heh did u ever check out the smiths? were you familiar with them before? it's fun to think of them as a british equivalent of R.E.M.

also, a friend of mine sent me this link recently: https://www.themckenzietapes.com/tapes

live shows from great 80s/90s bands

it straddles the line between anti-comedy and unfunny :p

I've heard of the smiths, but haven't listened to them too much. They played a Smiths song at the end of a Black Mirror episode, lol. I'll check `em out more.



Whoa, that looks like a great site. I've been listening to a lot of those bands off and on the past year. A friend of mine who is very into Dinosaur Jr. had me listen to Husker Du, and then Sonic Youth, which I've been very much into lately. I think he also told me to check the Feelies and the Replacements (among others), but I don't remember those too clearly. I'll check out the link myself and also see what he thinks of it.

The site somewhat reminds me of an analogous site of rare live recordings that I've been exploring, but along the Winston-Salem axis of 80's power pop bands that took inspiration from Big Star, rather than the New York axis of your link.

The site is named after Chris Stamey's band, who grew up with Mitch Easter (producer of the first couple R.E.M. albums), and was a huge influence on my favorite (80's, not counting Paul Simon) singer-songwriter, Scott Miller, who sought out Mitch Easter after hearing the early R.E.M. stuff, and made a bunch of records with him in his two bands. (A bit of warning on that: if you do venture to listen to any of Miller's stuff, ask for a good starting point, since it can be hit or miss on the first listen. There are some reasons why his bans never became very popular, and it's not for everybody, but IMO nothing beats it.) You'll also find a bunch of Big Star / Alex Chilton stuff on that site, who either inspired or collaborated with most of the names I just listed. (BTW: if you ever listen to the d.B.'s, their first album is best.)

I see also there are a few Feelies recordings on there, as 8 from R.E.M., in addition to the other bands I mentioned. One also from the Talking Heads.

But yeah, although our common interest seems to be R.E.M., in terms of musical taste, everything I just wrote is somewhat in the opposite direction of the New York / Sonic Youth type punk and experimental stuff, and toward a straightforward 80's jangle pop / college rock sound.

Holy ****. Check out their first three albums, and also the compilations Hatful of Hollow and Louder than Bombs. The Queen is Dead is one of the very best albums of the 80s. It should right up your alley if you're feeling the 80s jangle pop / college rock stuff, because it's ground zero for a lot of those bands. (You could also check out Dream Syndicate, which is similar to R.E.M. too. Definitely drawing a lot and very explicitly form the Velvet Underground, IIRC.)

High School was amazing. I'd listen to the Smiths and... feel feelings. It was the best. Morrissey has a great, ironic sense of humor.

Oh, I've definitely heard of the Dream Syndicate. They're part of the "Paisley Underground", which, before moving from Davis/Sacramento to Los Angeles, my man Scott Miller's early early college bands were a part of... before diverging to a Winstom-Salem/Big Star sound. In fact it was Steve Wynn of the Dream Syndicate who set Miller in this direction:

[quote=Scott Miller]
Some significant percentage of my hope for music at the start of the eighties was pinned to the dB's. In 1980, I'd made friends at college with Steve Wynn, later of the Dream Syndicate, and having heard my 1979 indie single, he played me Stamey and Big Star, somewhat shocked that I hadn't heard any of that yet. It was the first time in my adult life I felt there existed an operative musical direction I wanted to be a part of. By 1982 the dB's were putting out great, inventive, profoundly musical records, and the world wasn't buying. The writing was on the wall.
[/quote]

(Later, Hilary Clinton would steal the title of the book in which Scott wrote this. )

Anyway, if Game Theory was "R.E.M. with keyboards", The Dream Syndicate was the Velvet Underground of the West coast.

On the topic of the Smiths, I will be listening to them this weekend!

The weird thing is, although I listened to all that other stuff I mentioned a lot, I never listened to the Dream Syndicate much. I should do that too....

Just listened to The Queen is Dead, now listening to The Smiths... I like it a lot! I can certainly see where the R.E.M. comparisons come from.

The weird thing is how acclaimed Morrissey is as a lyricist, and I certainly agree now... but I remember hearing the line (this was a while back, so I'd actually heard the Smiths before): "I was looking for a job and then I found a job"... and just thinking how lame it was!

In that book I linked to, Scott Miller tries to argue that Michael Stipe is the other great lyricist of the `80's... and I can see that too, but then the question arises: how the heck do you objectively assess lyrics that DON'T MAKE ANY SENSE TO ANYONE

Ha, I really like that song, though!

