Rolling Stone
Murmur
R.E.M.
A&M
BY Steve Pond | May 26, 1983
R.E.M.'s Chronic Town EP was one of last year's more invigorating, tuneful surprises: a record from an Athens, Georgia, band that cared not a whit for the fashionable quirks of that town's dance-rock outfits like the B-52's or Pylon. R.E.M. fashioned its own smart, propulsive sound out of bright pop melodies, a murky, neopsychedelic atmosphere and a host of late-Sixties pop-rock touches. The execution wasn't always up to the ideas — instrumentally, the band was still stumbling at times — but Chronic Town served notice that R.E.M. was an outfit to watch. Murmur is the record on which they trade that potential for results: an intelligent, enigmatic, deeply involving album, it reveals a depth and cohesiveness to R.E.M. that the EP could only suggest.
Murmur is a darker record than Chronic Town, but this band's darkness is shot through with flashes of bright light. Vocalist Michael Stipe's nasal snarl, Mike Mills' rumbling bass and Bill Berry's often sharp, slashing drums cast a cloudy, postpunk aura that is lightened by Peter Buck's folk-flavored guitar playing. Many of the songs have vague, ominous settings, a trait that's becoming an R.E.M. trademark. But not only is there a sense of detachment on the record — these guys, as one song title says, "Talk about the Passion" more often than they experience it — but the tunes relentlessly resist easy scanning. There's no lyric sheet, Stipe slurs his lines, and they even pick a typeface that's hard to read. But beyond that elusiveness is a restless, nervous record full of false starts and images of movement, pilgrimage, transit.
In the end, though, what they're saying is less fascinating than how they say it, and Murmur's indelible appeal results from its less elusive charms: the alternately anthemic and elegiac choruses of such stubbornly rousing tunes as "Laughing" and "Sitting Still"; instrumental touches as apt as the stately, elegant piano in the ballad "Perfect Circle" and the shimmering folkish guitar in "Shaking Through"; above all, an original sound placed in the service of songs that matter. R.E.M. is clearly the important Athens band.
Robert Christgau
Murmur [I.R.S., 1983]
They aren't a pop band or even an art-pop band--they're an art band, nothing less or more, and a damn smart one. If they weren't so smart they wouldn't be so emotional; in fact, if they weren't so smart no one would mistake them for a pop band. By obscuring their lyrics so artfully they insist that their ("pop") music is good for meaning as well as pleasure, but I guarantee that when they start enunciating--an almost inevitable move if they stick around--the lyrics will still be obscure. That's because their meaning and their emotion almost certainly describe the waking dream that captivates so many art and pop bands. Which leaves me wondering just how much their pleasure means. Quite a lot, I think. A-
Pitchfork
R.E.M.
Murmur [Deluxe Edition]
IRS; 2008
By Stephen M. Deusner; November 24, 2008
Rating: 10.0
One of the talking points about R.E.M.-- one of the traits listed to distinguish them from many other bands of the 1980s, mainstream or otherwise-- was their stringent democracy. Each member received equal songwriting credit on each track on each album, and reportedly each member not only had equal voice in decisions, but the band would do nothing unless everyone agreed unanimously. Theirs was a "unique four-person democracy that in practice maximalized the talents and insights of four people rather than just one leader calling the shots," writes I.R.S. Records co-founder Jay Boberg in the liners for this new 2xCD reissue of Murmur, the band's first and best full-length. When the band triumphed, all of its members shared the acclaim; when it failed, everyone shouldered the blame. This was an atypical business model, but R.E.M. displayed a seemingly contradictory mix of egolessness and ambition. The group pointedly didn't appear on its album covers or inner sleeves; instead, R.E.M. remained confident that a kudzu-covered ravine or a folk-art painting could speak more strongly about their music than their own presence ever could.
