Michael Stipe Performs ‘No Time for Love Like Now’ From Quarantine

Michael Stipe shared a tender, at-home performance of his new song, “No Time for Love Like Now,” on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert Tuesday.

The video finds Stipe in a room in his house lit up with a seafoam green glow, matching the hue of the singer’s sweater. Playing the song’s instrumentals off a small speaker, Stipe looks down into the camera as he sings along with a potent, bottled-up woe, “Where did this all begin to change?/The lockdown memories can’t sustain/This glistening, hanging free fall.”

Those with keen eyes will note that the clip Stipe shared on The Late Show was very similar to the original video he posted at the end of March when he debuted “No Time for Love Like Now” (it was recorded in the same room, with similar lighting, although the musician’s outfit didn’t blend so much with the background).

A collaboration with the National’s Aaron Dessner, “No Time for Love Like Now” is still technically a demo and has yet to receive an official release. In recent months, Stipe has shared two new songs, “Your Capricious Soul” and “Drive to the Ocean.” Last month, he transformed R.E.M.’s apocalypse classic, “It’s the End of the World As We Know It” into a safety video about the coronavirus with lyrics about staying home and hand-washing.