Michael's Interview

By Murmur - The Italian R.E.M. Friends Association

Milan
28 March 2001

Michael: Good morning. I’ve just waked up so I might be a little slow! Have you heard the record? Yes? Ok, very good, let’s go!

Question: What about the lyrics, will we find them on the record?
Michael: Yes, you will
Question: So, was it a good experience for Up?
Michael: It was great for non-English-speakers, people who don’t speak English as their first language and also for many of the English speakers too, because of my lyrics.

Q: How do you think the lyrics can change the perception of your songs for non English speakers, I mean, I think Europe is a huge market for you as well as U.S.?
M.: It is and that is a great thing. The reason we did it for Up was just because, when we became a trio, we threw every rule out the window. The last record was a very difficult experience for all of us but in throwing up all the rules that we had, some of them were very old, we had never considered and discussed the idea to put the lyrics, we decided so and this is my decision, Peter and Mike agree, that was fine.

Q: How it was to work at this record under no pressure, after Up and the departure of Bill?
M.: Have you already talked to Mike? No? Because Mike says “This is the first record we have made we have been in steady places for a long time” and that’s true. The last record was very difficult to make, the band broke up near at the end of the record and came back later after the mixing. Now, there was a relative relaxed environment to record, we took measures to ensure that it would be relax for everyone. Usually we have a time plan: this is when we start, this is when we finish, this is when we give it to record company, this is we do promo, this is when we tour, everything for a year and a half would be scheduled. For this record we say so “This is when we start and we’ll finish the record when it's done”. So for me, because I’m the soloist, it was very relax. And I think in fact, I’ve recorded our songs where I have to think about or I have to use my thinking brain to finish the songs or to write them. I've recorded our songs where I turn my thinking brain off and my unconscious verse writes them and then I looked at them asking “What the hell I’m saying here? What’s it about?”. My favorite songs have always been the instinct songs, the ones where I turn my thinking brain off and I just allow… Country Feedback, It’s the End of the World, Losing my Religion, Man on the Moon, E-bow the Letter, Sad Professor. The number of instinct songs, my unconscious verse, on this record is the highest since Reckoning. I just turn my brain off to let the songs come in. Then I sat back and think “What the hell does this mean?” and, of course, by the time we finished I had a good idea what the song was about, I’ve done a little better than usually and I’m really proud of that.

Q: Do you have an idea of which is the image of the record?
M.: I think nowadays, particularly in the U.S. market, which is a market and nothing else at this point, popular music is very much stuck in a groove. That's not bad, it’s very disposed by pop music, which has been around as long as I’ve been alive and has its value but it can’t be anything else, in times like this, the song is more important than the album because the song sells, it sells the record and that's the usual way to sell for a market product. The idea of making a summer record, it was something that I was really excited about because usually a record is to realize at fall. I love the summer, I love the sunshine, I love the Mediterranean, as some of you probably know, and I hate the cold, and I wanted to write songs that were summer songs, so that was, pointing into it a kind of an idea that I had to work on and coming out of it a lot of the songs were about the sunshine which is a lot of air and a lot of space and people taking off the ground questioning for gravity throughout the songs. I don’t think you have seen the lyrics. No? So, hopefully you probably can get that idea just listening to the record.

Q: Which is the record atmosphere through the songs?
M.: I like the idea of creating a pop record having all the features that R.E.M. always put on: synths, acoustic guitars, strings, vocals, I mean all that. And then in the mixing striping that down as much as possible to create a lot of space and a lot of air so that what you hear is not a pop record but a kind of a dub remix of a pop record. I've spoken to Thom Yorke and some others people who do the same thing that we do, our contemporaries, talking to them later I have to know that it was very contemporary to add that synths before even music and to present a finish product as something that has been early edited, not edited but mixed in a different way. So on some of the songs we succeeded the product of those like The Lifting, She Just Want to Be, Imitation of Life, there are 13 or 16 layers working on all time.

Q: Which are the stories that you have told?
M.: I don’t know, I’m not sure yet.
Q: Are they the stories?
M.: Yes of course, yes of course I know but it’s up to you and our readers to pick them up, that’s part of the game.

Q: We can say that they are not sad stories, but sunny stories or happy stories?
M.: Yes, you know, sad and happiness they don’t have a right end I think, in my way to do and for most people.

Q: Are they happy-end stories?
M.: I think so, yea, I was injected right into the stories over a diar, so it might be, but it's not just part of the characters.

Q: Maybe we think so because a summer record is supposed to be a positive record.
M.: Yea, I think that too because the summer, the promise of summer cares a certain sweet…back in the real life, it’s no the idea, it’s not so specific.

Q: You should live a little bit in Italy..
M.: I’ll see what I can do, thanks for the invitation.

Q: In which way your different interests like photography and cinema affect your music?
M.: Mostly is where I found inspiration, being around other people who are creating things. I love to watch, that sounds silly but when it’s done properly it’s a really fantastic way to experience. That’s what I think the others things that I do, which are photography and film production can inspire me, to be around other people who are creating things allow my thinking and I don’t quest about what do I do until I finish.

