R.E.M.’s Michael Stipe Met Taylor Swift While Recording His Debut Solo Album

Michael Stipe met Taylor Swift while working on his debut solo album.

The former R.E.M. frontman revealed in a new interview with the New York Times Magazine that he is making slow but steady progress on his first full-length collection of songs since his band's dissolution in 2011.

Although he initially hoped to release the album in early 2023, the process was delayed by unexpected circumstances like family emergencies, art exhibits, apartment moves and COVID.

In May, Stipe decamped to Jimi Hendrix's legendary Electric Lady Studios in New York to record several songs for the new album, including "I'm the Charge" and a new version of his 2019 charity single "Your Capricious Soul," and a duet with Courtney Love for another project.

Stipe recorded the sessions with producer Andy LeMaster and LCD Soundsystem drummer Pat Mahoney, and the New York Times reports that the songs are "synth-infused, poppy, predominately danceable" – not like R.E.M. songs. "I don't want any electric guitars on this record. I had Peter Buck for 32 years. I don't need any other electric guitars," Stipe explained.

Taylor Swift, Jack Antonoff, the 1975's Matty Healy (whom Swift was dating at the time) and Phoebe Bridgers happened to be at Electric Lady Studios at the same time, and they all ended up hanging out together.

Upon meeting Swift, Stipe extended his hand and said, "You must be Taylor." In response, Swift told him, "Jack and Matty were saying they talked to you for hours yesterday. They were like, 'Best conversation!' They were so excited to be talking to you!"

The National's Bryce Dessner, the twin brother of Swift's Folklore and Evermore producer Aaron Dessner, also offered to write string arrangements for Stipe's solo album.

"I have a deadline now," Stipe told his mother and sister during a visit to Athens, Georgia. "I could keep working on this record for a decade and let my insecurities get the better of me."

Stipe didn't end up making his self-imposed deadline, but said that he "did come out of my terrible writer's block. I completely flourished as a writer after that."

"We can say for the piece that I finished the songs, and by God, I will finish them before the piece comes out," Stipe concluded. "How about that? Let's leave the piece closing with: I finished the songs."