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I was a really big R.E.M. fan when I was like, in my freshman year of high school. I was a huge R.E.M. fan.

I loved my 17 years with R.E.M., but I'm ready to reflect, assess and move on to a different phase of my life. The four of us will continue our close friendship, and I look forward to hearing their future efforts as the world's biggest R.E.M. fan.

People relate to things that feel real to them. All the good, happy, over-sexed and moneyed endings on TV are not the way most of us feel in our lives. The success of 'E.R.,' I think, is not relying on overly sentimental stories that are solved where people's lives wrap up nicely with happy endings.

I realised that the only time I really enjoyed music was when I was in the studio writing. So even though it was a six album deal, they saw quite early on that I wasn't enjoying it as I should be. I didn't feel there was anything behind it.

The REM and Nirvana successes don't mean much to me except as a potential distraction for bands who want to cash in on the trend. Don't try to sound like someone else. REM and Nirvana don't sound like anyone else.

It's like they had a backlash the first 11 years. I think the reason why it always seems like there's a backlash is because when bands are unknown, they only get written about by fans.

I'm obsessive about the kind of melodrama of getting through the days and trying to make them good and funny and a happy experience. But my feeling towards the fans is that they delivered me from darkness.

The fans have to realize that as opinionated as y'all are in the way you want it, the company is the same way, and they're gonna do what they wanna do... at the end of the day, I'm just a guy getting rich.

I'm certainly aware of the fans. I'm always hoping that what I'm doing is something they'll like, because I do appreciate them. But, no, when I get into the studio, it's all about what I like. It's the same thing that led me to the possibility of making that first Boston album, which was to divorce myself from all other influences.

Even from the very beginning, the type of fans the Ramones generated were the kind of people who wound up running industry, who became professors and scientists. Our staunchest fans were always a little bit more on the outside, the type of people who didn't fit in with society.