Background

John Michael Stipe was born on January 4, 1960, in Decatur, Georgia, into a family of a US army serviceman.

Due to his father’s nature of job, he spent his childhood at different places, including Alabama, Georgia, Illinois, and Texas. He once resided in Germany as well. He has a younger sister Lynda Stipe, who also became a musician and created her band Hetch Hetchy.

Education

Stipe graduated from high school in Collinsville, Illinois. His senior photo is pictured in the album art work of Eponymous. Also, he worked at the local Waffle House.

In 1978, he entered the University of Georgia, in Athens, Georgia, to study photography and painting.

Career

While studying painting and photography at the University of Georgia, Stipe befriended aspiring guitarist Peter Buck, and with bassist Mike Mills and drummer Bill Berry, they formed R.E.M. in 1980. Honing an atmospheric, jangly pop sound often reminiscent of the Byrds, R.E.M. toured relentlessly prior to issuing their debut single, "Radio Free Europe," on the tiny Hib-Tone label in mid-1981; the record's success on college radio attracted the attention of IRS Records, which released the band's Chronic Town EP a year later.

R.E.M.'s first full-length album, 1983's Murmur, cemented their reputation as critics' darlings and made Stipe an underground icon - his cryptic, often unintelligible lyrics were analyzed with Talmudic fervor, and his thrift-store image was copied by countless acolytes. Despite little mainstream airplay, 1984's Reckoning reached the Top 30 and with the darkly beautiful follow-up Fables of the Reconstruction, the band earned increasing MTV visibility for the videos "Can't Get There From Here" and "Driver 8." Stipe himself directed the video for "Fall on Me," the lead single from R.E.M.'s fourth LP, 1986's Lifes Rich Pageant; thanks to producer Don Gehman, Stipe's vocals resonated with newfound clarity, revealing a growing awareness with sociopolitical concerns (among them environmental issues and American foreign policy). 1987's Document was R.E.M.'s commercial breakthrough, buoyed by the Top Ten hit "The One I Love"; with Green, the band's debut for new label Warner Bros., Stipe for the first time ever allowed one of his lyrics ("World Leader Pretend") to be reprinted on the jacket sleeve. Released on Election Day 1988, the album was R.E.M.'s most pointedly polemic to date, although the hits "Stand" and "Pop Song 89" also reflected the band's wry sense of humor.

Following the Green tour, R.E.M. took an extended break, during which Stipe focused on his film company C-00, produced material for local discoveries like Vic Chesnutt and the Chickasaw Mudd Puppies, and lent guest vocals to a variety of projects. R.E.M. returned in 1991 with the chart-topping Out of Time, which generated the Top Ten hits "Losing My Religion" and "Shiny Happy People"; the elegiac masterpiece Automatic for the People followed and as alternative rock took over the pop charts, the band (and Stipe in particular) was widely acknowledged among the chief inspirations behind a generation of new artists. While touring in support of 1995's Monster, Stipe was temporarily sidelined by hernia surgery; he returned to complete the tour and two years later, R.E.M. resurfaced with New Adventures in Hi-Fi.

In 1998, their album "Up" was out with mixed reviews. Even though it reached the top ten in the United States and the United Kingdom, the album proved to be commercial failure, as the band’s market started declining in the United States and increased in the United Kingdom.

Apart from his musical activities, he released a photo collection ‘Two Times Intro: On the Road with Patti Smith’ in 1998.

He launched his own film production company, Single Cell, under which he made two super-hit movies - "American Movie" and "Being John Malkovich, the latter received three Oscar nominations.

Some other music albums that followed were "Reveal" (2001), "Around the Sun" (2004), and "Accelerate" (2008). Besides, a number of compiled video albums were also released.

He compiled six different cover versions of Joseph Arthur’s "In The Sun" as an extended play in 2006 to raise funds for the Hurricane Katrina disaster relief. In 2008, he released his own ‘holiday collector edition’ of a polo shirt, in collaboration with the garment brand, Lacoste.

After the release of the band’s 15th album "Collapse into Now" in 2011, the group disbanded amicably for good. He recorded a new song "Rio Grande" with Courtney Love in 2013, from the pirate-themed film "Son of Rogue’s Gallery: Pirate Ballads, Sea Songs and Chanteys." He debuted as a solo artist in December 2014 giving a surprise opening act at Patti Smith’s concert at Webster Hall, New York.

He has appeared in a handful of Hollywood movies, such as "Color of a Brisk and Leaping Day" (1996), and lent his voice in "Olive, the other Reindeer" (1999). He has made various small appearances on television, some being "The Adventures of Pete & Pete", "Sesame Street", "The Simpsons", and "The Colbert Report".

Achievements

• 

  In 1983, the band’s first album ‘Murmur’ was awarded with the ‘Rolling Stone Critics Poll Album of the Year’, beating legendary singer Michael Jackson’s "Thriller".
  
  The album "Out of Time" received the "Best Alternative Music Album", while the song "Losing My Religion" won the 'Best Short Form Music Video" and "Best Pop Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal" at the 1992 Grammy Awards.
  
  The band was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2007.
  
  Michael Stipe has been listed as a notable musician, film producer by Marquis Who's Who.

Works

More photos

• book

  • Our Interference Times: A Visual Record

    (Michael Stipe has collaborated with the writer and artist...)

    2019
  • Michael Stipe: Volume 1

    (“Volume 1 focuses on my timeline, on the work I've done a...)