Coupled with that air of mystery, R.E.M.'s practical democracy simultaneously stemmed from and extended to their music. They treated each instrument as essentially equal: Bill Berry's no-fills drums, Peter Buck's spiky guitar, Mike Mills' melodic bass, and Michael Stipe's grainy voice. Because these elements were characters in an equally weighted exchange, the remastering on this version of Murmur (overseen by Greg Calbi) makes it more than simply an anniversary repackaging, but a careful reconsideration that not only changes the lines of dialogue, but alters the entire conversation. Every unique strike of Berry's high-hat and snare becomes discernible, giving his rhythms greater urgency and force. Likewise, Mills' bass gets lower and richer, and his keyboard adds intricate textures to these songs: "Pilgrimage" is layered with reverberating low-end piano and vibraphone, and his honkytonk piano gives "Shaking Through" its country transcendence. Mills' backing vocals are emphasized to reinforce their point-counterpoint interplay with Stipe on "Radio Free Europe" and "West of the Fields". This new remaster doesn't throw off the band's equilibrium: The instruments are somehow now sound even more equal.
It does, however, shift the discussion slightly away from some of the typical influences ascribed to the band-- namely, the Byrds-- and toward the more strident sounds of British postpunk acts like PiL and Gang of Four, whom the band has cited as part of their inspiration but are often overlooked. This dimension of their sound is most apparent in Buck's fretwork; sure, it jangles, but that term has lost some of its evocative sheen through overuse. His guitar also chimes and shuffles and burrs and bellows its way through Murmur, giving "9-9" and "West of the Fields" their jitteriness.
Stipe sing-speaks aggressively through the former but, fortunately, the remaster does nothing to elucidate his vocals. No longer the mumbler heard on the Chronic Town EP, he enunciates more clearly on Murmur, yet there remains an unpracticed quality to his performance. Stipe switches between a wordless careen and a precise croon, reaching into his upper register on "Radio Free Europe" and into his lower on "Catapult". He indulges a slight yodel on "Moral Kiosk" and ends "We Walk" with a strange hiccup. Over the course of the album, his slur is more pronounced but still inscrutable, and he covers his lyrics in layers of ambiguity.
There's a historical component to Murmur that often gets lost: In 1983, R.E.M. sounded unique. No bands were combining these particular influences in this particular way, which made this debut sound not only new but even subversive: a sharp reimagining of rock tropes. Twenty-five years and 14 albums later, our familiarity with R.E.M. means that Murmur has lost some of what made it revolutionary upon release. Fortunately, rather than collecting obligatory bonus tracks and outtakes-- most of which would have overlapped with Dead Letter Office-- the set includes a second disc documenting a show in Toronto from July 1983, just after the album's release. It marks the first time a full R.E.M. show has been released on CD (LIVE, from 2007, was culled from two nights in Dublin), and judging by the intensity with which the band run through old and then-new songs, it could have held its own as a separate release.
It's startling to hear some of these songs stripped down to their four basic elements, with no keyboard or guitar overdubs. Likewise, it's a bit odd to hear only polite applause after "7 Chinese Brothers", which would appear on Reckoning a year later, and surprising to hear people scream for "Boxcars" and a cover of the Velvet Underground's "There She Goes Again" (which they play) and especially "Shaking Through" (which they don't). Live, Stipe deploys an even wider arsenal of vocal tics: vamping on "Just a Touch", growling the chorus of "Talk About the Passion", and sing-speaking through a jaw-dropping "9-9", all while Mills' backing vocals soar overheard and Buck's guitar chimes reliably on every song. Because they were known primarily as a live band, and because they built their identity as such when the industry avenues of promotion failed them, this live disc, much like the remaster, goes a long way toward re-creating for listeners the context in which R.E.M. introduced themselves and making these familiar songs once again excitingly unfamiliar.
BBC Online
Unapologetically intelligent, Murmur is a fully-fledged classic.
Sid Smith 2007
The success of the B-52s in the late 70s placed the spotlight on Athens GA, fuelling speculation about who might follow in the wake of their mighty bouffant vibe. Though there were contenders aplenty all would be eclipsed by REM. After the ep-sized gulp of garage band air that comprised 1982s Chronic Town, REM not only joined the race but crossed the finishing line with flying colours via their first full-length recording.
Creating the dream-like state implicit in their name with surprising confidence, the normal certainties of rock music were diffused behind a veil of beguiling amorphous harmonies, thoughtfully layered guitars, astute percussion and wilfully vague lyrical musings moved in and out of focus of each. Although they drew upon an array of influences that included elements of folk-rock, new wave sourness and the melancholic interiors found in some of The Beatles’ lesser known works, Murmur was exquisitely its own thing and hard to pigeon-hole.
