Deadsplinter Up! All Night: All The Right Friends

23/9/20 Earendil the Mariner 26

‘All The Right Friends‘ is one of the first songs R.E.M. wrote. It was written by Peter Buck and Michael Stipe in 1979. At the time they hadn’t even met the other 2 members of the band; Bill Berry and Mike Mills. ‘All The Right Friends’ was intended to be in their 1983 debut album, ‘Murmur,’ but it was left of it. The original recording was eventually released in 2006 as part of the ‘And I Feel Fine… The Best of the I.R.S. Years 1982–1987’ compilation:

I was looking for a live version but surprisingly I couldn’t find anything. After some extensive searching I found a video (not good quality) of R.E.M.’s 20 February 1981 performance in Atlanta’s 688 Club. ‘All The Right Friends’ is at the 8:18 point. If you click the embedded video below it will start at that point:

Full playlist: Rave On 0:00, Burning Down 1:38, Dangerous Times 5:46, All The Right Friends 8:18, Get On Their Way 13:02, Different Girl 15:54, Permanent Vacation 19:27, White Tornado 21:45, Narrator 23:53, Windout 27:04, Gardening At Night 28:46, Mystery To Me 32:39, Radio Free Europe 34:37.

A slightly different version of ‘All The Right Friends’ was recorded for Cameron Crowe’s 2001 movie ‘Vanilla Sky’. It was, also, included in 2006’s ‘In Time: The Best of R.E.M. 1988–2003’ compilation.

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26 Comments

  4. Oh my God, you just made my boring, crabby Wednesday so much brighter. Thank you for your excellent research. The minute President Biden assumes office I am going to propose you and Michael Stipe for the Congressional Medal of Honor. Radio Free Europe is one of my favorite songs ever.

    • Also, I was at UGA from 1986-1990 getting a very useless journalism degree. Michael Stipe was always around and pretty much the King of the Townies. The Student Union was going to have a one night only showing of Lawrence of Arabia – at the time – my most favorite movie in the whole wild world. I hung out almost all day so that I could be in the front of the line and get a really good seat. I was successful and managed to get a seat right in the center. As the theater started filling up. A couple of townie guys sat in front of me and were very adamant about saving two empty seats. Just as the movie was about to start – in walks Michael Stipe, King of Townies. The sea parts and he ended up sitting right smack dab in front of me in one of the empty seats.
      He smelled so rank (like he hadn’t showered in three months and then rolled around in dead fish guts just before he came in kind of rank) – that I spent the whole movie having to basically turn my head and breathe in to the back of me and then hold it until I couldn’t hold it anymore. The. Entire. Movie.  Lawrence of Arabia is over three hours. There wasn’t an empty seat anywhere or I would’ve moved. I thought I was going to pass out a couple of times. I didn’t even get a respite at intermission. Nope, dude sat there wafting his putrid essence the whole time. 
      When the movie finally finished, the lights came on, and even though at the time I was one of the most timid people on the planet – as everyone was filing out – I caught his eye and said to him
      Goddammit Michael, next time could you at least take a fucking bath. 
      He just stared at me. His buddies got all pissy and started telling me that I couldn’t talk to Michael like that. I just looked at them and said – Y’all need to take a fucking bath too and walked away.
      Anyway, it’s not that exciting of a story and I still love REM and Lawrence of Arabia.

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