everything. The peculiar chining section midway though Get Up was inspired by a Bill Berry deam in which he heard 12 music boxes playing in sync. "Not 11, he explained, Not 13." Six music boxes were duly purchased, and double tracked by Litt. Berry still wasn't satisfied, so another six were located and added.
Stipe's lyrics meanwhile, where proving his most ambitious yet. He was writing in the first person - something he once said he would never do. - albiet with the provison that the narrative voice tenderd to blur from song to song. The Wrong Child was inspired by a newspaper story of a chronic burns victim braving the outdoors for the first time. Orange Crush was a surreal acci=ount of the bombing of Vietnam (Stipe's father, it later transpired, flew planes during the war). Hairshit, for its part, appeared to be narrated by a dog. All are easily interpreted as anthems for the downtrodden, the unconculted, the easily hurt, the hopefull.
Continue through to Part Three of R.E.M. Green - The Q Sleevenote (last one!)
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