'They taught me how to dress': Michael Stipe on
Limbo District, the greatest band you've never
heard of
================================================

"I thought I'd landed in a hippy cowtown," says
Michael Stipe, of his first months as an art
student in Athens, Georgia. "I was an urban punk
rocker, and Athens seemed beige and granola; it
took me a while to find my 'people'." But, in
1979, at the only coffee joint still open after
Stipe's nightshift at the local steakhouse, he
saw "this unbelievable, almost-cartoonish trio
who looked like they'd stepped out of the Weimar
Republic", he says. "I waved at them. They waved
back."

That trio - Jeremy Ayers, Davey Stevenson and
Dominique Amet - later became Limbo District,
the most radical group of an Athens underground
scene that gave the world the B-52s, Pylon and,
of course, REM. But while those bands went on to
enjoy global recognition, Limbo District are
forgotten. They existed for only two years,
imploding messily before releasing any music.
For decades, the only evidence they ever existed
was several minutes' footage in 1987 documentary
Athens, GA: Inside/Out.

"They were one of the greatest bands on Earth,"
says Stipe. Now a new album of rediscovered live
recordings illuminates a group whose fusion of
art, furious rhythms and punk sensibility proved
an indelible inspiration to Athens' future
stars.

Limbo District were led by Athens-native Ayers,
the son of a professor of religion and
philosophy at the University of Georgia. "Jeremy
Ayers inspired almost every musician in Athens,"
adds Keith Strickland of the B-52s. "His
early-70s parties were like art happenings -
walls covered with black plastic; floors thick
with popcorn; Beefheart and Velvets records
playing. He opened doors to creative
possibilities. Plus, Jeremy and his boyfriend
Chris [Coker] were gay - so were Ricky [Wilson,
future B-52s guitarist] and I, but we weren't
out yet. It was inspiring to see Jeremy walk
around Athens in tight velvet pants and a little
fur coat."

Ayers loved recording himself reciting poetry
and playing percussion while Chris improvised on
recorder. Strickland says: "It was a cacophony,
and it was the introduction to writing and
recording for Ricky and me. We continued that
method of songwriting."

In 1972 Ayers escaped to New York, joining Andy
Warhol's Factory studio, writing for Interview
magazine as Sylva Thinn and befriending
superstars such as actors Holly Woodlawn and
Jackie Curtis. "Andy loved Jeremy," says Stipe,
"and Andy was hard to impress." But within two
years, Ayers returned.

"There was a cynicism to that scene, a hard
edge," says Strickland. "Jeremy wanted a
different life."

Athens was certainly different: it had no clubs,
no "real" music scene. Bands in Athens played
house parties to entertain their friends;
careerism wasn't a prospect - although REM
would, of course, go on to global stardom.
Even here, Ayers' influence was key.

"Jeremy was a great friend and mentor," Stipe
says. "The person that I became, the public
persona of Michael Stipe, I owe to him. He
taught me how to dance, how to laugh at myself,
how to dress. At the time I thought he was the
first love of my life - although it turns out I
was just infatuated with him," Stipe laughs.

Ayers formed Limbo District in 1981, playing
percussion. His boyfriend, Stevenson - "a big,
buff, beautiful redhead who loved to discuss
Schopenhauer", says guitarist Kelly Crow, who
went on to become a band member - played bass.
Amet, who played organ, was from an upper-class
French family and knew nothing of rock'n'roll.

"At their first rehearsals Jeremy asked her to
sing Johnny B Goode, and she sang like it was
opera," says Crow. "Jeremy loved that: he'd been
hoping for someone who didn't come from a
[typical] western music background."

Amet was "Amy Winehouse levels of exotic", adds
Stipe. "She'd strike matches and use the ash as
eyeliner, applied with a nine-penny nail."

Singer Craig Woodall was "a small, quiet guy
from a place where you couldn't be outwardly
queer and not expect something to happen to
you", remembers Crow.

"Craig had a very hard life," adds guitarist
Margarita Bilbão, an émigré from Basque Spain
they discovered after hearing her rant against
Athens on student radio. She'd never played
guitar before, but the band loved her attitude,
and that was more important. "I hadn't had any
friends in Athens," Bilbão remembers.
"Those guys became my saviours."