Michael Stipe’s artsy inclinations ensured that countless hours would be spent by fans figuring out what he was mumbling (given that he improvised many verses direct to mic – as with “Radio Free Europe” - he was probably in the same boat), whilst the music’s fondness for avoiding the obvious meant that there was more to explore than a numb backbeat or bratty bawling about being bored.
With several of the tracks resulting out of studio jams, producers Mitch Easter and Don Dixon had the foresight to roll the tapes ahead of final takes. Edited down, these vignettes pepper the album building mood and mystery ahead of the actual songs.
Displaying a remarkable maturity, they’re unafraid to experiment. The vein-popping “9-9” constantly moves the pulse into unexpected timings without ever sounding precocious. Their sure-handedness with glorious melodies such as “Perfect Circle ” hints at things to come; the sweet, descending chorus resolves wonderfully without ever schmoozing the saccharine zone. The tribal thump of “Moral Kiosk” or “Pilgrimage’s” yearning lines proves we don’t have to have everything spelt out in rockist crayons in order to find meaning or be uplifted. Unapologetically intelligent, Murmur is a fully-fledged classic.
PopMatters
R.E.M. : Murmur (Deluxe Edition)
By Tim O'Neil 25 November 2008
I’ll set the scene:
In 1983, punk was D-E-A-D, desiccated and spread across the radio waves as New Wave. The underground had gone below ground, but there were inklings of a new scene coalescing around college radio stations and newspapers all across the country, not limited to regional acts or styles. There wasn’t really a word for what we now call “alternative”, or “indie”—maybe “college”. Punk had been angry and political, diametrically opposed to the mainstream of corporate music culture. When the embers finally died the ashes blew into the atmosphere and circulated the globe: if many of the groups who picked up the banner of punk were not as angry nor as violent, they were still dedicated to the idea of creating an opposition to corporate rock culture.
Put aside the fact that this kind of stance, taken to its logical extremes, is necessarily self-punishing; and put aside the difficulties inherent in even trying to draw lines between big and little, indie and major. Humility was a new sensation in rock music—a field where even confessional singer-songwriters were famously bombastic. Punk had been full of piss and vinegar, military swagger or skid-row savage. These new musicians didn’t want to put themselves on record covers, not even for the purpose of sneering. Or if they did put a picture of themselves on a record cover, it was usually vaguely embarrassing. They were actually products of these new-fangled independent record labels, labels that didn’t have huge graphic design departments, who could afford to put something ominous or cryptic or just plain ugly on the sleeve because the kids buying these new records were themselves ominous or cryptic and, yes, maybe even a little ugly.
It wasn’t about burning the bridges anymore—punk had already burnt all the bridges that needed burning. It was time to build a new canon out of all the stuff that the really smart critics had been raving about for years, all the records that smart musicians listened to… hell, let’s just go ahead and say it, these people were smart, and self-consciously so. Suddenly, for at least a small percentage of the population, being smart wasn’t incidental to being a rock & roller. It wasn’t just the Stooges and the Velvet Underground, although obviously they were the touchstones. It wasn’t just Sweetheart of the Rodeo and Pet Sounds, although they were there too. It was the Fugs and Television and Nick Drake and all those other lost artists who never seemed to fit in anywhere else, or who never amounted to as much as they should, or who faded away before they could hit it big. Essentially, it was everything that everyone else had put off, conglomerated and melted into one big old gnarled waxwork.
Everything was small, purposefully small—everything except the sound.
Imagine a rock & roll album with a soggy, overgrown railroad trestle for a cover. What the hell does that even mean? It’s a mystery, it’s a purposeful obfuscation, a dodge. It’s willful obscurantism. It doesn’t try to sell anything: there’s no promise of adventure or thrills or sex or wild youthful abandon, or even intellectual stimulation or literary pretension. It’s a picture of a trestle.
But it’s not just a picture of a trestle.
You can’t say that R.E.M. were the first alternative band, not in any meaningful or accurate sense, and you can’t say that R.E.M. represented any kind of massive break from the immediate past. They were the lucky beneficiaries of a burgeoning national college radio scene, the first big “stars” of a system specifically designed to discourage stardom. They wore their influences on their sleeves, and it was obvious to anyone with ears that they were extremely well-educated music fans: Pylon, Gang of Four, the Cure (Three Imaginary Boys and Seventeen Seconds), Young Marble Giants, Mission of Burma, Patti Smith. But it wasn’t just the hip youngsters, there was also older, squarer stuff in the mix, stuff like the Byrds and the Band (although R.E.M. hardly needed the advice of four Canadians to conjure up some home-brewed faux-Faulknerian Southern Gothic), and even the Beatles. For a while it hadn’t been cool to raid your parents record collection any deeper than that old copy of Velvet Underground & Nico your uncle used to roll his joints on, but suddenly it was OK to write jangly pop songs again. There was something freeing in that.