    2018

• music

  • Murmur 1983
  • Reckoning 1984
  • Fables Of The Reconstruction 1985
  • Life's Rich Pageant 1986
  • Document 1987
  • Green 1988
  • Out Of Time 1991
  • Automatic For The People 1992
  • Monster 1994
  • New Adventures in Hi-Fi 1996
  • Up 1998
  • Reveal 2001
  • Around The Sun 2004
  • Accelerate 2008
  • Collapse into Now 2011
  • R.E.M. Live 2007
  • Live At The Olympia 2009
  • Unplugged 1991/2001: The Complete Sessions 2014
  • Best of R.E.M. at the BBC 2018
  • Bingo Hand Job: Live At The Borderline 1991 2019

Religion

Michael Stipe was raised in a Methodist household, where he moved often with his Army family. He has been one of the more interesting figures in recent rock memory, including his sexuality, theatrical style, and wildly popular hit "Losing My Religion." While Stipe doesn't claim Buddhism in his lyrics, he has long been associated with the religion. He claimed: "I'm actually not Buddhist. It's just that I'm bald and I have a certain demeanor and my voice is really low when I talk. ... I was raised Christian, though I'm not Christian either."

Politics

According to the Los Angeles Times, R.E.M. was considered to be one of the United States' "most liberal and politically correct rock groups."

In March 2018, Stipe joined the "March for Our Lives" rallies to advocate gun control after the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting. He also released a teaser of his new song in the rally.

Views

The sensibility that Stipe began to develop during his time as an art student transferred to the spectrum of his work for R.E.M., from art directing all graphic, video and stage design, to writing, composing and performance, and his iconoclastic personal style. Stipe’s visibility as a media figure in the popular culture of the 1980s and ‘90s left an indelible mark on the aesthetic trends of the time, many of which have trickled down to contemporary culture.

Quotations: "Sometimes before we make a record I go back and listen to a few. It's equally humbling and uplifting."

"My feeling is that labels are for canned food... I am what I am - and I know what I am."

"I'm tired of being this solemn poet of the masses, the enigma shrouded in a mystery."

"I'm just not that fascinating a person to have had all those lives that I've written about."

"So, when you divide the world into music lovers, music fans and then those people who are just very casual about their music, it's wallpaper to them, it's elevator music, it's just the thing that's playing in the background that helps them through their day."

"I'm not homosexual, I'm not heterosexual, I'm just sexual."

Personality

In October 2019, Stipe released his debut solo single “Your Capricious Soul.” All proceeds from that song went towards the climate change activist group Extinction Rebellion.

By the year 1994, there were questions swirling about his sexuality and he said that he was attracted to, and had relationships with, both men and women. He once said: "I've always felt that sexuality is a really slippery thing. In this day and age, it tends to get categorized and labeled, and I think labels are for food. Canned food."

Stipe described himself as a "queer artist" in Time in 2001.

Physical Characteristics: Stipe has a slim body built up. His height is 5 feet 9 inches (1.75m). He has a blue eye color and has a bald head.

Has a brick tattooed on his right hand and on his upper right arm a tattoo of the characters Krazy Kat and Ignatz Mouse from George Herriman's comic strip "Krazy Kat".

Interests

• photography

• Philosophers & Thinkers

  Nikola Tesla

• Politicians

  Greta Thunberg, Martin Luther King, Jr.

• Writers

  "The Hunchback of Notre-Dame" by Victor Hugo, William S. Burroughs, Walt Whitman, James Baldwin, Janet Flanner, Joan Didion, Gore Vidal, Jean Genet

• Artists

  Claude Cahun, Vaslav Nijinsky, Rudolf Nureyev, John Giorno, Constantin Brâncuși

• Music & Bands

  Radiohead, Patti Smith, Peter Gabriel, U2, PJ Harvey

Connections

Stipe met fellow musician Natalie Merchant in 1983. The two started a friendship, and eventually had a romantic relationship for a period of time. For some time they continue their dating relationship and later broke up.

In 1994, Stipe described himself as “an equal opportunity lech”, and said he did not define himself as gay, straight, or bisexual, but that he was attracted to, and had relationships with, both men and women. In 1995, he appeared on the cover of Out magazine. When asked if he ever declares himself as gay, Stipe stated, “I don’t. I think there’s a line drawn between gay and queer, and for me, queer describes something that’s more inclusive of the grey areas.”

He lives with his partner Thomas Dozol in New York.

Sister:

Lynda Stipe

Partner:

Thomas Dozol

Friend:

Thom Yorke

Friend:

Helena Christensen

Friend:

Frances Bean Cobain

Stipe is the Godfather of Frances Bean Cobain.

Friend:

Cortney Love

Friend:

Natalie Merchant

colleague:

Bill Berry

colleague:

Peter Buck

colleague:

Mike Mills

Friend:

Kurt Cobain

References

• R.E.M. Athens GA: R.E.M. In Photographs 1984-2005 Following 'Aim High', Tom Sheehan's collected portraits of Paul Weller from 1978-2015, 'In Between Days', The Cure In Photographs 1982-2005, and 'You Love Us', Manic Street Preachers In Photographs 1991-2001, this book, showcasing his work across 3 decades with alt-rock pioneers R.E.M, is the fourth in a series from the legendary music photographers immense archive, each focusing on his long relationship with a favourite subject.
  2018
• Michael Stipe: The Biography
  2007
• R.E.M. | Fiction: An Alternative Biography R.E.M.'s public image has always been tightly controlled. Icons of anti-celebrity rock, who bacame huge celebrity rock stars, they were, according to the story, the first U.S. post new-wave band who were both commercially successful and cool. Drawing on exclusive interviews with Mike Mills, Peter Buck and other members of R.E.M.'s nuclear family, Fiction re-evaluates the music and career of a group who sold almost no records for the first half of their existence, then became 'the biggest rock group in the world' in the second half.
  2002