R.E.M. - The Flowers Of Guatemala Lyrics

Not to ruin a great comment but I bet you there's a lot of musicians who wish they could have written this besides Bono. I can't agree more than most bands strive find a mid-tempo song like this that was done easily by REM

The word "Stipe" means the 'stalk' of the fungi, or in this case, the amanita muscaria. Coincidence?

Reminds me my best friend who’s been gone 10 years. He turned me on to rem and I fell hard for murmur,Life’s rich pageant, chronic town and everything inbetween. Love you oss and miss you brother.

Great song but the rest of the album is where the real magic lies.

pretty good

I love Guatemala because i borned in this Country i like travel all Places with your landscapes very beauty AND I Will travel always during my life

This album was the soundtrack to the second semester of my freshman year in college. I feel fortunate.

👍👍👏👏👏

Back when REM was still good.

Superman existed long before the creation of the cartoon in another aspect in allegory.

waking to this early Sunday morning before heading off to my rock and roll church nondenonimational

The song is NOT about the intrinsic beauty of the Guatemalan country, but its a darker tome about the CIA sponsored genocide, the graves of which are now covered by the flowers.

Flowers called Amanita that bloom at night? Amanita is a mushroom, a extremely deadly toxic mushroom. They're singing about the ground being covered with death, truly a dark tome about genocide.

Sigh! Yet another wondeful REM song. About the US sponsored coup in Guatemala in 1954 installing a dictatorship and ousting the democratically elected government. A song of contrasts - the beauty of the Guatemalan landscape and prettiness of the tune versus the Amanita weed of the US. Flowers covering everything a reference to the graves of all that died in the coup.

So beautiful. Peter Buck's solo was what sealed the deal for me with the band. I heard it by chance one day when I barely knew who REM was. Now decades later, their music changed my life.

lovely psychedelia

This goes out to a girl from Guatemala named Andrea Renate Treidel.

as a rebellious teenager i purchased Pageant and Document on the same day and threw away the receipt so i wouldn't need to take them back.

The flowers cover everything

ANOTHER beautiful early R.E.M. song.

Canzone profonda, bello l'assolo di Peter Buck

This is a song me and my step-dad listened to and it really means a lot to me.

I took a picture that I'll have to send
People here are friendly and content
People here are colorful and bright
The flowers often bloom at night

Amanita is the name
The flowers cover everything
The flowers cover everything

There's something here I find hard to ignore
There's something that I've never seen before
Amanita is the name they cover over everything

The flowers cover everything
They cover over everything (Amanita is the name)
The flowers cover everything

Don't look into the sun
Don't look into the sun

There's something that I've never seen before
The flowers often bloom at night
Amanita is the name they cover over everything

One of my favorites of REM. Sing along with Michael..Epic

Bono still dreams he could have written this song

Beautiful song.

R.E.M. came to London to record this album. It was rainy and dreary. You can hear the claustrophobia in the album. It just makes it better. But it was a right shit to record.

Ok, it wasn't recorded in London. Scrap that. Sorry. No idea where I got that from.

@123ubuntu666 The previous album was recorded in London (Fables of the Reconstruction)

Turn the dirt and we will turn the world

I hope everyone tries to plant flowers and compost -- as much as possible lovelies

thanks! such a beautiful song and one of my favorites from r.e.m.

you can definitely see the influence on Belle and Sebastian with songs like this

sublime

This REM's best album - you can just let yourself go to the cohesive structure between songs - First the honest beauty of 'Flowers...Fall...Cuyahoga...Swan" - these sames songs were filled with deep questioning of place, of self. - Offset this with a classic level rock song in "Begin the Begin" and "Superman" fun - still filled with reflective hope and irony and they give us an album for the ages.
Not only is this REM's best album, "Life's" is one of the best albums ever, period.

I can't get drunk anymore it doesn't work no matter what I do. could drink a litre of vodka in a night stone sober.

so stop and save your money lol

the definitive introverts band

Ma chi sono quei 15 imbecilli che hanno messo pollice verso? Decerebrati.

Peter Buck is one of the most economical guitarists in the history of rock. Not a single wasted note and every one is powerful. Beautiful work.

