The world went a bit crazy today | so I went and got a haircut

[underpants]

REM keeps paying off

So...what in the world
Day in the life and nobody laughed\

cut it off, just a touch

[brett_jv]

1. A pistol-hot cup of rhyme ...

That album came out in 1986 just before I moved off to San Luis Obispo to go to college, and was the first album I bought as a 'college student'. Well, cassette tape, actually. Since then I've listened to it roughly 1000 times and know every word to every song ... along with every other REM album from the IRS era. Arguably the best first five albums (+1 EP) made by any band, ever. Although U2 is pretty close (Boy, October, War, TUF, and TJT), I still would give the nod to REM.

BTW, if you're an early-REM fan, and you've never heard the record 'The King is Dead' by The Decemberists ... you're seriously missing out.

And if you're going 'damn, that guitar line sure sounds like REM' ... that's because it is, in fact, Peter Buck. He plays on 3 tunes on the album.