But all of this is academic: for all the groundwork that had been painstakingly laid, Murmur was Ground Zero for Alternative Nation. It doesn’t take anything away from groups like Hüsker Dü and the Meat Puppets and the Replacements and Dinosaur Jr. and Sonic Youth—all of whom came up at or around the same time—to say that without R.E.M.’s success, the whole idea of “alternative” music might never have amounted to much of anything. R.E.M. emerged out of the backwoods of Georgia—Georgia!—like Athena bursting forth from Zeus’s skull. If R.E.M. hadn’t come along, maybe something else would have; there is nothing inevitable about them. But the fact that they did come along at exactly the right moment gave the whole enterprise some kind of legitimacy. Suddenly, people were paying attention. All the above artists owe large slices of their careers to R.E.M., because it was R.E.M. who popularized the notion that you could be a rock musician and still keep your self-respect. You could keep your cred, you could keep your sound—hell, you could even keep your indie label if you wanted. All that mattered was that you kept your soul, on your own terms. Without R.E.M., it’s a certainty that there would have been no Pavement, no Pixies, no Radiohead, no Nirvana.
And it all began with one weird little album with a weird little cover, with weird little songs sung by a weird guy who couldn’t even enunciate properly.
In the years since its release, I’ve listened to this album many hundreds of times, perhaps more than any other album I’ve ever owned. Dating back to their first TV appearance on the Letterman show in 1983, I’ve been there for every step of the way. As such, I think I’ve got a little bit of credibility in the matter (even if, it will be admitted, I may be a tiny bit biased). Murmur isn’t even my favorite R.E.M. album, but there is no doubt, not for one second, that this is the most important R.E.M. album. It all starts here: this isn’t one of those awkward, unsatisfying debuts that betrays no hint of the band’s potential—no Pablo Honey. It’s all here, from day one.
They’ve already got a knack for writing anthemic pop songs, and “Radio Free Europe” is still one of their best. The art of writing these kind of impossibly great songs just can’t be taught, it’s something you either have or you don’t. R.E.M. have it, and it’s quite striking that they can write them about nothing at all—seriously, does anyone know what “Radio Free Europe” is about? I’ve been living with the song since 1983, and I’ll be damned if I have a clue. But it’s not just the pure pop, they’ve got the harder rock as well: “West of the Fields” still pummels, fast and hard and disciplined in the thrilling manner of the best punk, but built around an almost transcendent moment of emotional clarity. Slower ballads are present, in the opaque “Perfect Circle”, overly-earnest topicality (“Talk About the Passion”), even the left-field novelty numbers they occasionally throw out to keep people on their toes (“We Walk”). There’s such an incredible amount of material in just these twelve tracks, so many different directions outlined, that it’s still possible to see new and thrilling possibilities based strictly on this template, even after all these years.
The main attraction of the Deluxe reissue is still the album itself. It’s been given a digital makeover that amounts to a monumental improvement over the previous muddy CD releases. Never having heard Murmur on vinyl, I’ve only ever heard it on hissy cassette tapes or poorly-mastered CD—and this is the best the album has ever sounded, crisp and clear in detail without sacrificing the intentionally murky atmosphere. You can actually hear everything, and it doesn’t sound like it was recorded in your uncle’s basement. The second disc features a live performance from 1983, featuring the entirety of Murmur as well as a few rough drafts of later songs and an obligatory Velvet Underground cover (“There She Goes Again”). For a 1983 concert recording, it sounds pretty damn fantastic, enough so that you’re left scratching your head as to just why they sat on these tapes for 25 years. I was surprised to hear just how tight they were at such an early date—I suppose they had been playing together long enough by this point that they knew what they were doing fairly well, but still. It’s probably of secondary interest to anyone but the fans—but to them, absolutely, positively, unequivocally essential.
