The drummer, Bill Berry, had an aneurysm(?) that required surgery, and soon after he decided he was ready to get off the road. The rest continued with hired-gun drummers, but their post-Berry albums never hit, and the band themselves said that their fundamental chemistry wasn’t the same. They chose to break up.
Their EP, Chronic Town and then Murmur and Reckoning are wonderful, timeless albums. When Stipe chose to write intelligible lyrics in bid for commercial appeal, they lost me. Not because of the attempt at commercial appeal - hey, more power to them - but simply because the stuff got whiny. I disagree with Penfeather about the band’s basic talent, but agree that Everybody Hurts is an automatic radio-changer. Losing my Religion and especially This One Goes Out to the One I love - just ugh.
But Moral Kiosk, Harborcoat, Pilgrimage, Wolves Lower and all of those songs? Great, great stuff!
I suspect the posters who are dismissing them mostly know them only from their later work. Their best work, in my opinion, was before they hit the mainstream.
My story is similar, except I am from small-town Georgia. Like you, I have a “flashbulb memory” of the first time I heard R.E.M., except in my case it was in a college dorm in North Carolina, and somebody broke out the Chronic Town EP. It was a revelation. Completely different from anything else that was out there at the time. Hell I was so impressed by this band and by what I subsequently heard about what was happening musically in Athens at the time that I chose UGA for grad school just to be near the scene.
I wonder if the blasé attitude of some posters is just because R.E.M. has had so many imitators over the years that their work doesn’t seem as unique and fresh as it did to those of us who heard it for the first time way back then.
The second to last season of Parks and Rec had a scene where Aziz Ansari and Ben (can’t remember the actor’s name) co-deejayed a high school prom. Aziz’s Usher and R. Kelly weren’t going over too well, but Ben’s REM and Pixies were a hit. The kids called it “classic rock”. So maybe they’re already heading that way. I sure have fond memories of growing up listening to REM. Michael Stipe went to high school with my mom, so even though he’s mostly from Georgia, we kinda think of him as a hometown hero of sorts here in Illinois.
Their big hits that got mainstream airplay were…kinda bland?
…But everything up through *Document *was pretty interesting. It’s easy to say, and overused, that “I liked them before they were popular. Once they got popular they sucked,” but I think that really fits here. Maybe some historian music critic will find Reckoning one day and be blown away.
I know you’re intentionally simplifying, but I just can’t let that stand. The 80’s was an embarrassment of riches for alternative music. It was the peak of college radio, and plenty of stuff was not synth-based. And *none *of colege music was hair metal.
Hijack…
If you aren’t familiar with Isbell, I recommend checking him out. Several of the songs he wrote while with the Truckers are among the band’s best work. He’s also been getting recognition for his solo work and with his band The 400 Unit, as well as with his wife Amanda Shires. Yes, I’m a bit biased since I’m from Alabama. …end hijack.
I just had to respond since I was that age in '83 and had 70 people in my class too. But I’m a Yankee. I don’t remember exactly where I was but I do remember **Radio Free Europe **and liking the sound.
…end hijack.