R.E.M. - Monster
In nature, generally speaking, smaller animals tend to have a higher metabolic rate, and live shorter, more hectic lives than bigger creatures. To put it another way, the light that burns twice as bright burns...
R.E.M. - Automatic For The People
After the introduction of so many slower songs in Green, and the mostly becalmed, acoustic, mandolined Out of Time some observers were expecting R.E.M. to follow-up by turning again, and heading back into rock territory....
R.E.M. - Out of Time
So the burning question is this: after all these years, even allowing for the fact that it was the album that introduced R.E.M. to me, allowing for the fact that its the album that led,...
R.E.M. - Green
In some ways, after the move to Warner Bros, it was a case of much the same for R.E.M: their first album after leaving I.R.S. was produced by Scott Litt, just as their last album...
R.E.M. - Document
Document - surely people’s choice for most divisive I.R.S.-era R.E.M album. Some love it, some maybe only bought it on the strength of The One I Love, many no doubt rarely investigate it fully. It’s...
R.E.M. - Lifes Rich Pageant
After the much-questioned production sound of Fables of the Reconstruction R.E.M. headed off in an altogether different direction for its follow-up Lifes Rich Pageant, opting to work with Don Gehman. Where Fables… producer Joe Boyd...
R.E.M. - Fables of the Reconstruction
And so to the first R.E.M. album that disappointed me. I forget the order in which I acquired my collection, but it’s entirely plausible that I worked backwards through the I.R.S years, perhaps tentatively afraid...
R.E.M. - Reckoning
Between the release of Out of Time in 1991, and Automatic for the People the following year, I embarked on an unwavering quest to make up for lost time and buy the complete R.E.M. back...
R.E.M. - Murmur
Like Chronic Town before it, Murmur hasn’t aged badly, if at all, in the very, very nearly 30 years since its release. Not that it sounds new, in any way. There’s a certain old-timeyness, a...
R.E.M. - Chronic Town
Recorded in a spirit of independence, experimentalism and a touch of music concrete, and produced by fellow Athens musician Mitch Easter, Chronic Town was recorded at Easter’s Drive-in studio in October 1981. Already the familiar...
Elbow - The Loneliness of a Tower Crane Driver
In their commentary on the DVD of The Seldom Seen Kid Live at Abbey Road, Elbow’s Guy Garvey introduces The Loneliness of a Tower Crane Driver:
Nick Drake - River Man
When Richard Hewson’s string arrangements for Nick Drake’s debut album Five Leaves Left came in, there was widespread disappointment at Island Records: too mainstream was the verdict. “I have this friend”, said Nick, “he’d be...
Joanna Newsom - 81
Joanna Newsom may be something of an acquired taste; her songs and albums may be long and meandering. There is, however, something definitely worth savouring about a talented musician going about her business with such...
R.E.M. Day
On 11 March 1991 an album was released that would launch a new chapter in my musical life, and inspire in me a devotion to one band. The band was R.E.M.; the album was Out...
Harry Nilsson - Everybody's Talkin'
For years I listened to this song without properly appreciating how amazing the string arrangement is at the start of Everybody's Talkin': a stupendously beautiful long note that plays through the verse, and into the...
The War on Drugs - Red Eyes
'With Red Eyes Adam Granduciel once more picks up the baton passed on by songs from **Slave Ambient** like Brothers, Baby Missiles, and Come to the City and just heads on down the highway with...
Ben Folds - Landed (Strings Version)
Something of a curiosity, this: as beautiful as the stringy version of Landed is, this is not a song that ever needed a string section bursting through and demanding to be heard. Take that away,...
Eels - I'm Going To Stop Pretending That I Didn't Break Your Heart
Reading what a few serious critics have to say about the matter, it seems that live albums are viewed with no little weariness and great cynicism. Perhaps they've been suffered one too many by-the-numbers- run-throughs...
Sharon Van Etten - Taking Chances
After the success of 2012’s Tramp, expectations are pretty high for Sharon Van Etten’s next album; if Taking Chances is anything to go by, it might be safe to start assuming those expectations will be...
The Auteurs - Underground Movies
Voices and strings don’t always need to combine angelically. Scowling up at McAlmont and Montgomery is Luke Haines, his voice, general demeanour and attitude a permanent scar on the rosy-cheeked face of britpop.