Two Times Intro : On the Road With Patti Smith [Hardcover]

Michael Stipe (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 1998

Michael Stipe, the lead singer of R.E.M. and a longtime photographer, offers a behind-the-scenes look at a 12-day concert tour with one of his idols, the legendary Patti Smith. 120 photos. Advance press coverage on the Internet. Feature on "Dateline".

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

When singer Patti Smith toured in 1995, for the first time in almost 20 years, R.E.M. frontman Michael Stipe tagged along as tour photographer. Two Times Intro is the resulting photo diary--as Stipe calls it--and it's filled with his moody black-and-white prints and Polaroids (taken with an ancient camera by Smith guitarist Oliver Ray) that capture a specific mood of Smith's as she moves through the shifting, impersonal spaces--taxis, concrete backstage areas, empty theaters--of life on tour. Stipe is a long-time Smith fan, as he recalls in an essay in the book: he "bought her first album the day it came out. It was mind-blowing--emotional and imperfect, swirling, B&W." His photographs of Smith and her band mates display the same emotional intensity and incongruity that her music originally stirred in him. The layout, executed completely in black and white with echoes of imperfections like torn Scotch tape, creases, and torn edges seemingly photocopied onto the page, gives readers a sense of watching an ancient black-and-white television--scratchy, static-filled, impenetrable, and mysterious, but also somehow comforting. All of this is evocative of both Smith's music and her lyrics, and in that it is a strange but fitting homage to her. Stipe intersperses throughout the images musings about Smith by the likes of William S. Burroughs, who calls her "a shaman--that is someone in touch with other levels of reality," Sonic Youth's Thurston Moore and Kim Gordon, and long-time friend and fellow musician Lenny Kaye. Ultimately, the book is not a photographic triumph but it should be very compelling to Smith and Stipe fans alike.

Review

In reverse of Defiance, Michael Stipe's photo-journal of Patti Smith's celebrated return to touring promises a woman coming out of mortal isolation. Though it's a Ray gun design, it has an Interview feel: famous people looking at other famous people and -surprise! - at themselves. Like Ginsberg's snapshot chronicles of his Best buddies, it throws up a democra-punk vibe without ever questioning how cool everybody is. Still, Patti's image burns into pictures with weird radioactive mystery, and Thurston Moore's all-too-brief note reminds you he's a far better writer than singer. More of each, please. -- Spin, J.C., May 1998

Some of Stipe's photos are pointlessly blurry; others are exquisite.... -- Entertainment Weekly, Margot Mifflin

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 130 pages
• Publisher: Little Brown & Co (T) (April 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0316815721
• ISBN-13: 978-0316815727
• Product Dimensions: 11 x 7.4 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,987,089 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Michael Stipe's view revealed in black and white, July 4, 2001

By 

Mediahound (SF Bay Area, CA United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 50 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Two Times Intro : On the Road With Patti Smith (Hardcover)

This book includes not just black and white photographs shot by Michael Stipe while on the road with Patti Smith, but also many polaroid photos taken by Patti Smith's guitarist Oliver Ray. Oliver Ray's photographs are designated by a little "O" near his photos.

While Stipe certainly has some real gems here, he doesn't demonstrate complete mastery over his camera equipment, which to my knowledge was a Leica M6. Many of the images here are blurry and/or out of focus. But that is ok, it evokes a certain frantic 'on the road touring with a rock band' style.

Oliver Ray's Polaroids are on the other hand, wonderful. Taken with a cheap Polaroid Land Camera 100 (circa 1960s) using instant Polaroid 667 black and white 'peel-apart' film (which is still sold), Ray achieves stunning results especially when you understand the' limited featured' camera he worked with. This book is an interesting study for anyone who is as fond of Polaroid photography as I am.

If you are an R.E.M. and Michael Stipe fan, or a Patti Smith fan, then of course you will enjoy this book. However if you are seeking true pristine photographic works of art, look elsewhere. Most of these images evoke a more 'grunge' (for lack of a better word) feel. There is some great prose by Stipe, Ray, and many others including Patti Smith. And, there are many famous people depicted including the likes of Allen Ginsberg.

One note about my copy of the book-after just one reading, the binding fell apart and the first quarter of the book fell apart into separate pages from the book. This was very dissappointing and should not have happend under normal reading...

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Talk about such passion . . ., April 8, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Two Times Intro : On the Road With Patti Smith (Hardcover)

As you can see I came to this book as one who appeciates Stipe's gift with words and wanted to see how his photography shaped up. I was not disappointed. Emotive, non-linear, these are words Michael Stipe is used to seeing in his reviews, and this one is no different just because it is visual rather than musical. Who needs focus? Any fool can point an automatic, take a snapshot. What is wonderful about this book is that Stipe's love of his subjects, the reverance and passion shows through. He has a natural eye for the beautiful and for the grotesque and the pictures are almost organic in composition. We are too linear in our thinking. Stipe makes us look in directions we forgot were there. He frames those things we take forgranted and fail to notice in what was, for him, everyday life. I didn't come looking for the clinical, artfully-lit style of Mapplethorpe. I wanted a piece of unadorned reality through someone else's lens, and that's what I got. Stipe and Ray (Smith's guitarist). The poetry's rather beautiful, also.

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Beware!, May 24, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: Two Times Intro : On the Road With Patti Smith (Hardcover)

When I first saw this in a bookstore, I passed on buying it because the photographs are absolutely awful. But I'm a huge Patti Smith fan, and when I read a review saying that it was worth getting just for the text, I took the bait. Bad move. The text isn't bad, but no big deal. And again the photos are just terrible, "arty" in the very worst way-- badly framed, mostly out of focus, uninteresting shots to begin with. Considering the opportunity Stipe was afforded, this is a real shame.