Released in 2011, R.E.M.’s last studio album, Collapse into Now, ends and begins with the song, Discoverer, and so I was.
It had been twenty-five years since my favorite celebrity, River Phoenix, died of an accidental drug overdose outside of the Viper Room. Throughout the years, I became increasingly suspicious that this overdose was just a cover story for ritualistic murder Hollywood style. The information piled up and I decided to start a blog exposing the details of my findings. The further along I went the more worried I became that I’d stumbled over the line and that somebody might come after me…
At the start of this thing, I didn’t know about the golden gods, the dying gods, being passed through the fire and everything that goes along with it. I didn’t know who or what I was dealing with. I didn’t know that I was about to be initiated into this thing. You can read all about it here.
I said a lot of ugly things about River’s mother. I made accusations and pointed the finger. I then stumbled upon the Michael Stipe connection. I didn’t know what to think. I thought maybe he suffered from split-personality disorder. I thought maybe he was some kind of Manchurian candidate. I thought a lot of things.
I had always been a huge R.E.M. fan. I loved their music and I loved Michael Stipe’s lyrics. I thought he was one of the best songwriters around. I still believe that. His words inspired me and his voice cut deep to my soul. I put Automatic for the People right up there with The Beatles Abbey Road, so, stumbling onto this thing was a nightmare in more ways than one.
Where am I going with all of this?
This thing changed me. I’m not who I was at the start of this thing, for better or for worse. And as much as I hate this thing, and as much as I wish it had never happened, there is an extremely bright side to all of this. There is redemption to be had for everyone involved, including River.
If River’s life imitated his art then we must also look at his first full feature film, Explorers. Released in 1985 (a year before Stand by Me), the movie depicts three teenage boys who build a spacecraft to explore outer space. The idea comes to them through a series of dreams where they envision flying through the clouds over a city-like circuit board. Eventually, the boys build a spacecraft and travel into outer space where they meet two green-skinned aliens. These two aliens are the ones responsible for sending them the dreams in the hopes of meeting a human. Along with the two green-skinned aliens, the boys also meet a gigantic brown alien who turns out to be their father. The boys eventually return safely back to earth.
It truly is the stuff that dreams are made of.
River had been lost in space for quite some time. And beyond all logic, with a helping hand from God, an absolute miracle, he has returned safely back to earth, and he’s even brought a friend back with him.
The song Blue combines elements from both Country Feedback and E-Bow the Letter for one final tribute to River. The video, in fact, even features shots of River from My Own Private Idaho.
The video begins with a backwards shot of a “The End” sign, and so we have the beginning as the end, i.e., the translation of River’s DNA.
River, from My Own Private Idaho, appears on the screen in an empty screening room. A green chair sits in the center of the room. River leans up against a tree in his orange jacket with the number 4 on the shoulder sleeve. The floor is checkered black and white. Notice, also, the open “Exit” door with the neon green sign.
The number 4 represents the spirit realm and the tree symbolizes River as the dying god. The orange/red jacket represents “the monster” or the last departed time (yellow) coming together with the destination time (red). The black and white checkered floor represents the word as well as River’s fall. The door with the green sign symbolizes River’s rebirth as a golden god.
A man/woman sits on a rooftop as the scene fades into the campfire scene from My Own Private Idaho. The man/woman represents River as the golden god – a concept repeated throughout the video with androgynous looking men and woman as well as transvestites. He/she represents Baphomet and the hermaphrodite child.
We then see a now crowded screening room as the campfire pans across into the head of an older woman with gray hair.
The older woman, who resembles River’s mother, sits next to a younger woman with dark hair. Here, we have the concept behind the lyrics for the song, Belong, the light from the golden gods, and the dying god as the dark-haired woman.
The words, Souvenirs of Hollywood, can be seen on the glass side of a building as well as a lookalike of River from Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. A traffic light is seen to the far right, and above the lookalike, green leaves.
