REM have been with me throughout my life…. What an amazing song…especially with the Drivin’ n’ cryin’ intro bolted seamlessly on. Still listening in 2024 (nearly) 40 (FORTY!! 😮) years later… REM music is timeless
Everytime I hear this it's magical... what a band and what a performance.I remember taping my tourfilm on cassette so I could hear it in my Walkman on repeat.....Genius. Pure genius
@@cbennett196631 Really? Am I supposed to explain to you how my opinion of this performance makes me feel? I don't know how to respond to this question. Obviously with any art there is a tremendous amount of subjectivity and each performance or work impacts people in different ways. I've described how this particular one impacts me. I don't feel that there is really a need to elaborate further, honestly.
@@Nevets1073 that doesn’t explain why it’s “sublime” at all….the personal drama is great and all….but why is it “sublime”….I think your just using a buzz word bc your lazy in telling us why you really like this awesome song
REM were with me from the time a friend gave me my first mix tape with pop song 89 on it in about 1990, to the year they broke up, just before my eldest daughter was born. 2011 felt like such a turning of a page in my life...
My favorite song by R.E.M. - lucky to have heard it at every TX Green Tour show w/ Robyn Hitchcock & The Egyptians as openers for all four shows - some of the best shows I've ever seen.
@@christopherdillard6835I saw them on the Green World Tour as well. Feb '89, Christchurch, New Zealand. The 5th or 6th show of the tour. They played for almost 2&1/2 hours! Local heroes The Bats supported, REM loved em. And wouldn't ya know it, a couple years later when Out of Time came out, two tracks could have been Bats songs!!!
this is so wonderful, one of my favourite REM songs, long live the memory of REM, I have been a fan since I was thirteen, will still be listening when I'm old and grey, thanks REMhq for posting :^) x
Michael Stipe is a true artist, his lyrics mostly just flowed, and though he headed in a direction with each song, it usually guided him as much as he did it. Mills and Buck the same. This is why this band was still functioning successfully when they decided to quit, after so many years. They were not sellouts to the organized "same ole same ole" music, like pop, what country music has become, and rap, where though each artist is a little different, the music all basically sounds the same, done quick for quick money. The King of Birds, to me, is about a person in their own soul, and realization that they are thought of as no different than the rest of the world, and the agony of thinking they are just another number in the multitude. Yet in this, they know that to themselves they aren`t, and the song is about the battle of these two things within Stipe himself, I actually think, but if not, to whom it may concern. I miss them, the world needs more music like this....
One of the greatest bands ever, of all times. Tourfilm has that emotional energy that can make a lifetime memory. They are definitely a living legend, and when the have died, they'll live forever, immortalized by our love to good music with a meaning. Thank you.
2022..2:50..one of several fav Stipe moments ...orig. vrsn too..love his ending improv lyrx/vox on this one esp....a top 3 vocalist for Me...they wld make so much on a reunion tour ..maybe by 2030😂💪🤟🏼🙏🏻
Lyrics; Intro: What we think we need, what they believe we need What we think we see, what they believe we see It's been a long, long wrong And it keeps on go on and on The singer must sing his song And the leader must start the march, then fall behind to walk with the people. A thumbnail sketch, a jeweler's stone, a mean idea to call my own Old man don't lay so still you're not yet young There's time to teach, point to point Point observation (children carry reservations) Standing on the shoulders of giants Leaves me cold Leaves me cold A mean idea to call my own A hundred million birds fly Singer sing me a given Singer sing me a song Standing on the shoulders of giants Everybody's looking on Standing on the shoulders of giants Leaves me cold Leaves me cold A mean idea to call my own A hundred million birds fly Away Away I am king of all I see My kingdom for a voice Old man don't lay so still, you're not yet young There's time to teach, point to point Point observation (children carry reservations) Standing on the shoulders of giants Leaves me cold Leaves me cold A mean idea to call my own A hundred million birds fly Away Away Everybody hit the ground Everybody hit the ground Everybody hit the ground Outro: Water is evening now The catacombs are filling in Who drew the shortest straw? Who drew the shortest straw? Who drew the shortest straw? Who drew the shortest straw?
As English is not my native language, I though all my life that in the end Michael mumbles: be true, be sure, be strong, be true, be sure be strong be true, be sure be strong oooo 😮😅 As a youngster it was a bit like a guide/goal to be: sure, strong, true. I wrote it on my schoolbooks. And now I find out the lyrics were totally something else. I am a bit confused. Love R.E.M. 🥰
@@itsneverbeenlike1 if you didn't know that first little bit before "a thumbnail sketch" is from a song called "with the people" by fellow Georgians Drivin N Cryin
This song along with Talk About the Passion and I Know It's Over by The Smiths got me through coming out 30 years ago when very bad thoughts were going through my head...now these songs still break me down, but in a good way
Private Cocky The other night I was playing a real old original with my ex and we got to the end and I threw in those lines about the catacombs filling in and she laughed because it took her right back to this moment.
Huge R.E.M. fan but never really cared for the album version of this song. This arrangement is so lush and beautiful, it's my favourite Peter Buck performance of all time. It reminds me so much of "The End" by The Doors, in that context the lines "everybody hit the ground" and "who drew the short straw" are especially haunting.
Hello All, Huge R.E.M. fan from way back and this version of the song has always seemed almost mystical to me. Literally gives me goose bumps it's so beautiful. One thing I've never been able to figure out is where the first few lines in the 'intro' came from...'what we think we need, what they believe we need...'. They are not on the Document version and I've always been curious. Thanks in advance for any information!
Jeff Gunther Got your answer. It's from an old Drivin' n Cryin' Song - a Georgia band that REM supported at the time - a song called 'With the People' from the album 'Mystery Road'. Great song and some intelligent southern rock music. Check out Honeysuckle Blue - amazing song on same album. I was at this show from Tourfilm - most of it filmed from Macon Ga show. Truly amazing moment.
+Bartleby Scrivener Thanks! Sorry it's taken me so long to see this and get back to you! I will definitely check out Drivin and Cryin and that album in particular
Bartleby Scrivener Stipe cowrote that with Kevin Kinney iirc. Similarly, the intro to "I Believe" on Tourfilm was a song called Future 40s cowritten by Stipe with Syd Straw.
