That’s an excerpt from the latest release from Michael Stipe. Stipe spent time at the WUGA studio Friday. The legendary singer and former Athens resident discussed his new song “Drive to the Ocean.”
“I don’t really remember writing it, as it turns out, I started a solo, not career, but I started writing, composing music for myself in the past couple of years and it’s a really new thing for me,” Stipe said. “Andy LeMaster who I work with a lot here in Athens and who I’ve co-written a bunch of work with, who’s an incredible musician, singer-songwriter, and engineer and producer in his own right, reminds me that actually we wrote that. That was you that wrote that.”
He says that’s a typical response to much of his work.
“The best work that I did with my former band R.E.M, I think my favorite work of ours, over the canon of 32 years, are the songs that I don’t really remember writing. They are the ones that kind of instinctually fell of me songs that fell out of me and then I was able to stand back and say wow, that’s really good.”
Stipe says proceeds from the song will go to the climate change awareness nonprofit Pathway to Paris, which came about as a result of the Paris Agreement. We’ll have more from that interview with Michael Stipe right here on WUGA.