Book of the Month, Musik Express, AUG 2008

R.E.M. Hello, by David Belisle

Six years around the world with R.E.M. - on stage and backstage, in public and very private

You may be forgiven for not wanting to see Michael Stipe's face anymore - it has been one of the most public and most often shown in popular music for the past twenty years. Having said that, what makes pictures worth looking at and taking depends on two things, always: the photographer's view of not only his object but also of surroundings and mood; the very surroundings and the very mood and what they do to a human being who has been traveling the world and getting to places that are more than what their names give away: stages, dressing rooms, hotels, film-studios, elevators, lobbies, streets, yards, backyards, rooms, restaurants, indefinable in-betweens.

It's beyond dispute that Michael Stipe fits the overly saturated description of an icon yet David Belisle, who has been traveling with the band for six years taking pictures in every circumstance and situation, has a completely different perspective from what we know - still he subtly confirms the idea we have had. He shows exhausted and lost people in sad weariness, happy men drinking beer, artists working in deep concentration; he captures all this so perfectly and casually, it seems, that one does not want to decide whether he is a genius or a maniac who had so many pictures to choose from so that his best shots would easily fill a whole book. A book that wistfully reminds you of the fact that R.E.M. were an exciting, mysterious and relevant band once, not a global mega-corporation that fills stadiums with old hits and serves respectable radio-stations with irrelevances in the guise of newer products.

Maybe this is due to the "supporting cast" that can be seen in the book, too - from Neil Young to Michael Moore, Yorke to Springsteen and Conor Oberst to Chris Martin...no, credit must go the photographer, to his view and his finger that created a work from which better music plays than from the works of those that can be seen here.

• (4.5 out of 5)
• Review by Hans Holzinger [translated from German]