R.E.M.’s hometown of Athens, Ga., still welcomes fans 45 years after the band started there

R.E.M. is turning 45 years old this Saturday, which is a perfect time to take a trip to its hometown.

Let’s just say, you can get there from here. All it takes is the right frame of mind.

You don’t take a trip to Athens. You make a pilgrimage.

Now, get in your car and point it towards Athens, Georgia. You’re ready for some driving music like “Driver 8.” The world outside blurs past you. The walls are built up, stone by stone. Fields dividing one by one. Take a break when you need to.

Before you know it, you have reached your destination. It’s a plain, little parking lot, with a free-standing church steeple.

“We are standing here at the site of Saint Mary’s Episcopal church,” says Paul Butchart, who gives tours to people from all over the world, who come here for one reason. ” It was here in 1980, that R.E.M. played their first show.” It was a birthday party of a friend of his.

The church building is long gone, torn down to make way for condos, but the brick and stone steeple remains, a monument to where it all started.

But if you really want to go back to the beginning, to “begin the begin” you’re gonna go to Wuxtry Records in downtown Athens. Not the main store, but the boxcar sized building on the side.

This is the exact space where Wuxtry employee Peter Buck met a customer named Michael Stipe, who kept coming back to buy cool records. They struck up a friendship and, in true Athens fashion, formed a band. And in 1987 had their first big hit with “The one I love.”

Nick Bonell works here today and, of course, plays in his own band, The Asymptomatics. He says even though it’s been 14 years since R.E.M. disbanded, the fans keep turning up.

“All kinds of people come to this store asking questions about the history.”

Less than a mile is away is the famous Weaver D’s restaurant. There is only one room, and as you walk in, Dexter Weaver calls out to you, “What can I get you, Doll, Baby?”

Squash casserole is on the menu along with a host of other Southern specialties.

Outside the little green brick building hangs the sign with the restaurant’s slogan: Automatic For The People. R.E.M. liked it so much, they named an album after it.

Weaver, a tall, jolly man of 70 tells the story as, “we were nominated for album of the year,” like he was on the album. “I was! They got the title from me,” he laughs. “So, it’s we.”

R.E.M. even took Weaver up to New York for the Grammys. When he came back home, sacks of fan mail started rolling in. Those who couldn’t travel here to eat, ordered T-shirts.

Half a mile down the way from Weaver’s restaurant maybe the most iconic REM landmark of them all: The Murmur Trestle, an old wooden railroad bridge immortalized in a black and white, pure Southern Gothic photo on the back cover of their 1983 album.

Today’s bridge is a reconstruction, but it looks a lot like the old one. It spans a little creek, in a lush, green ravine. Bring your album cover and take a photo with it. The words ring in your ears. “This is where we walked. This is where we swam. Take a picture here. Take a souvenir.” 

Happy birthday, R.E.M.