In my life,
why do I give valuable time,
to people who don't care if I,
If I dieeeeeeee

I dunno maybe you have to have heard it for the first time as an angsty teenager to find it relatable

the arpeggios definitely contribute to the idea that R.E.M. and The Smiths sound alike

heh I remember so vividly sitting in traffic on my commute to my high school blasting this every morning for like... all of junior and senior year... aaaah

post-punk was having a resurgence in the mid-2000s. would've been so cool to have youtube then. i still had to buy DVD bootlegs on ebay in those days to see live footage of bands (which meant I didn't see much live footage)

Except for this, which is probably my favorite live show:

lol, I was tempted to point out that the Smiths reminded me superficially of The Cure. But I didn't want to sound stupid because I just assumed I thought that because of the British accent...

One thing I've read is that bands like the dB's (and Game Theory) never made it in the US, because they just couldn't get record deals, or if they did, the record companies didn't bother to promote them (which was exactly the fate that Big Star suffered). Maybe they just sucked, but I've heard that 80's record companies in the States were just awfully conservative and unimaginative, a real cultural wasteland. In contrast to the situation in the UK, where there was very much a blooming pop scene. Even the Pixies would sign to 4AD, a British independent label.

And then the record companies went ape**** over grunge in the 90's, and it was all over for this particular sound of 80's pop. Although R.E.M. made it to the mainstream! Actually, I haven't really listened to later, 90's era R.E.M.... and I'd be interested to know how their sound evolved over the years.

OK, Sonic Youth succeeded in the US in that decade on an independent American record label. But not everyone is as good as Sonic Youth!

I like the song too! Maybe the difference was that this time I listened to the entire album in one go.

there were so may great DIY indie bands in the States, though. It was the golden age for indie music.

I don't doubt that there lots of them. In fact maybe too many? The top bands still probably got momentum from shows and word of mouth, and play on college radio. Actually, I think R.E.M. had to wait almost a decade before scoring a mainstream hit with "The One I Love" (not counting playing Radio Free Europe on Letterman).

As far as being promoted by labels, though: I am told though that the it was the British labels that had been around since the early 80's or late 70's (4AD, Creation, Factory, etc.) that were signing the great 80's bands, and that it was only later that American labels caught up in the late 80's (Subpop, Merge, etc.).

I actually prefer Murmor and Reckoning to their later stuff, and maybe that's my problem. Well, at least I think I do. I could probably warm up to later R.E.M. if I bothered to listen to it beyond the few hits I know and love, like "Man on the Moon" and "Losing my Religion"....

ahhh... they killed it!

yeah i think i felt that way for a while. Those first two records are hard to beat.

This is such a weird video:



I love how they only have subtitles during parts of the song. it really brings out how totally unintelligible the lyrics are without subtitles. lol

but yeah... they definitely recorded some fantastic songs after their first two albums, but there is a decent amount of filler on the albums after Reckoning and Murmur, which are both strong from beginning to end. Out of Time, Automatic for the People and Document are some of their more consistent albums. Life Rich Pageant is up there, too.

pretty sure i've posted this on this thread before, but this is one of their very best songs, I think. It's such a wonderful, beach boys-inspired, melancholic love song. Beautiful harmonies, and the various vocal melodies play off each other so well. Great lyrics, too.

What about Shiny Happy People?

i kinda like it. the video makes it even more charming

I know I've already spammed this thread a million times about this band, but I would be lying if I didn't share that this song is my latest obsession.

RJ, you know this one?

I LOVE that version of the song!

You're Living All Over Me was my introduction to Dinosaur Jr., and I absolutely loved it: killer album the whole way through. Hearing that cover of the Cure as a bonus track on the re-release was a hilarious and pleasant surprise.

btw greatest hardcore band ever

Mostly I've been listening to the Jocko Podcast lately although I did listen to some recent Glenn Beck episodes today. I bought in to the Amazon Unlimited music deal going on for 99¢ for four months. Having been a conservative talk radio junkie for a long time I really enjoy the diversion of music or entertainment podcasts such as Jericho, Stone Cold, and the CU Podcast.

Having a trip back to formative years to listen to German industrial/metal, because I was and am a supremely weird person.

I've been listening to this crossover of techno/progressive house/neotrance/electronica, which I've been trying to find a name for for ages now.

something about this is inspired

* head explosion from scanners *