R.E.M. – Green – 1988 I’ve always wondered if REM named this album Green because they made so much of it from their deal with Warner Brothers. At least once during a Listening Post I “liveblog” one album. All that means is I listen to the album and write about Continue Reading

R.E.M. – Document – 1987 By the time Document was released I had already moved to Los Angeles and was nestled in my basement apartment with the same REM loving roommate in West Hollywood. I lived less than 100 yards from Tower Records on Sunset Blvd. The movie billboard that Continue Reading

R.E.M. – Lifes Rich Pageant – 1986 And then R.E.M. rocked.In my senior year at NYU my roommate and I decided to paint all over our dorm room. He, being much more talented than I and smarter, created enormous doodles and motifs. I painted “I believe in coyotes, I believe Continue Reading

REM – Fables of the Reconstruction – 1985 The anticipation for Fables of the Reconstruction of the Fables or whatever the hell the guys were calling it, was palpable. How could it not be? REM was, by this time, OUR band. We heard them on college radio when we were Continue Reading

“There’s a splinter in your eye and it reads ‘react’. R. E. A. C. T.” R.E.M. – Reckoning – 1984 Often dismissed as Murmur part 2 (I have no empirical data for this, I just feel that way through conversations…and the fact that this album seems to never get talked Continue Reading

R.E.M. – Murmur – 1983 If we agree that the birth of rock and roll was 1955 with Rock Around the Clock, and it’s 2011, then the midway point for rock music is 1983. The year Murmur was released.What can be said about Murmur that every rock critic hasn’t already Continue Reading