REM: Classic or dud?

R.E.M. certainly were like the American kings of having all sorts of crazy rumors flying around!

Mozz and Stipe used to be pen pals, I believe.

Stipe also befriended Morrissey in the early nineties; he had a Mother Hen instinct for stars-in-need.

Was Morrissey really a star-in-need at that point though? Iirc that was when he was doing really well (relatively) with his solo singles

Kill Uncle?

mozzz could always use a hug.

Okay fair point, but to be fair most of his 1990-1992 singles charted higher in the U.S. than any of the late 80s stuff did.

i saw 10ooomaniaks open for them in arena. that sucked. but saw feelies open up for them and arena rock feelies was heavennnnnz.

Time For a Witness is a great record.

10ooomaniaks

Is this another one of those goddamn ghostwave bands?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-wESkX_ehgA

Busted out Monster from storage and am listening for the first time in yoinks...forgot Thurston Moore did backing vox on "Crush W/Eyeliner".

Michael Stipe played with a punk/new wave band called Bad Habits who were from St Louis, before moving to Georgia

The Minutemen were already on the REM tour and had completed it when D Boon died.

Bands I saw open for R.E.M. in early days - dbs (twice), Three O'Clock and True West, Guadalcanal Diary.

guadalcanal diary were pretty good iirc.

Circling back to the Wyman/Nevermind thing, as somebody who followed R.E.M. from pretty much the beginning, their success to me seemed gradual and linear (and totally unrelated to Nirvana). By the time Reckoning came out, they were already getting a little play on the mainstream rock station in my city -- I remember hearing "So. Central Rain" -- and then "Can't Get There From Here" and "Driver 8" both got some spins too, and "Fall On Me" was in regular rotation. (That was when some of my non-college-radio-listening friends started really noticing them.) So the success of "The One I Love" and "End of the World" seemed to follow logically. By Document they were playing 5,000-seat halls at least, maybe bigger. And Green was bigger again, and then OOT. It was a long, steady build.

ack, I just remembered that the closing show of the Green tour was at the Fox, not at the Omni. Still, they played the Omni on the Green tour, since it's one of the Tourfilm sites I think.

I wrote at the time (and still think) that they had Nirvana in mind when they wrote "Drive." It's kind of an oblique reaction, but I think it's there. (Love Guadalcanal's "Gilbert Takes the Wheel.")

it's well-documented that they had cobain in mind when they wrote let me in, from monster.

And then obv there was Kurt's lost night at Stipe's place.

btw while I've been repping for 90s REM, I'd love them to do an archive series, & at the top of that list would be the show from April 10, 1981, on the boot Georgia Peaches: Ripe!. They rip that night: "Baby I"! "Liza Sez"! "Narrator"! They dropped all these songs before Murmur but the songs smoke. btw this show is "out there" for the looking & it's well worth your time.

The 1991 Unplugged would be great too---another classic set with the definitive "Disturbance At The Heron House".

Yeah, the Cleveland stop on the Green tour when I saw them was the Richfield Coliseum, also the then-home of the Cleveland Cavaliers basketball team. It was the big leagues.

Green was a platinum album.

With their second top ten hit ("Stand").

Re Unplugged... I've got a bootleg cassette at my mum's house of the 1991 Unplugged. Ah, those halcyon days of buying dodgy bootlegs at provincial Record Fairs. Hideous pre-Photoshop cover art. Also got one called "It's REM Jim, but not as you know them" that kicks off with their cover of Where's Captain Kirk then studio versions of Television's See No Evil and Mission of Burma's Academy Fight Song. Finding MOB records in mid-90s central Scotland was no easy task (well, I probably could have in one of the better Glasgow shops, but those were beyond my ken then), so I really appreciate how REM covered interesting bands and planted seeds. This bootleg also has their Christmas fan club releases, including the version of Good King Wenceslas where Buck plays a tasty vacuum cleaner solo.

