Wednesday, March 25, 2009

That's me in the corner, that's me in the spotlight

Ok, here's the deal. we here at the Monkey have been on a total R.E.M. kick the last few weeks. Squeezing every ounce out of their discography from Murmur to Up. We needed to find some reason to share the love across the Blogosphere. Hence the following.

On or around this date in 1991, R.E.M. had their first No. 1 with their 'breakout' hit, Losing My Religion. The group, were the zeitgeist of college rock, and had been simmering just below the mainstream for at least five years prior to the sudden, overnight, crossover success of the song. Props to the mandolin.

The song was the first single from their multi-Grammy winning, Warner Bros. release Out of Time. It was recorded at Bearsville Studio in upstate New York and released on February 19, 1991. It remained on the charts for a whopping 21 weeks. Nothing would ever be the same for the boys from Athens.

In an attempt to not turn this into a dissertation about my current disappointments with R.E.M., suffice to say they are not the band they used to be (drummers are important!), we'd rather celebrate the band and the song with a twenty ought nine mashup of R.E.M. and perennial diva Cher. Surprisingly, somehow it works.

I'm just sayin'.

Losing My Religion
Losing My Believe (R.E.M. vs Cher)

R.E.M- Losing My Religion (Out of Time, 1991)

REM - Losing My Religion Acoustic (& Accident) - 1991 - Click here for more blooper videos

R.E.M. vs. Cher- Losing My Believe (2008)

No comments: