Night Garden: Berry, Buck, Mills, Stipe [R.E.M.]1981-1996 Song-by-song*

Discussion in 'Music Corner' started by Lance LaSalle, May 23, 2021.

  1. brownie61

    brownie61 Forum Resident

    Ha! Yes!

    In Boxcars, I could swear “Cages under cage” becomes “Cajun under cage” in the middle part (like pheasant under glass LOL). That’s how I’ve been singing it for all these years when I sing along, and I always kind of laugh at that, even though, if I think about it too much, it’s not particularly funny.
     
  2. dirkster

    dirkster Senior Member

    Location:
    McKinney, TX, USA
    Good points. I concur in both of your observations.
     
    Remurmur and Lance LaSalle like this.
  3. prymel

    prymel Forum Resident

    Location:
    Houston
    "Sitting Still" - 5/5. My second favorite song on Murmur.
     
  4. dirkster

    dirkster Senior Member

    Location:
    McKinney, TX, USA
    Sitting Still

    Not bad at all for a Bside. Just kidding. This is such a beautiful track. The lyrics are indeed inscrutable but that just adds to the mystique. I love later REM, but there’s something to the idea that they lost something when their lyrics got easier to decipher. Don’t get me wrong, they gained a lot in that trade too.

    “We could gather, throw a fit”. Yes we could!
    Sounds like maybe a guide vocal from Stipe, but with some background harmonies higher up in the mix. The segment from 2:35-2:50 is gorgeous.
     
  5. MEMark

    MEMark Forum Resident

    Location:
    Maine
    Just wanted to say that this remembrance is one huge reason why I love this site and other sites frequented by music lovers. The impact of REM's music on you and the sheer joy it brought you is so evident in this post. I spent more hours than I could count listening to the band as a teenager in the 80s--they brought me so much joy for so long. Sorry--I don't mean to derail the point of this thread!!
     
  6. Bob C

    Bob C Forum Resident

    Location:
    So Cal
    Sitting Still = 5/5 for me with a slight edge to the Hib Tone version. I love independent 45s.
     
  7. Mr. D

    Mr. D Forum Resident

    Yeah, I can hear you. All of the above.

    Sitting Still 5/5
     
  8. J_D__

    J_D__ Senior Member

    Location:
    Huntersville, NC
    Is Peters guitar more prominent in this mix?
     
    Remurmur likes this.
  9. ghoulsurgery

    ghoulsurgery House Ghost

    Location:
    New Jersey
    If not louder, it definitely sounds clearer and brighter to me
     
    Remurmur, J_D__ and Lance LaSalle like this.
  10. Lance LaSalle

    Lance LaSalle Prince of Swollen Sinus Thread Starter

    Our votes for 'Sitting Still"

    1-0
    2-0
    3-0
    4-5
    5-10
    Average: 4.6933
     
    pablo fanques and Remurmur like this.
  11. Lance LaSalle

    Lance LaSalle Prince of Swollen Sinus Thread Starter

    Today's song is "White Tornado", credited to Bill Berry, Peter Buck, Mike Mills and Michael Stipe; produced by MItch Easter and R.E.M.; engineered by Mitch Easter. There are two versions released.


    "White Tornado" was recorded on the same day as "Radio Free Europe" and "Sitting Still", on April 15th, 1981; and it was included on the promo cassette made on that day, but was not included on the single.

    The version above was released on the band's album of B-sides, outtakes and rarities, Dead Letter Office in 1987.

    Later, they went on to re-record this song live in the studio Not sure about that and that version was released as a the B-side on the Superman single in 1986.

    Peter Buck: guitar
    Mike Mills: bass
    Bill Berry: drums

    The second version was also released as a bonus track on a European 1993 reissue of Reckoning; and both albums were released on the iTunes record Complete Rarities 1981-1987.
     
