Thom Yorke on the Fame Advice Michael Stipe Gave Him
Radiohead frontman Thom Yorke opened up about fame, privacy and a three-decade friendship with R.E.M.'s Michael Stipe in a new Rolling Stone conversation with Harry Styles. The exchange, recapped by NME, traces back to 1995, when Yorke supported R.E.M. on their Monster tour.
What Yorke said
Styles brought up spending long stretches of his early career stuck in hotel rooms. Yorke replied that walking around and watching strangers can pull a person "out of themselves," before turning to his memories of the Monster tour. He said Stipe noticed he was hiding in the dressing room and refusing to go anywhere, so Stipe started physically pulling him out the door, offering a rule: "If you don't care, they don't care" — and, Yorke added, if you don't look at other people, they won't look at you either.
Yorke recalled Stipe testing the theory on him directly: the two walked into a crowded nightclub in Stockholm, and no one bothered them. Yorke said being recognized still makes an artist feel exposed, but that shutting yourself behind a door for long stretches is worse — not an easy call, but the better of two bad options.
Where the Kid A lyric came from
Stipe told NME in a 2019 interview that the friendship grew out of touring together and mutual respect for each other's work, naming Yorke as someone — alongside R.E.M. bandmates Mike Mills and Peter Buck — he turns to for industry advice. He downplayed being called a "mentor" but admitted that, being older and more experienced, those conversations did help.
Yorke also said in 2019 that during the intense touring period after OK Computer, he called Stipe to say he couldn't take it anymore. Stipe told him to imagine detaching from the moment and to tell himself, "I'm not here, this isn't happening." That line later became the main lyric of "How To Disappear Completely" on 2000's Kid A. When NME asked Stipe to confirm this, he replied with a single word: "Yep."
Three decades of shared stages
- 1998 Tibetan Freedom Concert: Yorke joined R.E.M. for "E-Bow The Letter," taking over the part originally sung by Patti Smith
- 2003, two Vancouver shows: Yorke joined R.E.M. for "E-Bow The Letter" and "It's The End Of The World As We Know It"; the following night Stipe returned the favor, joining Radiohead onstage for "Karma Police"
- 2004, a secret show at a London church: the two again performed "E-Bow The Letter" together, with the recording officially released in 2018
R.E.M. disbanded in 2011, and Yorke revealed at the time that Stipe had first texted him to give him a heads-up that the band was ending.