Even among the post-punk mavericks of early-80s
Athens, Limbo District's wild, perverse cabaret
was "radical", says Stipe. "They were
intentionally abrasive, like Einstürzende
Neubauten or Psychic TV, but they had melody,
humour. They rewrote where punk could go next,
drawing on vaudeville and Edith Sitwell. They
unsettled people, in a playful way." Strickland
remembers the band as "a mesmerising tapestry of
pure imagination, with a sexy, surreal, Fellini-
esque quality".

Athens loved Limbo District, but touring
revealed them to be an acquired taste. "We'd
clear the room," says Crow. They recorded
material with future REM producer Mitch Easter,
but no one would release it. Bilbão grew anxious
over her limited skills and fled to New Orleans,
heartbroken. She was replaced by Tim Lacy, who
was replaced, in 1983, by Crow. Around this
time, Jim Herbert, a professor at the
university, made Carnival, in collaboration with
photographer Marlys Lens Cox. The remarkably
surreal, dreamlike short film imagines Limbo
District as "a 1920s existential travelling
circus" pausing for respite by a lake and
engaging in some nude wrestling. Stipe attempted
to get MTV to screen Carnival. "But there's
butts and dicks and breasts in that thing," Crow
says. "They were never gonna play that."

The band was on borrowed time anyway. Woodall
fell into heroin addiction and spent subsequent
years homeless, struggling with alcoholism and
mental health issues. Stevenson's brother
Gordon, of New York "no wave" band Teenage Jesus
and the Jerks, was an early Aids casualty; his
death in 1982 broke Davey's heart. He and Ayers
broke up in 1983, ending the band, and Stevenson
moved to France, to study philosophy at the
Sorbonne. Amet, who had been arrested for
shoplifting groceries and was facing
deportation, went with him.

"Dominique had been in love with Davey since day
one," says Bilbão.

"Davey was everything to her," nods Crow. "They
lived together in an apartment where you could
see the Eiffel Tower from the balcony."
Stevenson died of Aids in the early 90s. Amet
subsequently married, had a son, and died 20 or
so years ago. "None of us know any more than
that," sighs Crow. "She'd always told me she
wanted a kid. She didn't make it out of her
40s."

Ayers, meanwhile, moved into painting and
photography. "His paintings were quite beautiful
- figurative and symbolic," says Strickland. "He
did a beautiful painting of Ricky, from memory,
after Ricky's death. Jeremy was always so open.
You felt like you were seen when you spoke to
him; you were being listened to and heard."

Before she fled Athens, Bilbão would visit
Ayers: "If I felt mad and everything seemed
wrong. I'd have a cup of tea in his garden and
talk and we'd be happy. It was like an oasis of
peace, his big garden of bamboo." It was here
that Ayers died of a seizure, on 24 October
2016. He was 68.

"It was so tragic, but poetic," says Herbert.
"He died in that garden that he loved so much."

In the years following Limbo District's split,
the B-52s and REM enjoyed multi-platinum success
and critical acclaim. But the avant garde
experimentalists who'd proved such a key
inspiration to both groups were "lost in time as
an entity", says Stipe. It took Henry Owings,
unofficial historian of the Athens music scene,
to rediscover their legacy, releasing three EPs
of unheard studio material and live album Live
Limbo on his Chunklet Industries label (with
more to follow); he is now organising screenings
of Carnival across the world.

For years, Crow had been Limbo District's
archivist. "I carried all the studio recordings,
live tapes, flyers and posters from home to
home, for decades," he says. "We'd always wanted
to release our music, but could never afford to.
I was about to give up on it. Then Henry reached
out. Henry cared. Our music's on streaming now.
I can drive my car and listen to Limbo District
on the stereo."

Stipe is "just happy there's renewed interest in
Limbo District, that a shred of their influence
still exists". For Bilbão, it's the memories of
the people who made Limbo District that matter
most. "The music was just an accessory - the
important thing was the people," she says. "I
think about Dominique, Davey and Jeremy all
the time. They were incredible. I've always kept
them in my heart."

Live Limbo is available now via Chunklet
Industries. Carnival will be screened in the UK
later this month.



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