R.E.M. are getting inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame on Thursday and all four original members — Bill Berry, Mike Mills, Peter Buck and Michael Stipe — will be on hand to accept the award at NYC’s Marriott Marquis in Times Square. Ahead of that, CBS Mornings corralled them all into the same room for their first group interview including Bill Berry in 27 years.
The interview airs tomorrow morning, but the show posted a short clip on their Instagram. In it, Anthony Mason asks them a couple questions, including “What does it mean to be honored for your songwriting?” Buck says they “lived or died on the strength of our songwriting,” and Berry adds “Early on, just to put food on the table, we had to write songs as fast as we could.”
When Mason asked them if they had ever looked back at R.E.M.’s whole body of work, Mills immediately says “No… none of us are quite that self-indulgent” to which Stipe interjects, “Okay, I am!” Stipe adds, “I end up on YouTube and watch some live performance and am like ‘wow, I can’t believe we did that.”
Mason also asked Bill Berry if he regretted leaving the band in 1997 after surgery for a brain aneurysm. “Of course I did. That was a weird time for me and I made it weird for these guys too,” Berry said. “It may have lowered my energy level and I just didn’t have the drive I once did. I didn’t regret it at the time, but I’ve sort of regretted it a little later.”
UPDATE: Watch the entire segment below.
Also getting inducted into the Songwriters Hall of fame this year: Timbaland (Timothy Mosley), Steely Dan’s Donald Fagen and Water Becker, Hillary Lindsey, and Dean Pitchford.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V1qjo0Oz1qw