Lyrics to the song:
I've took a picture that I'll have to send
People here are friendly and content
People here are colorful and bright
The flowers often bloom at night

Amanita is the name
The flowers cover everything
The flowers cover everything

There's something here I find hard to ignore
There's something that I've never seen before
Amanita is the name, they cover over everything

The flowers cover everything
They cover over everything (Amanita is the name)
The flowers cover everything

Look into the sun
Don't look into the sun

The flowers cover everything
They cover over everything
The flowers cover everything

The flowers cover everything
They cover over everything
The flowers cover everything

There's something that I've never seen before
The flowers often bloom at night
Amanita is the name, they cover over everything

This haunting song oozes with regret and grief. The singer pictures Amanita, a flower that grows wild on graves, as a symbol for the terror that fell upon the Guatemala's Mayan Indian people in the late 1970s and early 1980s. A report from 1984 discusses the people responsible justifying "the murder of thousands by a military government that maintains its authority by terror." A lot of the whole affair could have been avoided is the U.S had not supported the Guatemalan government in their attempts to cleanse their nation of the Mayan civilians.

Some of Michael Stipe's best vocal work.

One of their best songs.

You know the funny thing....  I'm one of thee BIGGEST REM fans, but for the longest time (just personally,) Life's Rich Pageant to me was always one of the bands weakest albums.  However, as of late I've been listening to the album over and over lately and damn if many of the songs on this album are really really good.  (Begin the Begin, These Days, Fall on Me and Flowers.)  I'm glad I stepped away for a while and gave this one a second try.  :)

You show great wisdom Tommy. This is an insanely good song and the album is awesome. The change of tempo on this song are beyond my comprehension.

You can't really say your one of R.E.M.'s biggest fans when you haven't listened to Life's Rich Pageant on head phones, in a darkened room, late at night, when all hope seems lost to you, in the same sentence..

Gravitating, I just tried that last night...  Everything except for the hope seeming lost part.

R.E.M. Carried me through some dark times here.. I will be forever grateful to them..

Just let go... listen... this album will carry you like no other.

GREAT song! 📻🎶🙄

fun fact the was a commemoration to the Guatemalan genocide

Qué chilero.

one of the best songs ever made

A masterpiece, of an album

i've had this song in my head all day. i've been singing it walking around town.

no one writes songs like this anymore.. they write what should be flushed down the toilet

Mark Jabbs I hear that. Someone needs to take this big mess we call the new music scene and flush it right down the toilet.

There are plenty of good bands out there, but you have to find them for yourself now.

erock2229

Agreed, there’s so much new music out there that is truly breath taking such as Japanese Breakfast and Ghost

I've took a picture that I'll have to send
People here are friendly and content
People here are colorful and bright
The flowers often bloom at night

Amanita is the name
The flowers cover everything
The flowers cover everything

There's something here I find hard to ignore
There's something that I've never seen before
Amanita is the name, they cover over everything

The flowers cover everything
They cover over everything (Amanita is the name)
The flowers cover everything

Look into the sun
Don't look into the sun

The flowers cover everything
They cover over everything
The flowers cover everything

The flowers cover everything
They cover over everything
The flowers cover everything

There's something that I've never seen before
The flowers often bloom at night
Amanita is the name, they cover over everything

This song is breathtakingly great. I keep coming back to it even after all these years.

Our Beatles <3

love mike mills backing vocal's , perfection .

Michael Bishop Yes. Mr. Mills had skills.

This music is awesome! I love it.

beautiful song

It's just so pink and green.

The (short) lead solo is the best.

two people ate the wrong mushroom...

Mario and luigi?

A masterpiece of a song.

I think of this song sometimes when I drive by the 7 Eleven.

FLOWERS OF GUATEMALA. .IS ONE OF THE MOST BEAUTIFUL SONGS FROM REM...& GUATEMALA A GREAT COUNTRY..

Thank you..Ervin Asturias

Gracias jerson..dios te bendiga. .

There's no apostrophe in the album title-that was intentional

If you are a 50-something like me.. this puts a tear in your eye. If it don't, y'all already dead.

Good call all around.

I'm 44 mate and it still makes me cry

It does not make me cry, but i like it. Its tune is great and lyrics are smooth. I like it,so
my advice to you though. You can like what you are a fan of but don't be a judge mental dick about it okay.

I know you ain't the real Mike Mills, but this is the prettiest song they ever released. Best LP too. It was.magic.

I assure you. I'm quite alive & well.

Effin magnificent. The IRS days were their best. I was a young guy, first new car with my bike in the back, drove out to the Cape Cod Canal and rode the hell out of that bike on the adjacent trails. Mid to late  80's... damn, am I really 52?

I was in college in Florida and the wind blew from Athens. These guys ruled all. So much acid, so little time.

Mike Mills
You were great on bass in this song! Well done!

