When R.E.M. left the small-label surroundings of I.R.S. for the
\ngreener pastures of a major-label deal late in the ’80s, the
\nimmediate response from their former label was to capitalize on the
\nsuccess of their former client. Two records in quick succession –
\nthe best-of
\nEponymous<\/i> and the b-sides collection
\nDead Letter Office<\/i> – cropped up, ready for eager fans to
\nsnatch from the shelves.<\/p>\n
It may have seemed strange for a band like R.E.M. to have a
\n“greatest hits” album out when they really were just beginning to
\ntaste mainstream success in 1988. But what
\nEponymous<\/i> does is more than just collect tracks from the
\nband’s stay at their former label; it provides the listener with a
\nhistory of where the band came from and what they were about to
\nbecome. If you didn’t bother picking up albums like
\nLife’s Rich Pageant<\/i> or
\nReckoning<\/i>, then this is going to be an education for you. If
\nyou were one of the people who got into R.E.M. on the ground floor,
\nthis is a wonderful trip down memory lane.<\/p>\n
One of the gems of this collection is the inclusion of the
\noriginal version of “Radio Free Europe” that Michael Stipe and crew
\nreleased on Hib-Tone, a small indie label, back in 1981. It’s
\ninteresting to hear the birth cry of a band, and R.E.M. almost
\nshows the listener that they’re planning on being in the race for
\nthe long run with this one song. (For the longest time, I preferred
\nthe grittier emotion of this version to the studio-polished one on
\nMurmur<\/i>.)<\/p>\n
If there’s one word that could be used to describe the mood of
\nEponymous<\/i>, it’s this: fun. No, really. From the early days
\nof songs like “Talk About The Passion” and “So. Central Rain” to
\nthe pre-superstar work from
\nDocument<\/i> like “The One I Love” and “It’s The End Of The
\nWorld As We Know It (And I Feel Fine)”, the selection of tracks
\nmake this sound less like a label trying to capitalize and more on
\nrejoicing in the music they left behind.<\/p>\n
True, there are one or two questionable inclusions here, such as
\nthe country-tinged “(Don’t Go Back To) Rockville” and the
\nlost-genred “Romance”. But even these songs show the quirky charms
\nof R.E.M. and how they refused to let themselves be pigeonholed
\ninto any one category.<\/p>\n
In a way, the R.E.M. that existed before 1990 was an entirely
\ndifferent band than the one we know today. While I’d still argue
\nthat
\nDocument<\/i> is the must-own album of this portion of R.E.M.’s
\nhistory,
\nEponymous<\/i> is a delightful way to get acquainted with the
\ngroup’s early days – and is sure to spur you into checking out some
\nof those albums.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":25350,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[5748],"rating":[5613],"class_list":["post-36556","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-r-e-m","rating-rating-a-minus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/36556","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36556"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/36556\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25350"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36556"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36556"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=36556"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=36556"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}