Oh, man - I just got one of those icy spine shivvers.(Want one too?)
R.E.M's "Fables Of The Reconstruction" ...is 25 years old.
TWENTY-FIVE. (And I bet more than a few of you aren't even that old, hm? Put that beer down.)
In celebration of time flying like you just can't believe, Capitol/ I.R.S. have released an expanded 25th Anniversary 2CD and digital edition of the R.E.M.’s classic 1985 album.
The new edition features the digitally remastered original album, plus 14 previously unreleased demo recordings, cut prior to the album’s studio sessions, including one long-sought track that has never been released. The commemorative release also adds insightful new liner notes by R.E.M. guitarist Peter Buck, with the 2CD package presented in a lift-top box with a poster and four postcards.
This being The Vinyl District however, we've got a copy of the remastered original album on 180-gram vinyl to mail to one of you old codgers.
We'll keep it easy because, well, you've earned it after all these years. Simply sing the praises of the band, or the release, or some far flung memory from 'back in the day' in the comments to this post and the most compelling gets a brand new copy mailed to him or her around which new memories will be borne. Or forgotten. Who knows.
Remember to leave us a contact email address—important!—and we'll choose one of you nostalgia buffs next Monday, 8/9!
6 comments:
TVD,
I know you and our friend in Japan are not a huge fan of the efforts of Stipe, Buck, Mills and Berry and I have always wondered why. I have been following them since college and I feel that R.E.M., in many ways, helped create the soundtrack of my life throughout the years. Yes, it is true that I am one of the three people who purchased ‘Around the Sun’ and ‘Accelerate’ and this fact alone is why I should win the give-away.
I cannot believe it has been 25 years since the release of this album. 1985 was truly a momentous year in my life. I just put on Driver 8 and I still think it stands on its own today.
Please TVD, bestow a true fan this wonderful release to complete my collection.
Regards,
Spike
spikelo@verizon.net
REM
I have a very distinct memory of listening to REM one cool spring evening in South Carolina. Riding in the back seat of a car down a long country road late into the night, windows down, with good, good college friends in tow. Wind blowing, cow manure and sweet grass wafting in. REM's "Night Swimming" is playing and I have no cares. We are most likely slightly inebriated and heading to a field to "tip cows", an oft discussed southern activity for us northerners temporarily transplanted to the south. Never did we actually tip a cow, that night nor any other, but a whole lot of stupid fun was had.
With kids, a husband, mortgage, jobs and all the other cares of adulthood, stupid fun is few and far between. Put on REM though and I can have a tiny taste of that carefree person I was some twenty years ago.
Brenda Funk
brendakaybrown@yahoo.com
TVD-
R.E.M. can easily be pinpointed as the single most influential band to my life!
I stumbled upon them on a Nickelodeon show back in 1983 when they did a live set for some afternoon program. The show was already a year old as they played songs from the then new "Chronic Town EP"..and I was hooked. Then I found out that Murmur had been released, bought it on the spot and devoured every track on that LP until i knew them frontwards and back.... and the addiction was solidified.
I was at the store the week that Reckoning came out and was back the second my local record store opened when Fables was released. I already knew most of the songs after already having seen a Pre-construction show at the Univ. of Buffalo. It was in that same year that I made a pilgrimage (yes, I used that on purpose) to Athens, GA over Thanksgiving break from high school. It would be less than one year later that I would call Athens, GA my home as a student (and local musician) in Athens.
It took my love of R.E.M. to head south and thus make the new friends I have today and afforded me the chance to meet my wife and then join in a succession of bands. you see, I wanted to recreate the life of gigging around the southeast as Bill, Peter, mike & Micheal had done just a few years earlier.
Fast forward to today-I have bought every reissue that Capitol/I.R.S puts out and am a proud card carrying member of the R.E.M. fan club....now if I could only track down a copy of the Hib-Tine single and the blue vinyl reissue of Chronic Town!
Thanks ior the GREAT BLOG!
Cheers,
Jay Coyle
Music Geek
jay@musicgeekmanagement.com
R.E.M. is one of the rare bands that I have loved since being young up to this day. As I grow older and change I find new and more songs that I love by this wonderful band.
When I was younger Green was one of the first CD's I ever bought. Despite being told Stand was a terribly cheesy song, I didn't care and I loved every moment of Green. That lead me to find more new R.E.M. and checked all of their Warner Brothers record.
Within the past three years I started to give the IRS years a chance, as when I was younger I guess I didn't understand the true genius behind the albums, and I have once again fallen head-over-heals in-love with R.E.M. I have been lucky enough to find original pressings of Document, Reckoning and Murmur in great conditions this past year on Vinyl and would love to be able to add this masterpiece to my collection.
Email: Dunnand@gmail.com
Just before Record Store Day this year, I became a vinyl collector. The two entities that caused me to finally see the light with regard to vinyl are one of my old music buddies in Oklahoma and reading thevinyldistrict.com prior to purchasing an older record player. Yes, this may sound disingenuous, but as some say, flattery can get you anywhere. (Disclaimer: I kid, I kid!)
The first tap that I ever purchased was R.E.M's Fables of the Reconstruction. Of course, I no longer have the tape (it was eaten long ago), but I still do have the cassette tape case. Was it Fables of the Reconstruction or Reconstruction of the Fables? It was madness! Everyone easily recalls "Driver 8" from this album. It's a great song and feel it necessary to hum a few bars everytime I take the train. However, the song that continued to grip my attention since that first listen in my old Walkman has to be "Feeling Gravity's Pull". Guitar harmonics. Typical complex Stipe lyrics. Powerful but unobtrusive bass line. This song made me stand in attention. I can't say that Fables of the Reconstruction (or Reconstruction of the Fables, it's madness I tell you!) was the most accessible R.E.M. album, but it is certainly among their most honest.
Trey
stfl_hq@yahoo.com
I could be here for days discussing my love of R.E.M. In addition to many stories similar to those above (Fables is my favorite, my first show was Bucknell '85 on the "Pre-Construction" tour) - I also credit R.E.M. with me being a bit of a record collecting dork. Back in the day I wanted it all. I scrambled to collect b-sides, magazine flexis, fan club records...I couldn't get enough. Attempting to collect every pressing from every country in every format...it became an obsession. Not an easy (or cheap!) task in the pre-Ebay days. That has waned a small-bit in the digital years, but not much. They're the one band who gets a free-pass on everything. I still want it all.
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