Athen's Finest
REM have been one of my favourite bands since I was about 16 (many years ago) so I was quite sad to hear that they’d called it a day. However they have created a body of work most bands would kill for. The music critics have been desperate to write them off for a while, probably since Bill Berry left, but they’ve still (mostly) come up with great music. Even a fan like me would admit their last couple of albums have felt that perhaps they were losing their fire a little bit.
Although initially Berry’s departure seemed to invigorate them, their first album afterwards ,”Up”, is one of my favourites and seemed to give them a new sound from their previous records before that. Perhaps “Up” wasn’t successful enough and so the albums that followed returned to type – still pretty good but it’s almost like they decided to sound atypical REM. They never really made a bad album, (although “Around the Sun” comes close!) and were one of the most consistent bands I knew. Favourites? Pretty hard but I’ll always have a soft spot for “Green” which was the first album I heard and the one that got me into them.
So adieu R.E.M. and thank you. I’ll leave you with the first R.E.M. song I heard, “Stand”, which I distinctly remember dancing to at a youthful age at the Sleaford Rugby Club 6th form disco. It didn’t impress any girls…