That they were able to jump out of the gate so well is primarily thanks to an incredibly strong rhythm section. It’s a rare thing in rock, but the drummer—Bill Berry—was the All-Star of these early recordings. He knew what he was doing even when the rest of the band might have seemed tentative, and it’s to his credit that the many disparate elements hang together as well as they do. Because, on paper, these ingredients could have added up a mess. Michael Stipe can’t sing, Peter Buck can barely strum, and while Mike Mills has some good, melodic bass lines (in the vein of Paul McCartney), he’s threatening to crowd the guitarist out of the arrangements. It could have been a disaster. Even given a strong set of songs to carry them, the fact that they don’t sound like a bunch of art students fumbling about on their first album (which is pretty much what they were) is pretty remarkable. There was some wisdom in building the band slowly: they didn’t just jump into the studio to record a whole album after they had some success with “Radio Free Europe” in 1981, or even with the Chronic Town EP the following year. They waited until they were ready, and the results speak for themselves.
Of course, once they got started, they never really stopped. In the space of six years between 1983 and 1988, they released six albums, all varying degrees of excellent. They stopped recording so much after they signed to Warner Brothers in 1987, and by then they were one of the biggest rock bands on the planet. By the early ‘90s, with the releases of Out of Time and Automatic for the People, they would jump from being one of the biggest to being—for at least a moment—the biggest. They reached their apex of popularity right as grunge peaked, and that’s no coincidence: for all that grunge may have sounded like punk, their spiritual forefathers were groups like R.E.M.. Kurt Cobain wasn’t listening to Achtung Baby when he killed himself, he was listening to Automatic.
And that’s why R.E.M. still matters. Even as their supposed peers—shambling corpse-bands like the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Metallica, and U2—maintained (at least some of) their popularity at the expense of their relevancy and critical appeal, R.E.M. never strayed from their (delusional? hypocritical?) ideals, even if it meant jettisoning a wide chunk of their popularity. Let’s be frank: if they had wanted to, they could have easily banged out an album packed full of “Losing My Religion” retreads every year for the past decade and reaped substantial rewards for maintaining a consistent presence on retail shelves. It only took one Pop-sized disaster for U2 to institute a massive course correction in favor of a renewed dedication to insipidly predictable stadium-pleasing crap. But the last decade has seen R.E.M. stumble through the wilderness, producing good albums (Up) in equal measure with the bad (the execrable Around the Sun), all because of a naive unwillingness to be ruled by any considerations besides their own best judgment. They had to learn the hard way how to recognize lapses in said judgment when they occurred, and accordingly, they had to take their lumps before they could find their way back. That’s why this year’s Accelerate was such a righteous return to form: it wasn’t some cynical back-to-basics play for renewed popularity, it was an honest rediscovery of everything that had made the group so good to begin with, a hard-won triumph in every sense of the phrase. Or, to put it another way: if they had just wanted to restore their “commercial viability”, they picked about the most ass-backwards way conceivable of doing such a thing. It was enough for them to actually put out another album worth listening to.
That’s all they ever wanted to do. They succeeded so well with Murmur that we’re still talking about it some 26 years later. If they had broke up after their first album, well, we’d probably still remember Murmur—at least every once in a while—long after Michael Stipe had been promoted to assistant manager at the Athens Applebee’s. But as it is, they are so important precisely because Murmur wasn’t a fluke. It was the start of something pretty special, both in terms of the group’s astounding career trajectory and the invention of alternative rock itself. If you’ve never heard the album, or if you dismiss R.E.M. out of hand for whatever reason, please don’t take my word for it. This is strong stuff, stirring and savage in equal measure, awkwardly fumbling one moment and running ahead the next, but doing it all with such a clear and winning confidence that it’s inconceivable to imagine they were, basically, a bunch of kids. It makes me want to be young forever, despite the knowledge that I probably won’t. And even if I can’t be young forever, I can hold on to that feeling every time I hear this album.
Rating: 10/10
Extras rating: 8/10
Slant Magazine
R.E.M.
