{"id":39872,"date":"2006-08-07T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2006-08-07T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/reviews\/murmur\/"},"modified":"2006-08-07T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2006-08-07T00:00:00","slug":"murmur","status":"publish","type":"review","link":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/reviews\/murmur\/","title":{"rendered":"Murmur"},"content":{"rendered":"

Around the same time The White Stripes were in high school, one of my co-workers called R.E.M.\u2019s Murmur<\/em> \u201cthe greatest garage rock album of all time.\u201d <\/p>\n

Say what?<\/p>\n

I initially thought garage rock meant loud, dissonant guitars. Bands like The Stooges and MC5 were garage. R.E.M. was too arty. Too melodic. The only thing that seemed to make Murmur<\/em> \u201cgarage\u201d was that its low-tech sound made it seem like it was recorded in a garage. And even with its earthy sound, Murmur<\/em> sounded like it was recorded instead in a shed.<\/p>\n

But the definition of garage rock is as varied as college or alternative rock. According to Wikipedia, the term “garage rock” came from the fact that most of those bands sounded like amateur musicians playing in a garage….but that a lot them were hardly novices. So, in essence, anything that doesn\u2019t sound like a Pink Floyd epic or a Kraftwerk album could be garage rock. <\/p>\n

Murmur<\/em> is a certifiable classic, although it probably isn\u2019t R.E.M.\u2019s most consistent album (that honor, arguably, goes to Automatic for the People<\/em>). It\u2019s not that Murmur<\/em> is uneven in terms of quality, but that instead the four most amazing songs are stacked on the first side of the album. The instant anthem \u201cRadio Free Europe\u201d is as galvanizing as other leadoff tracks such as The Clash\u2019s \u201cClash City Rockers\u201d or The Sex Pistols\u2019 \u201cHolidays in the Sun.\u201d If Peter Buck\u2019s melodic guitar and Bill Berry\u2019s clean percussion obscured Michael Stipe\u2019s voice there, though, Stipe gets his moment as his vocals are at the center of the beautiful \u201cPilgrimage.\u201d <\/p>\n

The few thousand people who purchased Murmur<\/em> in 1983 listened to a new sound that would define college radio for the next 25 years. The only thing is that the sound wasn\u2019t really new. \u201c9-9\u201d and \u201cWest of the Fields\u201d had some late 60s-70s elements like The Faces and even The Beach Boys involved, yet while Stipe\u2019s mumbled delivery may have played a part, songs like \u201cTalk About the Passion\u201d and \u201cCatapault\u201d were both familiar and totally new at the same time. Like other great full-length debuts, Murmur<\/em> has a sound that you can\u2019t quite put a finger on. <\/p>\n

The sophisticated sound on Murmur <\/em>didn\u2019t mean R.E.M. lacked a soul. Stipe, who up until that song had sang in a slightly jostled and high-pitched tone, activates a sustained baritone that makes \u201cPerfect Circle\u201d one of the most unlikely sexy songs to emerge from college rock. <\/p>\n

Mike Mills\u2019 bass is the only instrument that tends to get overlooked in Murmur<\/em>. He would later take a more high-profile role in subsequent releases. It\u2019s not that Mills\u2019 playing is unremarkable in Murmur<\/em>, it\u2019s just that he does such a good job supporting Berry and Buck that it\u2019s hard to define a high point.<\/p>\n

Like U2, R.E.M. would slowly gain in popularity, not reaching their commercial peak for another decade. In that time, the band would continue to evolve in its songwriting and musicianship. But still, it seems that regardless of their releases, Murmur<\/em> sounds like a template that has been used for each of their albums. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":28425,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"artist":[5748],"rating":[5613],"class_list":["post-39872","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\/39872","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\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=39872"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/39872\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/28425"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=39872"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=39872"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=39872"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}