    Last edited: May 25, 2021
    pablo fanques, YoGarrett, ARK and 3 others like this.
  12. Lance LaSalle

    Lance LaSalle Prince of Swollen Sinus Thread Starter

    This version was recorded live in the studio later, but released earlier, in 1986 as a B-side.
     
    Remurmur likes this.
  13. Summer of Malcontent

    Summer of Malcontent Forum Resident

    The single version of 'White Tornado' can also be found on the Singles Collected compilation. I initially thought that comp was pretty redundant given the existence of Dead Letter Office, but it has a few rare b-sides and single edits.
     
    parman, Remurmur, Bob C and 1 other person like this.
  14. CBM

    CBM Forum Resident

    Location:
    Washington, DC
    Getting late to this thread but really excited. I'll echo what a few have said so far in that this is the band that changed my life. Discovered them with the release of Document as a 15 year old so the I.R.S. years are my favorite. 34 years and some 5000 albums in my collection later, Chronic Town through Document is the most meaningful stretch of music in my life. Absolute perfection. In the midst of a lot of bad 80s music, especially in my relatively small midwestern home town, R.E.M. opened my mind to another world out there that I wanted to get to. I remember buying each of these early albums at the one relatively decent record store near me and it seemed like I was the only one who could have possibly been interested in them. Glad to see there are others here who were going through the same experience.

    In the past year, I've finally picked up a guitar and started to teach myself and learning some of these early songs has brought on a whole new appreciation.
     
  15. John Fever M.D.

    John Fever M.D. Forum Resident

    Great thread. Looking forward to this.

    I know I'm tardy in posting but I will say that I prefer the Murmur version of both RFE and Sitting Still. I first heard this version of RFE when Eponymous was released and the Murmur version was already part of my DNA tho I do enjoy the frenetic energy of the earlier version for sure. But I live inside the Murmur version. I will wait to wax on about that until we get there.

    Though I realize that many of the same tracks were used in the early cassette version of Sitting Still it just really feels more realized and whole to me on Murmur and I hope a reconsideration can be made for inclusion during the Murmur discussion because it really feels like a different song.
    But the song itself is a 5/5 for sure.

    I agree with so much that has been written already. There is a strong emotional connection between myself and early REM. I too spent my teen years picking out Buck's guitar parts and attempting to decipher Stipe's impressionistic lyrics and putting my own emotion meanings to songs that may or (likely) may not have anything to do with the author's. I was listening to a live recording from '81 on youtube last night inspired this thread and it always strikes me how ROCK FREAKING SOLID Berry's drumming is. Even in those very early days they were so locked in with each other and Berry was the engine. And Mills' bass lines not only lock down a groove but also give some of Buck's parts context and they also impart such a beautiful sense of melody on their own. Just a fantastic band.

    Bring on the kudzu...
     
  16. John Fever M.D.

    John Fever M.D. Forum Resident

    Very similar here tho other artists share that space too. Every release awaited with bated breath and scrutinized looking for secrets and answers. They were a secret club with a secret language (until they weren't).
     
  17. John Fever M.D.

    John Fever M.D. Forum Resident

    White Tornado. A garage-rock Wipeout and a helluva lot of fun. I didn't hear this until Dead Letter Office and still consider it to be a legit release, not just filler. I didn't hear a lot of non-LP tracks until Dead Letter Office and didn't expect this kind of jam from them although Underneath the Bunker should have been a clue. What great fun it must have been to see them in a small club and they launch into this! 4/5
     
  18. AlienRendel

    AlienRendel Senior Member

    Location:
    Chicago, il
    White Tornado - 3/5 - Fun, but inconsequential. I did learn to play this on guitar, early in my studies. Pretty simple.
     
  19. Lance LaSalle

    Lance LaSalle Prince of Swollen Sinus Thread Starter

    I adore "White Tornado." I just love this kind of instrumental. I am a big fan of the Ventures (as were R.E.M., clearly.) I love the way they had this "hidden" B-side wildness that could really surprise you with a garage instrumental like this or a humorous cover or whatever. But this song just rocks. Drumming is cool a.f.