If it wasn't for Lifes Rich Pageant I, would more than likely have killed myself years ago.. This album kept me sane..

Yes, his record was big for me. I just loved it and it does take me to when I was about 18 or 19, first year of college in California and when everything was REM and I was figuring out who I was where I was going..... All good. 51 now.

No. You're 55.

One of the best REM songs ever...Got hooked on REM later (about 8 years).  LOve the haunting quality to this song.

Guatemala is 1 of the 5 most beautiful countries in the world.  With 4 extreme climates in one country and 2 extreme climates 2 hours away driving from the cold of the highlands to the pacific coast beautiful beaches.  God bless you all!  Beautiful song

god bless you

Years ago I flew into Guat City at sunset, and out the window of the plane it looked like freaking shangri-la-- volcanic mountains surrounding the city and an orange and blue sky fading..

Couldn't agree more. One of the most sublime and gorgeous places I've ever had the luck to discover.

God bless you too and have a good one.

I’ve been to Tikal in Guatemala. I am an atheist. While I know that god does not exist I know that heaven does.

Reagan was a criminal. He just let someone do all the murdering in Latin America for him.

Zachary Page ha, like thousands of murders wouldn't have been committed there anyway.

Zachary Page your a brainwashed idiot

This song came out when Guatemala was into a very bloody civil war. Ronald Reagan was behind it like in Nicaragua and El Salvador with the excuse to erradicate comunism in Central America. The difference is that Guatemala's case was almost secret at the time, and much more violent. If you want more information search in the web about "Guatemalan Genocide", which is widely documented. So yes, I think REM was talking about politics here contrasting the amazing landscapes and beauty of Guatemala's nature, with the brutal military politics that killed 250,000 people, most of them in the decade of the 80s. By 1986 alone, a rate of 100 oppositors were kipnapped and dissapeared per week by the state military forces.

robken0174 The murders here are a direct aftermath of the unresolved civil war and the huge poverty it left.

Zachary Page yeah he just destroyed the Soviet union

flowers londrina paraná brasil

flowers curitiba parana brasil

flowers vitoria conquista bahia brasil

flowers of itajubá brasil.

Man... haven't listened to this one in a long time - brought tears to my eyes.

right on . me too...

cinecyclist kinda reminiscent of I remember California...eh?

I hear ya john smith. I don't listen to any thing past out of time

Best Peter Buck solo. Great song.

One of my favourite REM tunes, shame they lost this simple power.

Dan Hare Sometimes progression forces change to go the opposite

What a beautiful song. R.E.M.'s early stuff was so good.

R.E.M.'s early stuff was SO good. Automatic for the People & New Adventures in Hi-Fi are great albums, but there was something special about R.E.M.'s earlier stuff, such as Reckoning & Lifes Rich Pageant, that was lost in Automatic for the People & New Adventures in Hi-Fi.

Their first 5 albums were pure gold. I've listened to them since I was in the womb, and I cherish these works to this day.

I particularly remember listening to Lifes Rich Pageant on tape way back when.... also, I listened to the album while driving to meet the first girl I fell in love with. A little personal trivia, thanks for reading. 

Roger that.

agree, Life's Rich Pageant is still one of my favorite albums even after all these years.

Wolfdragon92584 what an amazing run. Murmur Reckoning Fables Pageant Document Green. I make that six!

Porque que estes caras não vieram aqui em Itajubá, tomar um cafezinho aqui em casa no Ano Bom.

theres something here i find it hard to ignore ...

Ecstatic joy, smoke a spliff, drink a beer, whatever floats your boat but have this on Full volume and join the cloud party x

Ain't that the truth Angie!!!!!

One of R.E.M.'s most beautiful songs metaforically describing a bloody chapter in Central American history. Few bands can pull this with such a sublime song like "Flowers"

Michael Stipe has long been aware of the violence of U.S. foreign policy in places like Guatemala. Stipe reads analysts like Noam Chomsky, who wrote "Turning the Tide,"
which is about the dirty wars the U.S. sponsored in much of Latin America.
Regarding Guatemala's recent history, I'd recommend the documentary,
"When the Mountains Tremble," then listen to this song.
It will be a different way of experiencing R.E.M.'s music.

I'm from guatemala! :D They country of the eternal spring!!

I want to go............(away)............

beautiful.

@toeragtoolbox Yes, especially this thing: we pore over every song Michael Stipe sings!

A real gem, showcases everything good about R.E.M; thanks for posting!!!