Murmer

As humans we love anniversaries, and music lovers in particular have come to love 20/25/30 etc anniversaries of special albums. This being 2013, the single most important non-Beatles album that fits into this category that jumps out to me right now is REM's Murmer - not only my favorite REM album, but one of my favorite albums of all time, by anyone.

The summer after 9th grade I got a job cutting grass at the DMV. It was a TINY square of grass that took maybe 15 minutes to cut. I got $10 to cut it every Saturday, and of course after maybe one Saturday the scorching heat completely killed the grass, leaving nothing to cut the rest of the summer. But I'd still show up every week, go thru the motions, and walk in to collect my ten fat ones. The lady would always be all "gee, did it really need it this week?" to which I'd look like she was ridiculous "oh yeah, yeah it really did" and then take my ten bucks to invest in some little-known company at the time called "Google." - XMASTIME

I remember blowing up Murmer that summer in Brothatime!!'s Chevette each week when he'd lug me and our lawn mower back and forth to the DMV for this pretty sweet gig.