Murmur
Rating: *****
By Paul Schrodt ON October 30, 2003
With their first full-length release, Murmur, R.E.M. dumped the trademark jangle-pop of their lo-fi debut EP, Chronic Town, for much bleaker themes. Singer Michael Stipe took on a more cerebral socio-political stance, his distant tone casting an elusive cloud over the album's cultural criticism. The opening line of "Laughing" ("Laocoon and her two sons/Pressured storm tried to move/No other more emotion bound/Martyred, misconstrued") is an early indication that Murmur's pleasures aren't of the simple kind—its gloomy maxims about pilgrimage, spiritual sacrifice and lost time are smartly humorous and satirical. "Talk About The Passion" finds Stipe at his most compassionate, describing a struggle to overcome despair with lyrics that are at once empathetic and pessimistic ("Empty prayer, empty mouths, talk about the passion").
At the time, most of the folksy songs on Murmur didn't fit within pop radio's limitations—these were songs to be listened to, not just danced to. Despite its urgent, Chronic Town-like guitar licks and clickety-clack percussion, "Radio Free Europe," the album's only toe-tapper, offers up some of the most playful yet pointed political sarcasm of the band's career. Inspired by the Radio Free Europe radio station (funded by the U.S. to promote institutional values to countries behind the Iron Curtain), Stipe's propaganda-hating self-rule is passionate, pointed and biting without sacrificing the rhyme and ingenuity of his lyrics: "Beside defying media too fast/Instead of pushing palaces to fall/Put that, put that, put that before all/That this isn't fortunate at all."
If the band's recent sun-drenched Up and Reveal are any indication, trading in their idealistic jingle-jangle for the intricate truths of yesteryear isn't in the band's current agenda. Of course, it would be virtually impossible (even illogical) for the band to reproduce the integrity and infinite charms of Murmur, an album that is very much a product of its time: the graceful chants of "Perfect Circle"; the amusing perplexity of "9-9" and "Moral Kiosk"; the soothing wisdom of Stipe's voice in "Shaking Through"; and the overall frankness with which Stipe observes the most hypocritical facets of a "democratic" culture that seemingly relies more on the voices of a few than the collective whole. An attempt to clone the achievement of Murmur would also be creatively contradictory. R.E.M.'s career has been propelled by musical evolution, and they're only one of a handful of bands to have skillfully mastered so many styles. The band isn't up for fighting today's problems with the same unshakable scorn of their youth, and their listeners probably aren't either.
Label: I.R.S. Release date: October 30, 1983
AllMusic
R.E.M.
Murmur
AllMusic Rating *****
Review by Stephen Thomas Erlewine
Leaving behind the garagey jangle pop of their first recordings, R.E.M. developed a strangely subdued variation of their trademark sound for their full-length debut album, Murmur. Heightening the enigmatic tendencies of Chronic Town by de-emphasizing the backbeat and accentuating the ambience of the ringing guitar, R.E.M. created a distinctive sound for the album -- one that sounds eerily timeless. Even though it is firmly in the tradition of American folk-rock, post-punk, and garage rock, Murmur sounds as if it appeared out of nowhere, without any ties to the past, present, or future. Part of the distinctiveness lies in the atmospheric production, which exudes a detached sense of mystery, but it also comes from the remarkably accomplished songwriting. The songs on Murmur sound as if they've existed forever, yet they subvert folk and pop conventions by taking unpredictable twists and turns into melodic, evocative territory, whether it's the measured riffs of "Pilgrimage," the melancholic "Talk About the Passion," or the winding guitars and pianos of "Perfect Circle." R.E.M. may have made albums as good as Murmur in the years following its release, but they never again made anything that sounded quite like it.
Drowned In Sound
R.E.M.
Murmur [Deluxe Edition]
IRS; 2008
by Andrzej Lukowski
December 5th, 2008
Before talking seriously about R.E.M.’s first and best album, let's dive in and get the whole 'deluxe edition' nitty gritty out of the way. Remastered for its 25th year, this Murmur isn't a significantly changed record, but now comes picked out in slightly clearer colours, the sonic murk dispersed a little so as to coax out odd little touches like the weird ambient noises preceding opener 'Radio Free Europe'. It’s what you’d expect really, and certainly there’s no clipping or compression or attempt to turn this strange record into FM rock or whatever. R.E.M. geeks will likely have already heard the '83 Toronto concert that comprises the second CD, but it's definitely a welcome bonus. A stripped, propulsive 50 minutes, it should logically serve to expose Murmur's opaque workings, but you’d be as likely to perform an autopsy on ghost as demystify these songs. There’s a little more balls and a little less finesse than the studio versions, a handful of tracks from Chronic Town and Reckoning, and general confirmation that that R.E.M. Live album of last year wasn’t that much cop.
