History Trivia / REM

** "Disappear" was inspired by Michael Stipe's use of the phrase "I'm not here, this isn't happening" as a SurvivalMantra to cope with tour-related stresses. The name and general theme of the song further came from Music/{{Radiohead}}'s [[Music/KidA "How to Disappear Completely"]] from the year before, which was based on Thom Yorke's use of the same mantra after Stipe suggested it to him to cope with the stress of touring for ''Music/OKComputer''; Stipe and Yorke had been already been personal friends for a good while up to that point. Upon remembering that the Radiohead song existed, Stipe called up Yorke to apologize for "stealing" the concept, to which Yorke retorted by saying that it was more Stipe's song than Radiohead's -- and that Yorke had also "stolen" a few things from Stipe for his own material, so that they were now effectively even.

** "Disappear" was inspired by Michael Stipe's use of the phrase "I'm not here, this isn't happening" as a SurvivalMantra to cope with tour-related stresses; the name and general theme of the song further came from Music/{{Radiohead}}'s [[Music/KidA "How to Disappear Completely"]] from the year before, which was based on Thom Yorke's use of the same mantra after Stipe suggested it to him to cope with the stress of touring for ''Music/OKComputer''; Stipe and Yorke had been already been personal friends for a good while up to that point. Upon remembering that the Radiohead song existed, Stipe called up Yorke to apologize for "stealing" the concept, to which Yorke retorted by saying that it was more Stipe's song than Radiohead's.

** "What If We Give It Away" was almost completely forgotten for about 5 years until the band was short of material for Lifes Rich Pageant and a friend of the band who remembered the song suggested they rerecord it. The band did so, with rewritten lyrics. It ended up on the album because it flowed well in the context, though it never made a return to their live setlists. Peter Buck has said that the band never thought it was anything special.
** Depending on the source, the band refused to perform [[Music/OutOfTime "Shiny Happy People"]] live due to either [[CreatorBacklash absolutely hating the song]] or because they find it too difficult to perform live. Furthermore, they also bounce between either hating the song or having a love-hate relationship with it.

* AwesomeDearBoy: According to Peter Buck and Mike Mills in an interview with Creator/{{MTV}}, this was a driving factor in the band's decision to open for five of Music/ThePolice's shows during the latter group's supporting tour for ''Music/{{Synchronicity}}'', enthusiastically nothing that "We get to see the Police for free."