Jack Pruitt Would Eat No Suet
I first met Michael Stipe in late 1989 or early 1990; he was tagging along with KRS-One, who was giving a talk (about world history, I believe) at Yale University. (They had not yet released their collaboration on Out of Time’s “Radio Song.”) I introduced myself to KRS-One’s publicist, Leyla Turkkan. She had a request: could I get them some coffee? Indeed, I knew where the kitchen was. When I returned five minutes later with coffee, Stipe looked me directly in the eye and said, “Thank you, Gavin.” Keep in mind, we hadn’t been introduced: while I was gone, he had made a point of finding out my name so he could be polite to me when I returned.
The second time I met Stipe was this past May at the Hollywood Bowl, where R.E.M. was headlining. When I mentioned his long-ago graciousness, Rolling Stone’s photographer chimed in with his own story of Stipe being polite, and the singer became visibly embarrassed. “Yeah, yeah, I’m a nice guy,” he said, and quickly changed the subject.
I was at the Bowl to write a backstage report on the R.E.M. tour as it began; it’s winding down now, but still has some dates in October and November. Unfortunately, the magazine only had room for about half of what I wrote, so I’ve added the original version of my article to the archives here.
Not in either version was some of the arcana I learned from my day at the Bowl: “Ignoreland,” for example, which became a staple on the tour, was originally suggested as a joke by Scott McCaughey when the band was brainstorming potential songs via email, but happily, the band took the idea seriously. McCaughey was baffled as to what the droning sound in the background of “Ignoreland” was; producer Scott Litt told him it was a harmonica (and threw in the bonus tidbit that the song was originally called “Howler Monkey”).
And who’s “Jack Pruitt,” who gets name-checked in the closing track on Accelerate, “I’m Gonna DJ”? Stipe says he just made up the name. “There’s no Mr. Richards, either,” he added.
posted 6 October 2008 in Archives, Articles and tagged Hollywood Bowl, R.E.M., Rolling Stone. 3 comments
October 7th, 2008 at 4:53 am
Stipe must’ve liked you a little better than he liked me. I met him after a film event in the late ’90s, when he was just getting into indie-film producing and my then-girlfriend worked for the late, lamented October Films. He was nice enough, but I think my obvious fanboy ardor came through and made me too nervous to have even three lines of normal conversation with him.
When he was leaving, I wished him well by saying, “Safe home.”
“Excuse me?” Quizzical, what-the-hell-is-this-guy-talking-about look on Stipe’s face.
So I repeat, nervously now, “Safe home,” and then, me or my girlfriend, I’m not sure which, explained what that phrase meant.
“Oh,” said Stipe. “Safe home. Got it.” But he still looked as if I was the weirdest person I’d met that night, which is saying something coming from Michael Stipe.
October 8th, 2008 at 4:24 pm
Perhaps he’s just a big baseball fan?
Everybody tell their Stipe stories!
May 22nd, 2013 at 10:24 pm
A few years ago I went to see Cat Power in NYC with Jon and Cristina. Afterwards we went to say hi to Judah and Michael Stipe was hanging around backstage with his bf. He was very nice and complimented me on my shirt, to which I replied, “Thanks” and then he asked who designed it, to which I replied, “Prada”. A bit later he, the bf, and I were in the hallway together and I just could not get up the gumption to say, “I like yr band” or “What happened to yr leg?” (he was on crutches) or anything at all. Totally tongue-tied. D’oh!