Q: Is it yours the picture of the cover? This one (showing it).
M.: Yes, I’ve seen it, thank you. I’m telling you that but it’s kind of exclusive in other countries I’m saying “We don’t know, it’s a found photograph, I’m not sure” so keep that for you.

Q: Is your music influenced by any contemporary bands?
M.: The fact that I consider Radiohead and Polly Harvey contemporaries, it’s unusual because they haven’t been around as long as R.E.M., obviously, they haven’t made so many records as we do, but for me when I think of that bands, there is a very close connection.

Q: What’s peculiar in their music that sounds attractive for you?
M.: I think all of us as a music fan, we know when we listen to something that’s been created for reasons others than a love and a passion for music. That’s again, music is part of life and it’s part of the radio, it's part of driving in a car, of cleaning the house or whatever you do listening music and there’s music that speaks out something more real. That’s what I attribute the people who are considered my contemporaries, the people that challenge me as a lyricist and as a musician to do better. There’s a sweet competition between me and Bono, Thom Yorke, Patti Smith, Grant Lee Philips, Natalie Merchant, Polly Harvey, Courtney Love and every time that I hear a song that is an amazing song, I may do join something insane, a reaction so bizarre, that makes my heart moves and that makes me think “I can do better and better” and so I try.

Q: In this record seems to be any Mike Mills’ vocals or I’m wrong? That was his choice?
M.: Yeah, it’s correct, he does sing significantly on All the Way to Reno, some of the songs are very much for a singular voice. They are written from a point f view, that’s not my point of view, well, of course, it’s my point of view because I wrote them but it’s not autobiographic, this is what I want to say, but in songs like I’ll Take the Rain, Chorus and the Ring you don’t necessarily need a background, it’s something that’s more alone, it’s more singular. This is one of the reasons why, there are a lot of reasons, this is one of them, why you can’t find a lot of back vocals.

Q: Which is your relationship with the fans and how it has developed during the years?
M.: I would say is getting better, for me it’s the way I really know whether I’m doing well, the reaction of the people in the street, not really the reviews…I do read that stuff all of them but the kind of reaction that I get, that's how I know that I’m doing well or not, I’d be proud of something and I think "All the world is going to love this" but then I never mention that song and say "I like that"…there are other songs that people really respond to.

Q: Talking about fans, there's someone else opinion which do you particularly respect?
M.: Peter and Mike obviously. It’s hard because people that are close obviously can’t be very objective about the music, they’ll be honest sometimes, mostly. Probably I can get an idea of what is not successful. Some of the songs are really difficult when they come to mind, New Test Leper lyrically is a song I’m so proud of but it’s a very difficult, it’s a pop song but it’s written on a lot of different levels and I had only ten persons in a year which mentioned that song particularly and say “Wow” then I knew that there are people who got it.

Q: How long it was to record the album?
M.: We started recording in May last year in Vancouver, moved to Dublin for the summer, which wasn’t very summer, something like today and when the weather was worse and I was stuck in a song I had a little bit of rest, I hadn’t it usually but there was really nothing to do than to rest, so I came to Italy, to Israel, I went to Denmark just to go to an hotel room and stay there for a couple of days, to stay there a little bit.

Q: Was the recording time longer than for the other records?
M.: Actually no, after Dublin we went to Miami to mix the record, before we stopped in Athens for a couple of days just because geographically it makes sense but so that was the recording time, the actual time that it took for me to finish was a about a year obviously I started working at my contribution to this album a little bit later.

Q: So the main difference between this and the others records is that you hadn’t deadlines?
M.: Well, working in a studio which costs thousands of dollars a day and having Peter and Mike sitting on a coach go on “ Ok, come on, do something here”, that is really a necessary pressure for me; my contribution that I put into the songs comes a lot better, I don’t know why, when I work under pressure and they know that, I can fool all of you but I can’t fool them. I don’t think we would be able to go through crisis as the one of the last record if we hadn’t that communicational level.

Q: There is a song on this album you are proud of or that you are expecting something in terms of reaction?
M.: I’ve Been High, I think it’s a beautiful song, it’s a song I would like to hear on the radio, I don't know if the record company agrees, or driving to work, well, it’s not my favorite song it’s my second favorite song.

Q: So which is your favorite one?
M.S.: Right now, Saturn Return is my favorite song, it might be the sound.

Q: Which is the best mood someone should be in to appreciate the atmosphere of your album?
M.: Hopefully any mood, I mean I don’t think it’s a sad record. Yesterday we were in Germany and we moved from one room to the next room to the next room and this table said “It’s such a sad record” and the other one “Oh it’s so uplifting”. Every 20 minutes there was a different set of journalist and everyone was contradicting each other, so I was completely confused, by the afternoon I have no idea about what I’ve done.

Q: How was the weather in Germany?
M.: Better than this (a really spring rainy day in Milan). It was beautiful when we took off last night, there was a very beautiful sunset…we're doing four countries in four days.

Q: Are you going to tour?
M.: We’re doing promotional stuff in six weeks, in a about a month and there might be singular shows or something, we will offer some benefit shows, some singular things but not a proper tour, ok, thank you, bye, we’ll be back soon! Ciao!


By Murmur - The Italian R.E.M. Friends Association
www.remfriends.com
Thanks to Bertis Downs and WEA/Italia

3/28/2001