Like the blue box/coffin and the subliminal messaging found in the movie, this scene represents everything discussed thus far. The time cycle and color coding (the traffic light) and the word in the flesh.
The androgynous lookalike is shown again with the green leaves appearing on the other side. Here, we have River’s marriage to the dying god after his death, so the two become one. He is now a part of their world, grafted in to that cursed tree.
We also see the silhouette of a man (1st pic) which is reminiscent of Country Feedback (2nd pic). One shoulder is lifted up while the other is lowered. In the first pic, the man is in front of a series of window panes. In the second, he was in front of a bridge. The man disappeared and a train barreled across the bridge from right to left. A woman then appeared on the screen and began talking as the train returned traveling in the opposite direction from left to right. The woman represented the dying god. The train leaving and returning represented the palindrome or the translation of the word. The bridge represented connecting with a dying/golden god, as do the man’s shoulders – as above so below.
In the pic from Blue, the window panes symbolize that the man (River) is now a part of the o-zone, the spirit world, or the fourth dimension. He has become one of them – a dying/golden god.
A boy is shown with a beat-up face, two blackened eyes, and, he’s wearing a hat. River appears (from My Own Private Idaho) on the television under the boy’s chin. The boy represents the Ray Brower/Chris Chambers prophecy.
The scene from My Own Private Idaho is of Mike Waters on a deserted road holding a stopwatch, notice also the name sewn into his shirt says “Bob” – the palindrome. Again, the Stand By Me prophecy in River’s blood and the time cycle.
A woman with dark hair wearing a blue dress appears behind a drawn curtain – she is the dying god. The drawn curtain forms a sort of spotlight or floodlight representing River’s collapse outside of the Viper Room and the concept of an alien abduction. The boy’s hat also symbolizes this concept. Like a flying saucer (the hat) or a UFO, River or Boy was abducted by aliens, i.e., the golden/dying gods. Notice, also, the gold lights faded in the background.
Yellow circus left the stakes of broken ropes, useless mud, The ties that bind, ha ha, I can be bad poet, Street poet, sh*t poet, Kind poet too. Subway, almost 4am, Halloween night, Had enough to drink to make my own party, All my fellow riders in half costume, half asleep, Half silly, gone to seed, I don't mark my time with dates, holidays, fate, wisdom, luck, karma, or whatever is, Convenient. I am made by my times, I am a creation of now, Shaken with the cracks and crevices, I'm not giving up easy, I will not fold, I don't have much, But what I have is gold
(I saw your face), I sing in platinum, I dress in brass (Good, lifting snow), I eat a zinc. Let it pass, Compare a toast. I like that, I understand courage (Ever lifting smoke), I still roll with the shout of a cab driver's attitude of the day, I try to see outside myself, I understand the eyes, Excuse all the lies, Sorry, I am sorry. Ha ha, (Boy of the moon)
I like you, love you, every coast of you (I'm not your face), I've seen your eddies and tides and hurricanes and cyclones, Low ebb tide and high, full moon, Up close and distant, I read you, Like the sky, the sea, the ocean, the sun, the moon, Blue, blue, blue, blue, blue, blue, blue, blue, blue, blue, blue, blue, Naked and blue (Naked and blue), Breathing with you. Touch. Change. Shift. Allow air. Window open. Drift. Drift away. Into now (Revenge you), I want Whitman proud. Patti Lee proud. My brothers proud, My sisters proud. I want me. I want it all. I want sensational. Irresistible, This is my time and I am thrilled to be alive, Living. Blessed. I understand.
Twentieth century, collapse into now
Cinderella boy, you've lost your shoe, Cinderella boy, your coach awaits, I saw its shadow all over your face, As you sit naked and blue into me
The video ends with the same “The End” sign from the beginning, and the glowing television appears in the sky in the background. In the scene above that, the glowing television appears over the ocean’s shoreline, and above that shot, circles of golden light.
The Apple and the birdcage 