That It's REM Jim tape also had their version of Spooky (Mike Mills vox) and a version of Dallas with Billy Bragg. Not sure it's the same as this... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ek9IO-0a4Jk

btw while I've been repping for 90s REM, I'd love them to do an archive series, & at the top of that list would be the show from April 10, 1981, on the boot Georgia Peaches: Ripe!. They rip that night: "Baby I"! "Liza Sez"! "Narrator"! They dropped all these songs before Murmur but the songs smoke. btw this show is "out there" for the looking & it's well worth your time.

i likely said this before, but i really wish r.e.m. would bless and release these early, widely-circulated bootlegs. i had a bunch on cassette, then lost them.

And then obv there was Kurt's lost night at Stipe's place.

― something of an astrological coup (tipsy mothra), Friday, 23 September 2011 00:47 (1 hour ago)

??

There was some interview with Courtney where she said Kurt was interested in exploring his sexuality or something. Then she said one night she dropped him off at Stipe's place and said, "Have fun!" Who knows.

I don't know who I trust more than Courtney Love, so I assume it happened.

in a corner garden -- wilder, lower wolves. house in order

also strange currencies > everybody hurts

can everybody stop and recognize the extreme truth of this please

I can't believe R.E.M is like my 25 year old notebook diaries...something I never want to delve into again, not even peak at. But, I can't toss them completely, but I don't know, nor do I care, to go searching around boxes for them and if they are gone for good, then they are gone for good. I really didn't think I would ever feel this way about the group back in the 80's.

not even peek at? they're one of the best rock and roll bands of all time. i'd hate to go a few days without hearing "shaking through" or "i believe"

songs i've heard on the radio since the breakup announcement: Superman, Radio Free Europe, Orange Crush, Shiny Happy People, Everybody Hurts

Superman was played after a song i missed that the DJ apparently got an irate e-mail from a listener about regarding people who "don't know the band existed before 1995" (so probably something from Monster?) so Superman was played as an 'oldies pick' to appease that guy. Shiny Happy and Everybody Hurts were played back-to-back by another DJ who characterized them as the two opposite extremes of the REM sound, which was also pretty funny.

lots of posing up top this thread

how so, it was 2001 not 1991...

all this 'never into rem' talk. 'unimpressed,' 'comfort zone music.' 'rem sucks eggs' is hard to relate to. like someone trying too hard

boy i sure do hate that college rock

oh, that was this minor phenomenon called "indie guilt", I believe we may have addressed that on a thread before...?

could be

I suppose it's been long enough that any/many of the posters on this thread were born when the band was already huge, so I suppose that would affect perspective. I mean, someone born when the band was already playing arenas is graduating from college now. Someone born when "Losing My Religion" was everywhere is only now old enough to drink. They never had the chance to "discover" R.E.M. or be possessive about R.E.M. or whatever. R.E.M. belonged to everyone - and was over-exposed, and starting to go downhill - their entire lives.

When I was listening to Monster earlier, I realized it could be defined as "Mid-Period" REM.

They were starting to go downhill their entire lives. That's nice.

Wild card question!

"like someone trying too hard" = ILX in 2001

E-Bow The Letter wrote the rulebook for releasing the 'experimental' first single, a la 'Pyramid Song', because the band assumes they just can.

I don't really believe this is the case - I think they were genuinely surprised to hear it referred to as uncommercial. If you listen to it immediately after Strange Currencies the similarities are obvious, they were probably just thinking along those lines.

all this 'never into rem' talk. 'unimpressed,' 'comfort zone music.' 'rem sucks eggs' is hard to relate to. like someone trying too hard

Radical theory but maybe they just didn't like them that much? I'd hate for my opinions on Morrisey or Bowie or other huge respected artists I dislike to be dismissed in those terms.

But there was definitely a thing during the first phase of C or D when people (most of whom don't post anymore) lined up to say dud about every major artist without much of an argument. There was a lot more generic poptimist canon-bashing.

It all changed when Taking Sides: Holly Valance Vs The Ramones