STRANGE CURRENCIES
Will you live to 83? Will you ever welcome me? (An old tribute to R.E.M.)
This is something I wrote about R.E.M. in January 2021, back on a different blog that had, I think, four readers. I am reposting it now because it’s the last thing I’m gonna write about music for a while. I just don’t think writing about music makes a whole lot of sense anymore. Going forward, I think I’d rather just listen (and I mean that in a few different ways). I’m also reposting it now because there are more people reading this blog of mine (and thank you for taking the time to do so, I know very well you could be doing anything else) and, even though R.E.M. sold millions of records (CDs actually…they were as much a 90s band as an 80s one), I still think they are criminally overlooked in the pantheon of great American rock bands. I hope you like this post but if not, that’s cool. I’d rather you like R.E.M.
In current personal news, a whopping three majorly positive developments in my life have happened in the last two weeks. I can’t talk about two of them yet, but my novel is going to be published and I could not be more excited. (I also need to chill on the blogging because I have to do one last edit before I hand the manuscript in, and I need to do it on ink and paper, where I catch errors of syntax and grammar and punctuation much more easily than on glowing pixels. I am very excited about the shocking sudden turnaround my life has taken since April and I am everlastingly grateful for it.
Okay. I’ll get out of the way now. Here’s my ode to R.E.M.
I’m sure I have more thoughts on R.E.M. but I’m no longer sure that music writing needs to exist. Reading about music seems like a very neutral way to experience something as so moving and powerful as music. I will always love R.E.M. But with love comes strange currencies. With a discography as generous and strange and wonderful as R.E.M.’s, one can have a different favourite R.E.M. song for each day of the year. So I think I’m gonna “retire” from music writing for a bit (hah! that word “retire” implies I did it as a job and did it with some level of acuity….hahaha…)
Okay I think that’s it. Let’s sing it together in Michael Stipe’s gravelly tremble:
These words? They will be mine. All the time.
#R.E.M. #reckoning #murmur #reveal #up #new adventures in hi-fi #monster #automatic for the people #out of time #itsamemorykindofsky