Mike Mills - Golf with R.E.M
MIKE MILLS MAY BE SHINY, BUT he's not especially happy. The
bassist
for the mega-rock band R.E.M. wipes away droplets of perspiration
that
have collected above the scraggly whiskers of his goatee. Then he
walks
past the number 9 flagstick at Green Hills Country Club in Athens,
Ga.,
having just bladed his approach shot onto a pile of cedar chips
10 feet
beyond the green. So what if this is not the best round of golf
he has
ever played? It's certainly my most memorable trip to the links.
For
that matter, it's my most memorable visit anywhere!
Golf with R.E.M. O.K., golf with a member of the Athens-based
group.
Not a bad gig, as we in the music biz like to say. This is the R.E.M.
of
Shiny Happy People fame, one of the songs that earned the group a
worldwide following; the same guys who made the MTV Ball buzz
during
President Clinton's inauguration last January; the very foursome
that
since 1983 has sold 20 million records and collected enough
Grammies to
gold-plate a crate of Pings.
Seated beside Mills in a golf cart on a cloudless August
afternoon,
motoring down sun-bleached fairways, I chat with him about
everything from
pitch pipes to pitching wedges. Truly, this must be Generation X-stasy.
My personal rock 'n' jock weekend took seed last March during the
NCAA basketball tournament. At the Final Four in New Orleans, I
ran into a
friend who had just met one of R.E.M.'s managers, Bertis Downs.
Downs had
told him that Mills and the band's drummer, Bill Berry, were
rabid sports
fans. Several months later I spoke with Downs myself and brazenly
asked
him whether I might play golf with Mills and Berry. (Front man
Michael
Stipe and guitarist Peter Buck believe, in the words of Mark
Twain, that
golf is simply a good walk spoiled.)
So here I am in Athens, and Mills is giving me the grand tour of
the
town. As we pass the University of Georgia's basketball coliseum,
he
tells me that "the reason it's so ugly is that it was
originally built to
accommodate livestock shows." Big smile to all my friends
back home in
Cleveland: Get a load of me and Mills just cruisin' the streets
in his
Acura. The car is crammed with golf balls, Frisbees, aluminum
softball
bats, a bowler's wrist support; Mills even has an Exerscience
squeeze toy
he uses to strengthen his fingers. But there's nothing to suggest
this
guy is actually one of the most successful musicians on the
planet. Oh,
and my new best pal.
Despite the sequined suit he sported at last month's MTV Music
Awards
and the fact that he owns a small antique table that belonged to
Liberace,
Mills possesses few of the trappings one associates with rock
stars.
Mills is so genuinely unassuming that you half expect to see him
shagging
fly balls with the locals at a neighborhood softball diamond. And
in
fact, he spends most Sunday afternoons in the summer doing just
that,
playing pitcher and second baseman for the Ga. Bar team in Athens's
Bar
and Restaurant League, affectionately known as the Hangover
League.
Atlanta Brave baseball, though, is Mills's passion. For the past
three years he has owned season tickets at Fulton County Stadium.
And he
counts as one of his greatest disappointments in life an ill-timed
European tour last fall that forced him to miss the Braves'
National
League playoff series with the Pittsburgh Pirates. Fortunately,
in
London, Mills was able to keep a TV tuned to CNN for hourly game
updates
while he and Buck practiced chord progressions in their hotel
room. He
was also able to commute from London and Rome to Atlanta for the
Braves'
three home World Series games against the Toronto Blue Jays.
"Sometimes
the music business sucks," says Mills wistfully. "Like
when it gets in the
way of Brave baseball or my golf."
The next day our first stop is Berry's house. He's not golfing,
but
he has offered to lend me his clubs. When, not so coincidentally,
an
R.E.M. song comes on the radio in Mills's car (this is Athens), I
tell him
that my ex-girlfriend and I used to listen to that disc nonstop.
I
comment on how many people, myself included, mark periods of our
lives by
the band's music.
Graciously, he thanks me and says he does the same thing with
sports.
He vividly remembers a Hawaiian cruise he took with his
girlfriend in
August 1987 because the Braves had just traded pitcher Doyle
Alexander to
the Detroit Tigers for then minor leaguer John Smoltz. "I
didn't know
anything about the guy," says Mills. "But I got to
talking with one of the
other passengers on the ship, and it turned out he was Smoltz's
high
school coach. He told me it was a great trade for the Braves, and
that
made the trip go a lot better."
As we are unloading our golf clubs in the parking lot of Green
Hills,
it suddenly occurs to me that I haven't yet issued my disclaimer
to Mills:
I'm a putrid golfer. But before I can say anything, I'm
introduced to the
third member of our party, Tony Eubanks, who is the bar manager
at
Athens's famed 40 Watt music club. This guy I can take -- doesn't
loud
music mess up your equilibrium? My spirits plummet, though, when
I'm told
that Eubanks is no stranger to competition: He was a member of
the 1993
world-championship masters' Ultimate Frisbee team.
The trouble begins for me before I even swing a club. Forget the
fact that my heart is beating like a synthesizer. After all, this
is golf
with Mike Mills! Bending down, I snap two tees as I attempt to
set my
ball into the firm earth. But Mills is a courteous host,
congratulating
me after decent shots and consoling me after poor ones. His own
golf game
mirrors his proficiency on the bass: rarely flashy, but most
effective.
On this day, however, Mills isn't quite himself. Poised at the 4th
tee, Eubanks raises his arms and motions to an undulating stand
of trees.
"Do you hear that?" he asks. "They're calling our
names." Indeed they are:
All three of us slice our tee shots dead into the thickest part
of the
woods.
We complete the round with similarly uninspired play. (I am
compelled, though, to mention Mills's first shot on the dogleg 8th
-- a
beautiful fade that lands fairway-perfect.) As we head toward the
clubhouse, Patrick Murphy-Racey, a photographer who is shooting
our outing
for this magazine, takes a few pictures. When he finishes and
begins
repacking his equipment, Mills leans down to lend assistance.
"Can you believe that?" Murphy-Racey whispers to me.
"I've been doing
this for years, and nobody has ever offered to help me before."
Soon afterward I am reminded of a Mills quote that appeared in
Details magazine last February: "I know [golf] has a certain
amount of
baggage because it's played by rich people with terrible taste in
trousers
who are racist snobs, and I'm sorry about that."
Golf Illustrated ran the quote in its April issue, launching a
spate
of angry letters. However, as I watch Berry's clubs disappear
into the
trunk of Mills's car, hot Georgia sunshine banking off the rear
windshield, it occurs to me that the golfing community would be
hard-
pressed to find a better ambassador for its game than Mills.
Our scores? I'd like to reveal those numbers, honestly, but the
three of us swore a blood oath to carry the particulars of the
scorecard
to our graves. I can, however, divulge that Eubanks and Mills
finished
ahead of me.
Our threesome retreats to the 19th hole. There Mills and I watch
the
Braves come from behind to defeat the Los Angeles Dodgers in 12
innings.
A perfect day. In fact, when I tell Mills that this has been
positively
the best day of a truly forgettable year, he puts his arm around
my
shoulder and insists things will get better.
They will, I say, if we can do this every weekend.
Now, though, I long for serious REM action in my hotel room.
Drifting off, I marvel that the fellas could have had my golf
game in mind
when deciding the order of the songs on their latest CD,
Automatic for the
People. It opens with the optimistic long-hitter's anthem, Drive,
and
ends with a song that describes what my Titleist attempted to do
for most
of the afternoon: Find the River.