Dear Friends,
We got home late last night. I am interviewing Steve from Redd Kross at 8am today. Other than that, and visiting Granny, I don’t have an agenda or a brain. I’m sure I may perk up later, but for now, I am reminded of why the 16ish hour trip from Doug’s front door to our Phoenix front door is painful in so many ways.
*****
In my brain there are two places.
In my brain there are two places.
The one on the left is calm.
The one on the right is calm.
The one on the left is calm.
The one on the right is calm.
In my brain there are two places.
In my brain there are two places.
If the one on the left is calm
The one on the rrrrr-right is calm.
Plain speak.
Plain speak.
Plain speak.
Plain speak.
*****
Violets are purple
I know this with my own eyes
Pretty flowers seen.
*****
Rumble would be a good name for a girl.
She wouldn’t take any shit.
Might even make a good President.
I’d vote for her.
*****
In high school, I was always fond of R.E.M. Many of my friends were really into them and they were, in a way, kind of like U2. They had great music that I really loved, but you could feel the tremendous pull of the mainstream nipping at the band’s heels all along. To put it simply, you knew they were going to become huge and abandon their coolness.
I didn’t own any R.E.M. until 1987 when I bought Document on cassette while I was in the Army. When Eponymous came out a year later, though, I was stoked because it had a bunch of my favorite songs of theirs in one place. I have never been opposed to greatest hits records. They are just good compilations.
As I look back, I think Eponymous came at a time in my life where I needed something other than punk and post-punk to listen to here and there. I found that I would go to Eponymous a lot, actually, to deal with some of the feelings of loneliness I felt at that time. R.E.M. was kind of great at doing that, I think.
Even listening to it now brings me right back to how I would feel back in the day when I would put Eponymous on the turntable. It was so different from a lot of what I was listening to at the time. Songs like “Talk About The Passion” and “Don’t Go Back to Rockville” transport me to laying on my waterbed thinking about different girls and wondering why I couldn’t find the right one.
Now, having been married for almost 18 years, that feeling is so foreign to me, but when I see my own kids kind of going through similar things, it’s nice to know they will have their own music to help them through the days and nights. Most people I was hanging with back then probably had no idea how lonely I got, living on my own, when the night would be over, and someone would drop me off at 7th and Earll so I could go to bed.
A lot of nights, I would throw this record on and listen to Michael Stipe sing in French.
There are some damn fine and supremely rockin’ moments, too. “Radio Free Europe” and “Can’t Get There From Here” are both songs that kick all kinds of ass. I think “Radio Free Europe” was the first R.E.M. song that I really latched onto in high school. I would get super excited when MTV occasionally played it. Luckily one of my buddies, probably Jerry, had the record and taped it for me.
Probably from 1984 on, I always had some R.E.M. on cassette, but I just never bought any. Could have been my fear of having my punk card revoked or maybe I was scared that I would fall under the spell of the jangle and leave all that distortion behind. Either way, you live and learn and grow. R.E.M. was part of that growth for me.
“Can’t Get There From Here” really is such a great song. There is an element of The Smiths to it, too, that I like. Mike Mills plays a pretty sick little bass line throughout the song. I also kind of like the way Stipe sang it, too. That deeper register in his voice on this one is just perfect.
“Driver 8” is another one that I really liked ever since hearing it. Fables of the Reconstruction is a really good record in its own right, too. Peter Buck’s guitar line is fantastic, as usual.
“Romance” is an interesting track as it hadn’t appeared anywhere else before this one came out except for on a movie soundtrack, I think. I wasn’t familiar with it then and apparently people aren’t too fond of it. It is the least listened to track from Eponymous on Spotify. People are just dumb sometimes.
The version of “Finest Worksong” that’s on Eponymous is pretty great, too. It is kind of a stripped down mix, but it works. It’s probably the most interesting of the last three songs (which include “The One I Love” and “It’s the End of the World As We Know It”). The other two have been way overplayed, in my book.
Back in 1989, though, I hadn’t grown sick of “The One I Love” yet. That would come later. It was “It’s the End of the World As We Know It” that really led me to believe that R.E.M. was going the way of U2 (just listen to the end of this version of “Finest Worksong” and would not be cool anymore. Outside of a few good moments here and there, I think I can safely assume that I was right.
Eponymous is still in my record collection, though.
*****
See you tomorrow.
I'm thinking AI would vote for Rumble, too.
Comments