'REM had no goals'

14 April 2011 Last updated at 00:37 GMT REM released their 15th album, Collapse Into Now, in March REM's 30-year career began in the underground, with the groundbreaking and influential mid-80s albums Murmur and Reckoning.

They finally achieved mainstream success with 1988's alternative rock masterpiece Green, and progressed to MTV-fuelled international success with singles like Losing My Religion and Everybody Hurts.

Somehow, they managed to enjoy world-wide mainstream recognition while also maintaining their status as one of the most esoteric, unique voices in rock music.

In doing so, they opened the door for alternative rock bands like Nirvana and Pearl Jam, and set a template (both musically and ethically) that's been followed by everyone from Radiohead to Arcade Fire.

In the wake of the release of the band's 15th album, Collapse Into Now, Michael Stipe granted a handful of interviews. Speaking to BBC 6 Music's The First Time, he displayed little of his trademark intensity and solemnity.

"His reputation for fixing you in his eye and carefully considering every aspect of every question is well justified," says presenter Matt Everitt. "But Stipe seemed happy to chat about his early obsessions and his comical ignorance of musical history."

When did you first become aware of music?

It would have been the Beatles, Michelle, my belle. I was staying with a German friend and she was making cabbage soup for me. That song came on the radio, and I remember standing alone in the living room, looking at that radio on a tall shelf and thinking that it was really beautiful.

Did you have a musical upbringing?

Not particularly. My parents were very specific about what they loved, and they would play it over and over again. Although I come from an artistic family, music was not a huge part of my upbringing.

What was the first single that you owned?

My grandmother took my two sisters and I to a record store, Mr Pemberton's Record Store in Texas. He had some singles that were discounted, so we were able to buy whatever we wanted.

We bought an Elvis Presley album, for one of his films called Double Trouble, and a Disney Film called The Parent Trap starring Hayley Mills. Amongst the singles was Tammy Wynette's D.I.V.O.R.C.E. and I Want To Hold Your Hand by The Beatles.

Now, if that isn't random, I don't know what is.

It's definitely an eclectic mix.

As a pre-teen, before punk rock radically changed my life, there were songs on the radio that resonated with me and, to this day, I don't know why.

Such as?

The band were a four-piece until drummer Bill Berry quit in 1997 after suffering a brain aneurism two years before

Benny And The Jets by Elton John. It seemed like it came from another galaxy. As an adult who makes music, I realise now that the production on that song is probably the weirdest to ever make the top 20.

Your first single was Radio Free Europe. What do you remember of recording it? Were you excited?

No, I wasn't! I didn't know the process of recording. In fact, it wasn't until our second album, Reckoning, that I realised the difference between the bass guitar and the guitar. I didn't know which one did which sound. I knew the bass guitar had four strings on it… because I could count them. But I didn't know the bass guitar did the low notes. That's how ignorant I was of music.

What was the first REM song that you felt connected with a mainstream audience?

From the first show we did I felt like a pop star, because people clapped when I did something. On some level, that's all part of the insane insecurity and courage it takes to perform in the first place.

But I think that when The One I Love came out and went into the top 20 in the US, that's when it felt like, "Wow, this is really serious. This is real."

It's always gratifying when someone works for a long time - and this doesn't just have to be in music - and finally achieves their goal. How did that feel?

But we didn't know what we wanted. We were the band that had no goals. The fact that we were making records and touring felt like this amazing adventure to us. We didn't necessarily want to conquer the world - but then we ended up doing exactly that in some small corner of the universe that belonged to pop music and us.

You've made a film for each of the songs on the new album. How did that come about?

Stipe has branched out into film, both as an actor and producer

To an 11-year-old child, the album is a thing of the past. But I think an album is something quite significant. A medium and a format that needs to be celebrated. So how do we do that in 2011? One thing we can do is create something that's going to be presented on YouTube, or you can watch on your phone. That's what these 12 films were all about.

When you were recording Collapse Into Now were you aware of trying to celebrate the album format. Did you sequence it to be listened to as a complete body of work?

Sequencing is absolutely important to an album. It's perhaps one of the most important things. Also being able to edit yourself: If you've written 17 songs, being able to bring it down to a number that will create a complete piece. That's a skill I don't own, but Peter [Buck] does.

REM is credited with being a band that took the alternative into the mainstream. Do you look at bands like Nirvana or Pearl Jam and see some of yourself?

Never! I just don't see it. It's like when people compared REM to The Byrds. I didn't get that either. It was the way Peter picked the guitar instead of strumming it, but I didn't know about the history of music to know that.