    I prefer the original 1981 version (i.e., the Dead Letter Office version) because I prefer the clean sound of the guitar, it's so elegant sounding. Simple to play, no doubt, but such a good melody and so cool sounding. I think that the band did a good job of connecting the pre-British Invasion American rock with the then-modern era.

    5/5 for me.
     
  20. Lance LaSalle

    Lance LaSalle Prince of Swollen Sinus Thread Starter

    Here's a live version from July 1983:
     
    pablo fanques, ARK, Remurmur and 2 others like this.
  21. Bob C

    Bob C Forum Resident

    Location:
    So Cal
    I'm always in for a nice surf instrumental. 4/5
     
  22. John Fever M.D.

    John Fever M.D. Forum Resident

    Interesting. Buck is using a 12 string on the live version where it sounds like overdubs to me on the studio version. Cool...
     
  23. dlemaudit

    dlemaudit Forum Resident

    Location:
    France, Paris area
    Are you sure this is a 12 string ? I never heard of him using one live , especially in 83
     
    Remurmur likes this.
  24. John Fever M.D.

    John Fever M.D. Forum Resident

    Well it sure sounds like it to me. You can especially hear the octave strings in the 3rd verse 1:24-1:34. Maybe he'd just bought it in Boston and couldn't resist playing it? lol. I'll listen to the rest of the set and see if I think I hear it again.
     
    Remurmur and dlemaudit like this.
  25. Lance LaSalle

    Lance LaSalle Prince of Swollen Sinus Thread Starter

    Tomorrow I'll start holding songs up from Chronic Town.

    Chronic Town is interesting as it seems that R.E.M. really waited a long time between releases here, considering the amount of songs they had built up by now. But maybe that's the way it had to be, and at any rate it seems to have worked out well for them in the long run.

    As "Radio Free Europe" became a "hit"(so to speak) on the college radio circuit, as their audiences outside of Athens grew in both size and enthusiasm, as the rapturous reviews came pouring in and the labels started sniffing around, they must have found it really important to get it right.

    The EP was recorded, again, in Mitch Easter's garage-turned-studio Drive-In Studios, in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.

    R.E.M. initially recorded and mixed several songs --an album's worth, really, between October 2nd and 8th, 1981. They came back in late January 1982 and recorded some more in a two-day session; there was remixing and mastering in February and March, a bit more recording; and the band returned again in June for some recording that I'm not sure made the record.

    In the process they recorded some of the songs that made the EP twice and several others songs were recorded that would be re-recorded and released on subsequent releases.

    In between sessions for Chronic Town they also recorded some demos for RCA Records, who had shown some interest. Those can be found on YouTube: here's Part one of those RCA demos:


    As the interest grew, eventually they were signed onto IRS Records, which was a independent label with major label distribution (A&M); small enough for them to be taken seriously but with major label distribution. This was owned by Miles Copeland, the brother of Ian Copeland, who had already signed them to his booking agency. In fact, though, it seemst that Miles Copeland did not want to sign them precisely because of their association with his brother; however, a vice-president heard their demos and, unbeknownst to Copeleand promised them a contract and in the end they were signed to the label.

    The EP was therefore released on IRS Records on August 24th, 1982.

    The track list was:
    1. Wolves Lower
    2. Gardening At Night
    3. Carnival of Sorts (Boxcars)

    4. 1,000,000
    5. Stumble
    LIke Radio Free Europe, it was critically lauded, and voted the number 2 EP of the year in the Village Voice. It had sold 20 000 copies by the end of 1982. On CD, it's been appended to Dead Letter Office.

    After those five songs, I'll hold up the EP as a whole for discussion before moving on to Murmur, starting with the re-recorded version of "Radio Free Europe" next Wednesday, the 2nd of June.
     

Share This Page

molar-endocrine