I'm desperately tryin to get back to Jackson. Took me three hours to get from New Orleans to McComb, Mississippi...birthplace of Bo Diddley and Brittany Spears.
Road WORK!
I'm ready for the last 60 miles...I gotta cokecola, a bag a cold boiled peanuts, and two moon pies for the road. Just try and stop me.
Before I head out for the last leg...here's a quick runndown of the week. A list of events, one from each day, that were more interesting than the dissolution of REM.
Monday...it rained during my drive to Oxford.
Tuesday...I almost died when I inadvertently ate an under cooked piece of gator meat.
Wed...we had some work done on our roof. In the process a horde of misquotes descended on our yard like panties on the stage at a Tom Jones Concert.
Thurs...I heard OOPS I Did It Again on my way to Louisiana.
Fri...I got burned for ten bucks on a book at Crecent City in New Orleans...and then I ate two Moon Pies on the way home.
That's it...as far as I know.
Where did REM go wrong with you?
ReplyDeleteTo some extent it wasn't their fault...kids our age started making records. It was inevitable but, they haven't held up nearly as well some of their peers.
ReplyDeleteHusker Du, The Minutemen, Sonic Youth...Pixies are all still on heavy rotation. Not so with them. Green was the last album I bought but, Fables is probably the only one I can still listen to.
Their trajectory of suck mirrors perfectly that of Micheal Stipe's emergence as the voice of the group...what a maroooon.
About the time of Losin' My Religion or whatever...I think Stipe said he was growing tired of the Southern thing. A thing that had served them well in the beginning...but, that was fine, because I was getting tired of them. Besides half of 'em weren't really Southerners anyway.
I don't know....most of it sounds just this side of Tom Petty.
ReplyDeleteThey weren't even th
Freaking pad.....
ReplyDeleteThey weren't even the best band or, as it turns out, the most relevant band from Athens...that has to be the B-52's.
BBQ killers were the real hidden gem...and very much ahead of the curve.
Now, much as I loathe and have always loathed REM, and particularly that whining git Stipe, and much as I love the B-52s, surely the finest band to emerge from Athens has to be the wonderful, ludicrous beast that is Harvey Milk...
ReplyDeleteEspecially as one April Fool's Day gig at the 40 Watt in Athens, they performed R.E.M.'s Reckoning from beginning to end while Michael Stipe was in attendance. I would so love to have been there.
ReplyDeleteHa. I'd forgotten about him...in fact I'd forgotten 1990's had even happened yet.
ReplyDeleteToo busy trying to get Killkenny Kats, Guadal Canal Diary and Love Tractor songs out of my head.
Shudder.
Two things that I will always love REM for...one, So Much Younger Then - outstanding bootleg of their first batch of songs that, as far as I know, have never been officially released. Fun stuff...they could have been what one record company wanted to turn them into...a male version of the Go Gos. We'd have been a lot better off.
Two, Roam and Love SHack might not be the greatest songs ever but they helped the B-52's get what they always deserved...PAID!!! and without REM and the attention they brought to Athens it probably would never have happened.
MESOPATAMIA!
ReplyDelete