I’ve got red wine in me but I’ll try not to gush as I celebrate one of my all-time favorite albums, R.E.M.’s Murmur, on the 39th anniversary of its release.
Murmur was released during the week of my high school senior prom and, no offence to anyone involved in that event, but Murmur means so much more to me than my prom ever did.
I had no awareness of Murmur as I was adjusting my cummerbund that week, but in August I found myself being strangely intrigued by R.E.M.’s brief set opening for the Police during their Philadelphia Synchronicity tour stop. I don’t remember whether I bought Murmur before or after that performance, but I took it with me to college two weeks later. In that first dorm room, one song at a time, Murmur gradually unfolded itself to me.
It took a while for Murmur to reveal its mysteries, but that’s the mystical thing about this record: 39 years later, driving home from a nice dinner with friends and work associates, Murmur is still revealing mysteries to the 56-year-old man who was once an 18-year-old kid beguiled by this odd new band out of Athens, Georgia.
My senior prom, nice as it was, is nostalgia now. But Murmur will always, always be present tense for me.
~217~