All Together Now

Music fans love to make lists. We love to inventory our knowledge of, and passion for, popular music. We make lists for ourselves, we make lists for our friends. What are the best live albums of all time? What are the best Bob Dylan song titles? What are the top ten best ’80’s female rock bands? What are the best songs about cars?

This list of lists could go on and on. One list that I have been for several years is a collection of the greatest opening lines of songs.

“Screen door slams, Mary’s dress waves.”

“Bottle of red, bottle of white. Whatever kind of mood you’re in tonight.”

“I am an old woman, named after my mother.”

“You never close your eyes anymore when I kiss your lips.”

I would also add to this list the opening line from “Cuyahoga” by R.E.M., which appears on their 1986 massive juggernaut album Life’s Rich Pageant. 

“Let’s put our heads together, start a new country up.”

During the 1980’s, R.E.M. built their career slowly and steadily, toiling away in the record stores and college dive bars of Athens, GA. Along the way they developed a unique sound. Lead vocalist Michael Stipe wrote disjointed lyrics, and mumbled his songs in a nasal tone while sounding pensive and reflective. He swore he would never write a love song. Co-writer and bassist Mike Mills sang harmony and played melodic bass lines. Guitarist Peter Buck inherited the jangly legacy of The Byrds and George Harrison, and drummer Bill Berry played a minimalist drum kit, keeping the songs moving along with power and economy.

Their rock songs had a punk ethos while sounding like electric folk. They were hard to pinpoint back in 1980. They remain hard to pinpoint now. Since their major label debut with Murmur in 1983, R.E.M. slowly expanded their audience and their influence. Each album was more popular than its predecessor.

In 1986, R.E.M released Lifes Rich Pageant, featuring “Fall on Me,” which peaked at number 5 on the Billboard charts, and “Superman,” their cover of a relatively unknown song from 1969, first recorded by a relatively unknown garage band called The Clique, that reached number 17 on the charts.

And hidden amongst these hit songs is “Cuyahoga,” and it begins as does any revolution, as does any childhood dream, as does any call to arms. It begins with an idea. An exciting idea. A necessary idea.

A simple bass line draws our attention. We are listening carefully. Sharp snaps of the snare drum calls our attention. Michael Stipe brings us in close to tell a story.

“Let’s put our heads together and start a new country up
Our father’s father’s father tried, erased the parts he didn’t like
Let’s try to fill it in, bank the quarry river, swim
We knee-skinned it you and me, we knee-skinned that river red“

Free of an overt thematic connection, “Cuyahoga” is like history written in magnetic words on a refrigerator door. What it lacks in conjunctions and adverbs it makes up for in big ideas, and tragic challenges. Here we find ourselves in a country that our forefathers created out of nothing, and revised and built and re-built over time. There were mistakes, and those mistakes were addressed. Some issues were resolved, some were left to linger.

We were given a beautiful country, a country made of mountains, valleys and rivers. Native Americans had lived on this land for thousands of years, and then America was created, and with that creation of also came tragic and savage industrialization. Factories were built. The skies filled with smog, and the water filled with refuse. The land was taken, and became something we could only remember.

“This is where we walked
This is where we swam
Take a picture here
Take a souvenir“

The Cuyahoga river is in Ohio, and it became infamous around the turn of the century. Because it had become so polluted, because it was left to rot and stink to such an extreme, the river could only be kept clean by using a torch to burn off the toxic pollutants. Over the years, the river would even catch fire on its own due to ongoing neglect and ignorance.

The Cuyahoga Fire of 1969

“This land is the land of ours, this river runs red over it
We knee-skinned it you and me, we knee-skinned that river red
And we gathered up our friends, bank the quarry river, swim
We knee-skinned it you and me, underneath the river bed”

R.E.M. had taken a long forgotten environmental tragedy, and turned into a visceral statement about the collective guilt we all should share for letting this once beautiful land collapse into a burning pile of polluted water and toxic chemicals. “Cuyahoga” is a statement of how we as a country forget what was once there, what was once beautiful. We forget how it was once a place to hunt, and run, and skin our knees. 

Guitarist Peter Buck carries the song along, adroitly switching between gentle arpeggios and fuzzy chords, singlehandedly dictating mood and energy. There is protest. There is anger. There is indignation. There is little regret.

“Let’s put our heads together and start a new country up
Up underneath the river bed we’ll burn the river down”

Relentlessly propelled by Bill Berry’s powerful snare, the accusation is laid bare. Rewrite what you will. Save the face that you must. The waste is still smoldering.

“Rewrite the book and rule the pages
Saving face, secured in faith
Bury, burn the waste behind you“

A long time ago, the founding fathers of our country put their heads together, and they dreamed of a new country. I wonder if they could see America now, would they want to put their heads together again?

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“Cuyahoga“
Written by Bill Berry, Peter Buck, Mike Mills, Michael Stipe
Performed by R.E.M.
Released July 28, 1986