I'm a huge fan of R.E.M, and especially their early work.
They put “indie rock” on the map; they put “college rock” on the map, and they put “alternative rock” on the map, and it is because of R.E.M. that terms like “left of dial” were even coined.
R.E.M.’s first three albums “Murmur” from 1983, “Reckoning” from 1984, and “Fables of the Reconstruction” from 1985 are quintessential indie rock albums, but most of today’s indie rock fans don’t know this, and they have no idea how pivotal those first three R.E.M. albums were to the indie rock scene. I recently had a conversation with a girl in her early 20’s who was a self-proclaimed “huge indie rock fan,” and after she reeled off a few decent current indie rock bands that she liked, I asked her what she thought of R.E.M. and their role in the indie rock scene. Her reply, and I quote was that “R.E.M. is a mainstream band, and they are to music what a ‘big-box-store’ is to shopping.” I guess in her defense, R.E.M. has been very mainstream for a long time now, but you would think that a “huge indie rock fan” would at least know where her favorite genre of music originated.
After “Document,” R.E.M. signed with Warner Brothers for $80M (the largest record deal in history at that time), so they were by definition no longer an indie rock band. Here’s the interesting thing, though. With that move to Warner Brothers, R.E.M. redefined what the term indie rock meant. Up until then, it literally meant that you were on an independent label. R.E.M.’s deal with Warner marked the turning point where the term indie rock became more of a genre of music and type of sound, rather than who was producing your records, and this still holds true today. Many of the bands that indie rock fans cite as their favorite bands are on major labels, and not on independent labels, and that change is definitely due to R.E.M.
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