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R.E.M.’s Mike Mills on ‘Live! with Regis and Kathie Lee’

Mike Mills
 
This happened: while the pioneering band R.E.M. were transitioning from weird-people fame to normal-people fame, their bass player Mike Mills was booked to appear on Live! with Regis and Kathie Lee. Hosted by former Joey Bishop second-banana Regis Philbin before he morphed into his final form as the launching pad of a billion “Is that your final answer?” jokes and sidekicked by Kathie Lee Gifford, a woman so oppressively chipper she became a national punchline in her own right, Live! was a daytime talk show geared toward the dwindling sedentary-housewives-at-home-all-day demographic.

R.E.M., at the time, had leveled up from college-radio darlings to for-real arena rock stars, thanks to the albums Green and Out of Time and the improbable global success of the single “Losing My Religion.” (I worked at a record store at the time, and I once retrieved a copy of R.E.M.’s full-length debut Murmur for a yuppie who asked if we had “their first album.” He was baffled—he wanted Green, and had no idea the band had been releasing music for ten years. Among normals, he was far from alone.) But their newfound popularity aside, even in the wake of the Nevermind deluge, there was a real frisson to a band known for moody music and challenging, cerebral lyrics (snobs: feel free to nerdfight about “Shiny Happy People”) to make inroads to the gleeful wide-eyed vapidity of daytime talk.
 

 
This is messed up: I actually saw this when it was broadcast. I have no idea what I was doing at home during the day in February of 1992. I have no idea what class I was blowing off. I have no idea why the TV was even on at all, let alone why it was on the channel that broadcast Live! of all things, but there it was. Odds are good I was baked. And I when I caught the words “R.E.M.” and “Mike Mills” coming out of the mouth of Regis fucking Philbin, I was transfixed. Mills has always seemed a good-natured guy, so he responded with aw-shucks aplomb to the banal interview questions—seriously, high school newspapers ask bands how they got their names, so it’s a shame Mills couldn’t inform them that the band had previously been called “Cans of Piss.” But then, surely in defiance of some publicist’s grave warning of certain doom, Mills does a marvelous acoustic rendition of “(Don’t Go Back To) Rockville,” a song from their second LP Reckoning, which was eight years old at the time. Surely a small army of American homemakers dropped their cheesecake and drove straight to the mall to buy it. Right?
 

 
Previously on Dangerous Minds:
The Ramones on ‘Regis and Kathie Lee’

Posted by Ron Kretsch
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03.07.2014
10:53 am
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‘Mirrorball’: Chris Cunningham, Spike, Jonze, Jonathan Glazer, Michel Gondry and co.

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Back in 1999, Channel 4 aired Mirrorball a TV series that showcased the best promo directing talent across the globe. Two series and one animation special were made, featuring the talents of Spike Jonze, Mike Mills, Michel Gondry, Jonathan Glazer, Jonas Akerlund and Chris Cunningham. Each program was dedicated to one director, with an interview, a selection of their work, and a specially filmed insert (from Gondry drumming to Glazer mucking around with actor Paul Kay - aka Dennis Pennis).  Mirrorball was an instant hit and has gone on to become a cult TV classic since the series was cancelled in 2001.

Inspired by Edinburgh Film Festival’s Mirrorball screenings, the offshoot TV series was a collaboration between the Festival’s David Smith and Blackwatch Media, under producer and director, Nicola Black. As Black explained to Dangerous Minds:

“It was a fantastic opportunity to bring together groundbreaking directors and treat their work seriously, for the first time. We wanted to reveal the process behind these incredible pieces of work, which used cutting edge technology and post production techniques to achieve startling and unforgettable visuals to tell brilliant stories.  You have to remember, this was way before any of these directors had made their names in movies.

Black started out as an intern working with Derek Jarman, before moving on to directing and producing. She set up her company in 1995, making an internationally acclaimed documentary on crime writer James Ellroy’s search for his Mother’s murderer. Since then, Black has made a variety of award-winning shows, animations and “hard-hitting” documentaries, and started the trend in “shock docs” with Designer Vaginas.

“Mirrorball was a great series to make, not only in terms of the breadth of creative work shown, but also by the fact it gave insight into the early works of film-makers like Spike Jonze, Mark Romanek, who went on to make One Hour Photo, Michel Gondry, who made Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and Jonathan Glazer, who directed the brilliant Sexy Beast.”

There were many great highlights to choose from the Mirrorball series (including Jonze’s superb short film How They Got There, Gondry’s genius work with Massive Attack & Daft Punk, Glazer’s collaborations with Radiohead, Akerlund’s Smack My Bitch Up and Mills promos for Air),  but we’ve gone for a selection from Chris Cunningham’s work, whose promos for Aphex Twin (aka genius Richard David James) are amongst some of the most original and disturbing ever made. Enjoy!
 

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Bonus clips of Mirrorball after the jump…
 

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Posted by Paul Gallagher
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10.14.2010
06:59 pm
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