So when that's turned around on me… I only recently found out that people think my voice is unique. People say they can recognise it instantly and I never knew that. It's not false modesty or humility. I honestly had no idea.

Does it feel like every REM album might be the last one?

I put so much into the work we do that, when I'm done, I feel like I'd never be able to do it again. For better or worse, one of the things I'm most proud of is that we've never taken the advice of other people over our own. So the triumphs that are ours are distinctly and completely ours. And the failures are also completely ours. So looking back, I get equal dollops of humility and triumphant joy.

You can hear the full interview with Michael Stipe on BBC 6 Music on 17 April at 1200 GMT. Collapse Into Now is out now.

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Energy goals 'need people power'

11 February 2011 Last updated at 09:18 GMT By Mark Kinver Science and environment reporter, BBC News About 70% of the houses that will still be homes in 2050 have already been built The way that people use and live in their homes has been largely ignored by existing efforts to improve energy efficiency, a study has suggested.

The focus on technological solutions had overshadowed the need also to consider the "human side" of energy use in buildings, it added.

Energy used in people's homes account for about a quarter of the UK's total greenhouse gas emissions.

The findings have been published in the journal Architectural Science Review.

"Technology is going to assist but it is not going to do everything," explained author Katy Janda, a senior researcher for the UK Energy Research Centre's (UKERC) Energy Demand theme.

"The paper is really to remind people who are interested in the technology that they cannot forget the human side," she told BBC News.

"I think we have gone too far towards thinking that technology is going to solve all our problems for us," added Dr Janda, who is based at Oxford University's Environmental Change Institute.

In her paper, she wrote: "Reducing energy use in buildings is a critical component of meeting carbon reduction commitments.

"This article argues that building users play a critical but poorly understood, and often overlooked, role in the built environment."

'Information gap'

Within the policy and research sphere, Dr Janda said that the "information deficit model" tended to dominate the social dimensions of the energy debate. In other words, households and bill payers lacked the knowledge they needed in order to "correct" their energy-use habits.

She quoted research that compared people's energy use with shopping in a supermarket that did not list prices on individual items. Instead, the shopper was presented with a bill for the purchases at the end of each month.

As a result, it said, households found it difficult to know how or where they could obtain details of their energy consumption. One development to bridge the "information gap" was the emergence of "feedback" devices, such as smart meters and energy monitor displays.

Some studies have shown that households can achieve up to 15% energy savings using smart meters. However, research published last year voiced concern that there was still no clear definition for smart meters.

As the simplest level, smart meters can be read remotely by the energy company. At the most advanced level, the devices provide information on what items are using energy and how much it costs. The technology also allows home owners to switch devices on and off remotely.

But Dr Janda observed: "Although the feedback approach is useful, there are other factors that influence people's energy use that may not be affected by their mechanism."

Complex beings

A UK Economic and Social Research briefing paper published in 2009 highlighted that buildings in the UK accounted for 45% of all energy use - the same as transport and industry combined.

It also warned that the UK would never achieve its target of cutting emissions by 80% by 2050 from 1990 levels without reducing energy and water use in buildings (potable water requires high energy use to purify it to drinking quality).

The paper also highlighted how people can influence the energy performance of buildings: "Often, buildings don't perform as expected, partially because occupants behave in more complex ways than designers account for; they open windows, leave doors open, generate body heat, keep tropical fish tanks and install plasma TV screens."

Dr Janda said it suggested that people's behaviour may be idiosyncratic, rather than reasoned and predictable.

One project that is collating data on how people's behaviour, as well as different technologies, affects a building's energy-use profile is the "Energy House" at the University of Salford.

Researchers have constructed a 1920s style terraced house inside a three-storey sealed testing chamber to allow them to measure energy use under a range of environmental and social scenarios.

Erik Bischard, professor of regeneration and sustainable development and one of the lead researchers on the three-year study, welcomed Dr Janda's findings.

"The built environment community is dominated at the construction phase by technicians and engineers who are driven by specifications and tight budgets," he told BBC News.

"Human behaviour, once the building is occupied, is often seen as someone else's problem - but this is a dangerously mistaken view. Almost half of greenhouses gases emitted as a result of how we use buildings.

"This is therefore very much everyone's problem and Kathryn Janda is absolutely right when she suggests that the behavioural sciences need to be part of design-stage thinking as a matter of urgency."

Dr Janda suggested that architects, as a profession, were best placed to pick up the baton to close the differences between the design of buildings and their use.

"Some architects have the skills and experience to take on this challenge," she said.

"But the field as a whole would need to develop professional expertise and seek ways of integrating user involvement in building performance to fully succeed."

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