By HANNAH DUNN-GRANDPRE – Variety Editor
Local Athens band, R.E.M., broke up on Sept. 21, 31 years after forming while they were all students at the University of Georgia together.
After 31 years, more than 200 songs and an induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2007, native Athens band R.E.M. officially parted ways on Sept. 21, 2011.
The band, which formed in 1980, consisted of drummer Bill Berry, guitarist Peter Buck, bassist Mike Mills and singer Michael Stipe and played new wave.
The band members met when they were all attending the University of Georgia together. Stipe was an art major at the time and became friends with Buck as well as Mills and Berry, who were already friends from their hometown of Macon. They also met the man who would become the manager of R.E.M., Bertis Downs, at UGA. Downs was in law school at the time. All five have continued living in Athens since.
“(R.E.M. was) young when they started — early twenties, still in college, no expectations, no particular career plan, no huge obligations,” Downs said. “They weren’t worried about being in a hurry. What they were worried about was being a good band and writing good songs.”
R.E.M released their first extended play, Chronic Town, in 1982. After it was released, they signed with International Record Syndicate records and released their first album, Murmur, the following year. Murmur was later named Rolling Stone’s album of the year for 1983.
“I think people love (R.E.M.) so much because their music is great and their lyrics mean something. (They’re) not wordless songs about love that make no sense,” daughter of Bertis Downs, Clarke Central High School freshman Addie Downs said. “Michael (Stipe) is a lyrics master. He knows how to word it with it sounding totally professional and their songs inspire. They’re really amazing.”
During the following years, R.E.M. passed several milestones. In 1987 they made their first music video, “Succumbs.” Their 1988 album, Document, was their first to sell one million copies. In 1988, after their I.R.S. contract expired, R.E.M. signed with Warner Brothers Records that same year.
“They had some time to grow into their job, to be good at what they do. It was a real blessing that their first record or two (wasn’t) massively big because it would’ve been a lot for them to live up to, and who knows if (the band) would’ve lasted as long as it did,” Downs said.
In 1991, “Losing my Religion” from Out of Time was released. The album was considered to be a turning point for the band.
“(‘Losing my Religion’) was a big song, still is, it’s one of the songs they’re most known for in their whole career. But, they’d been going 11 years by then and it was their seventh album and they’d had an EP before that.”
The following year, Automatic for the People was released. The album’s title is an homage to Athens restaurant Weaver D’s, whose owner, Dexter Weaver, greets customers with his slogan: automatic for the people. With this album, R.E.M. became even more popular with three songs in the top 40: “Drive,” “Everybody Hurts” and “Man on the Moon.”
“They’re a band that I love, that I always hold dear to my musical education that I went through (during) high school. As CDs were first coming out, they were some of the first (I bought), and I looked to buy (one) each time they had a new one come out,” CCHS social studies department teacher Drew Wheeler said.
In 1995, R.E.M. went on tour with their album, Monster. While on tour, Berry had a brain aneurysm on stage in Switzerland. Two years later he made the decision to leave the band, but only if Buck, Mills and Stipe were to continue.
R.E.M. resumed work on the album, Up, that they’d been working on before Berry left and it released in 1998. Sales for this album were not as strong as their previous albums. Throughout the early 2000s, R.E.M. released several albums with higher worldwide sales than domestic ones including Reveal and New Adventures in Hi-fi.
Yet in Sept. 2006, R.E.M. was inducted into the Georgia Music Hall of Fame. In the same month they were also nominated to be in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. All four members of the original band were inducted in New York City.
In spite of worldwide success, the band still called Athens home.
“Athens is a wonderful town to live in, especially when you have such a hectic life of touring all the time,” Downs said. “Part of the deal of being in a band is you’re going to have to travel a lot. So when you’re not traveling it’s nice to live in a place that’s not so hectic. If you live in New York (City) or (Los Angeles), when’s the time off?”
Because Athens is so important to the band, they’ve wanted to help improve the town by donating to different causes and organizations.
“R.E.M. (members have) tried to be positive influences on things like historic preservation issues, quality of life issues: what makes neighborhoods special, what makes Downtown (Athens) special,” Downs said. “I think their very first benefit was in 1984. It was for a local environmental group. They’ve just always tried to be on the right side of those issues.”
R.E.M. has also contributed a great deal to the public schools in Athens.
“R.E.M. has been good to the Clarke County School District, (they have) given them stipends here and there for different organizations. When I was principal at (Burney-Harris Lyons) on several occasions they donated money. We’ve received funds from them (at CCHS), as well,” Principal, Dr. Robbie Hooker said. “They’ve been very supportive of public schools.”
Although the band maintained its status as a local Athens icon, signs of the band’s deterioration surfaced as early as 2008.
“(It was) certainly something they talked about for a while. They talked about it as long ago as the last tour, which was a couple years ago,” Downs said. “It was certainly not taken lightly, it was not a decision like somebody woke up one day and said, ‘OK, that’s it, let’s issue a press release.’ It was definitely a very well thought out, well considered decision.”
R.E.M. announced their breakup on their website, www.remhq.com. They referred to the decision as “calling it a day” and included comments from each band member about what R.E.M. meant to them and what went into deciding to end their band after 31 years together.
“We have always been a band in the truest sense of the word. Brothers who truly love, and respect, each other. We feel kind of like pioneers in this — there’s no disharmony here, no falling-outs, no lawyers squaring-off. We’ve made this decision together, amicably and with each other’s best interests at heart. The time just feels right,” Mills said in R.E.M.’s announcement of their break up on www.remhq.com.
Even as R.E.M.’s momentum slows down, fans still have something to look forward to. On Nov. 15, the band will release their Greatest Hits album. There will be a listening party of the album on Nov. 14 at the 40 Watt, located at 285 W. Washington St. There will be a number of special aspects to the party, including an auction.
“The auction’s going to be super special because we’re not holding anything back because it’s the last one,” Downs said.
Even as the 31-year-old Athens band comes to an end, they will leave a lasting effect locally and globally.
“(R.E.M.’s) singles are going to be played on the radio for as long as we continue to listen to music from the ‘90s era. They’re going to be remembered for what they did. They will not be forgotten by any means,” Wheeler said.
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