Really, though, this reissue shouldn’t be tilted at completists, but at the many, many people who still haven’t heard any version of Murmur; who think the canonical ones are Document, Out Of Time and Automatic For The People; who are daunted by an extensive back-catalogue that’s light on early hits; who are put off by R.E.M.'s relative unfashionableness these days; who are maybe just curious as to why this relatively obscure 1983 debut is scoring top marks across the board on the reissue trail.
The standard journalistic cop out when attempting to articulate the power of Murmur is that it ‘sounded so different to everything else at the time’. Fair enough, but 13 more R.E.M. albums and the entire alt. country movement down the line, you can’t really say it sounds shocking. I’m going to attribute its continued power to three things: empathy, spirituality, and melody.
First empathy. Murmur is unquestionably Michael Stipe’s most obtuse set of lyrics. Interpret away, but there is not one phrase on this record that makes any literal sense on its own. On paper, that is. The chorus to ‘Perfect Circle’ simply consists of the line “heaven assumed, shoulders high in the room”, but it's devastating, a song more purely about loss - be it a life, a relationship, one's past - than any other song I can possibly think of. You can break it down to the mix of weariness and wonder in Stipe’s soft mumble and the stately, elegiac chime of the music, shining brave and pale against the dark. But the fact is you just know. ‘Sitting Still’ glows with a nervous joy that exists more in the strain of Stipe’s voice than the sole coherent line “I can hear you; can you hear me?” The clangourous ‘9-9’ only has two decipherable words, but that repeat phrase “conversation fear”, skittering nervously around Buck’s nagging metallic ricochets, is enough to set your teeth on edge and claustrophobia welling in your stomach. Or maybe it won’t be that exactly, but the fact is Murmur is one of the most intensely evocative records ever made, and on some level every song will be crystal clear to you, be it conjuring a feeling, an image, a colour or a story.
Next spirituality, by which I mean that as with a band like Arcade Fire, there’s constantly the feeling that there is something bigger happening here. It’s most obviously there in the secret wisdom of Stipe’s already impossibly old sounding voice. There’s also simple but effective tricks of harmony, like Mike Mills and Bill Berry shadowing Stipe vocally throughout ‘Pilgrimage’, an echo that magnifies and exalts the abstract lines. And it’s in the suggestive phrases that burst out of Stipe’s foggy vocal vistas : “this pilgrimage has gained moment, take a turn, take a fortune” sounds like a cryptic plea for the listener to do something greater, worthier; ‘Laughing’ obliquely references the Bible story of Laocoön; a ‘Moral Kiosk’ is clearly something important, but what? Murmur is subliminally suggestive of something vaster, but entrances you by never coming out with what that something is (which is of course exactly what R.E.M. did in order to become megastars).
Finally, melody. No need to labour the point – these are choons. Perfect, taut, hummable choons, laden with intricate harmonies, shimmering, beautiful guitar arpeggios, economic, kinetic bass and drums, the odd well-judged effect (notably the muffled recording of two pool balls colliding on ‘We Walk’), and a balanced song selection that breaks up the mostly misty, mid-tempo, slightly lullaby-ish songs in tone with a few fast pop tracks, one rocker (‘9-9’) and one ballad (‘Perfect Circle’). It’s the reason why all the Byrds comparisons were sort of right, sort of wrong, the music a perfect folk-rock foundation on which something greater could be built.
That’s my take, anyway. I’ve seen others, and maybe the reason for Murmur’s continued potency is that its magic refuses forensic explanation. Contextualise it in indie history all you like, but ultimately Murmur stands alone, a perfect circle.
Rating: 10/10
Amazon.com
Though critics swamped R.E.M.'s 1983 full-length debut with country-rock comparisons to the Byrds, Murmur sounds like no one else. The title is an apt description of Michael Stipe's singing style, although his smooth pop vocal mannerisms sweeten the enigmatic poetry. Like all great bands, R.E.M.'s individual parts (Peter Buck's ringing guitar, drummer Bill Berry's persistent thumping, and Mike Mills's unifying bass) are as interesting as the collective sound. The album-opening "Radio Free Europe" and "Talk About the Passion" endure as its radio singles, but the rest of the songs hang together well taken as a whole. --Steve Knopper