Saturday, April 01, 2023

No Apologies!

As a man of incredible taste, one of the few glaring holes in my 80s college rock bona fides is R.E.M.s Reckoning, an album I've never loved as much as most fans of the band. In fact, they usually call it a classic. But one of the  big hangups for me is the absolute WASTE of a fantastic riff throughout 7 Chinese Brothers, an amazing riff over which they just kind of tromp-tromp along, with no real sense of any momentum or theater at any given moment. If I'm being real I'd say I've always enjoyed their own parody of it from Dead Letter Office, Voice of Harold. At least that version's funny. for fuck's sake.

I just wish they'd thought at the time you now, this riff is remarkable enough to really try to flesh out another musical part in order to really highlight the great riff even further, but I guess they didn't agree with me.

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