Ever wonder what goes on in the mind of Mr. Stipe? Well I've got another clip here from the interview with Michael Stipe during SXSW where Michael Stipe talks about his dreamworld and the song "Sing For The Submarine." Since Accelerate was just released April 1st, it's pretty interesting insight. {PLEASE LINK TO FULL POST TO SEE VIDEO} The beginning of the interview, Michael's eye kinda drift off to the side. What you can't see is he was staring out the window of his h... MORE

"Where's My Jet Pack?" - Ryan McGuinness So as promised- I've got a few more Michael Stipe videos for you to check out. (Kudos to my buddy Eric for dutifully editing...). (IF YOU ARE READING THIS ON THE MOG HOME PAGE, PLEASE USE THE LINK BELOW TO GET TO THE FULL POST WHERE YOU CAN VIEW THE VIDEOS.) In this segment, Michael unwinds over coffee, chatting about millennial themes behind R.E.M's new album, environmental science class at 13, civil rights, and feeling 'fed... MORE

So we've been holding out on you....saving the best stuff for last. Here is BY FAR my favorite clip from the Stipe Interview. Here we had been talking for about 45 minutes and he was clearly comfortable.... (CLICK ON FULL POST TO SEE VIDEO) I ask him a question from Extraordinary Poems...(excellent q Chica!) and he ends up going on a hilarious tangent..... involving Cher, Vomit, NY Times, and jewish orthodox split pea soup.... Unreal....

Here's my new baby...

Thus far we're very happy together... he'll take me where I want to go, keep me in touch with those I care about & looks all sorts of pretty in MOGOrange. Got 29 days to see if we're a match made in heaven or bound for ruin. Anybody else got an enVous LG cellular device ?!? Anybody else got a cellular device they love dearly that I should look into if things with my Orange Crush don't last ?!? Speaking of crushes...

Anna, where'd you hide

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Best selling author Brad Meltzer’s new book The Book Of Lies will be released on September 2nd. Before you ask: Who is Brad Meltzer? What does Meltzer’s book have to do with music? The Book Of Lies, described as a "suspenseful, code-breaking drama," will be the first novel ever released with a companion CD. So while you read, music plays in the background, like a soundtrack to the book. (I had this idea about four years ago when I was living in Antananarivo, Ma... MORE

R.E.M.'s new rock album is due April 1 and it's great. I've heard it, most of it really rocks and there's an energy and rawness. A lot of fans are going to be real happy. Here's a track off the album.

  You always hear stories of musicians getting their gear jacked while on the road. Seldom do these stories turn out on a positive note, so R.E.M.’s Peter Buck is one lucky dude.

Following an R.E.M. tour stop in Helsinki, Finland on September 9th Buck’s prized Rickenbacker guitar went missing. The band is currently on tour in Europe behind their latest album Accelerate. Ten days later Buck was reunited with his axe, which he has used on the road and in the studio since... MORE

After I heard REM’s ‘Accelerate for the first time, I did three things. 1. I looked over my notes and research from the rehearsal shows to see which songs I’d heard before. (About half of them.)2. I listened to some old REM to see where it fit in a big picture of the band.3. I listened to it again. The first is important because the story of this album kind of begins there. The five night residency in the Olympia Theatre was, for all intents and purposes, to preview t... MORE

And I'm not dreaming. Let's start from the beginning. Last Thursday, I headed to an opening of Ryan McGinley's photography in Soho, innocently with my good friend Spyro. Some background: Ryan McGinley is an ingenue- his photos both gritty and ethereal. This show- was dosed in blissed out sunshine- of celestial beings- afloat in liquid, suspended in air- battling with gravity- lost in fields. He was the youngest photog to be displayed at the Whitney Museum ever (a... MORE

  Madison Square Garden
R.E.M. is "pretty much a great live band," Michael Stipe once said (i.e. in our SXSW interview earlier this year). Said words echoed in my head, high expectations pulsed in my veins, as I traipsed in to Madison Square Garden this Thursday. To be concise and admitedly redundant, I'd agree the show was indeed 'great.' But since I'm not one to be a) redundant b) concise and you Moggers deserve much more- below is a full photographic diary of that ni... MORE

Stereogum (who I just noticed refer to our own Michael Goldberg as 'One of the cool kids') have posted video of R.E.M. performing 'Hollow Man' on 'The Colbert Report'. It's a pretty solid performance, but the highlight on the page is some Youtube footage from Jones Beach, where the band preceded 'So Central Rain' with a cover of Creedence Clearwater Revival's 'Have You Ever Seen The Rain?' Seeing as these are two of my favourite songs ever, I feel the need to post the vid... MORE

Michael Stipe would not be amused.
Grrr. Today driving home I left my ipod in the back seat and couldn't get at it without causing injury to myself or other motorists, so I turned on the radio to the local "indie-college-urban-folk-rock- publicly-funded" station. And they were playing R.E.M. Yay. One of their new tunes from Accelerate, which I love and have heard round these parts. So after the song, one of those faux-folksy, mealy-mouthed DJs, (you know the kind who ... MORE