REM contest
Popular Music in the early 80s as I knew it had a few streams..there was the polished lame pop rock of Journey, REO Speedwagon, Styx and the holdovers from the 70s. Overall, this music was macho and male oriented.
There was what was called New Wave which was electronic keyboard driven and usually either empty headed bubblegum sounding singing and lyrics ala The Go-Go’s or mock-alien from mars sounding affected singing by the likes of Thomas Dolby, Depeche Mode, OMD etc.. It was all “radio friendly” with huge drum sounds and big choruses you could sing along with. Overal, this music by contrast, was often female oriented and the male singers wore make-up and acted feminine.
But, I also listened to some 60s music from The Beatles, The Byrds, Fairport Convention, Incredible String Band, Beach Boys, Zombies, Simon and Garfunkle, the Nuggets compilation among other things. Some of this music was “quiet”, strange, mysterious sounding, weird lyrics and odd song structures but still could be called ‘pop’. R.E.M. drew from 60s bands for inspiration. The Troggs being one band they famously covered quite often. Their sound was often more 60s garage band (during live shows), and 60s psychedelic band/60’s pop band in the studio. Chronic Town and Murmur in particular are very headphone friendly albums full of buried odd sounds and experimental song structures – this is all very 60’s, but by way of more New York than San Francisco. Peter Buck has mentioned many 60s bands that he loves over the years.
They also had a southern twang to heir sound thanks to Michaels singing and to songs like Rockville, even though none of them is truly from the South.
So, take all this in account, coupled with the understated sound of Bill Berry’s drums and Peter’s guitar (on the early mixes at least), it was almost a political statement they were making. They were making music they enjoyed and it was wholly American but not from this decade…they were like an undiscovered 60s garage band that had great records no one ever heard until 1982 or so.
The sound of their songs on the radio must’ve been very intriguing indeed to music listeners at the time. Nothing sounded like them except old music that never really existed but sounded familiar all the same. The songs had great emotional weight as well, although the topics were often incomprehensible. It didn’t matter though. On repeated listens, the music took on great emotional power for many many early fans.
Early indie and rootsy music of the time must have rejoiced when they started to achieve some success! Finally, personal, real, idiosyncratic folk rock sounding music was popular again, to some degree, when it had’nt been since before most of REM’s fans were born. It was a brief but shining period when it seemed dreamy jangly 60s pop was back and the slick massive cold drums and keyboards of New Wave and AOR rock wanna be’s sounded as by-the-numbers as it often was.
I’m sorry this was soooo long!!! I just love me some REM!!
Peace.