Stumble

The R.E.M. Breakdown

jD and Rico are back and this time they're discussing the last track on the Chronic Town EP, Stumble.

Transcript:

[0:14] Hey, it's J.D. here, and I'm joined, as always, by Rico Borrego to discuss the.

[0:18] Work of influential American band R.E.M.

Every week, we'll explore a different song in the band's catalog, working through the discography in chronological order to better understand just why this four-piece is considered soseminal, innovative, and downright awesome. So there's that.

Talk to me, Rico. How the hell are things going on your end?

Oh, pretty good. You know, just been hanging in there, still battling this cold, but, you know. Jeez.

I am, you know, I think my immune system, I haven't fully gotten sick, so I've been on my feet.

Strong like bull. But, you know, no stumbles today.

Ah, well played, my friend. A little stumble, though, I guess.

[1:07] Ball and game, baby. baby. We're, we're, we're finishing up Chronic Town today.

Yeah. This is kind of a bittersweet, isn't it?

It is, but I got to say, I'm really looking forward to the future.

Cause again, the closer we get to, I guess the band's kind of middle of the career.

Yeah. To me, that's, that's my, that's my era, even though I, again, wasn't alive for that era.

Like, you know, it's, it's you know kind of the time period that i enjoy the most from the band but again chronic town an ep that i have enjoyed but after doing these episodes i'm reallyloving chronic town you know i was familiar with the songs but even today's song song stumble i am, i'm actually in love with it way more than i ever thought i would be dude i am blownaway by how much swagger this band brings and how mature they sound on this song and this whole EP, really.

It's quite staggering when you think that they're just young men and they have this much gusto out of the chute, isn't it?

Yeah, and I think maybe the difference between them and other bands is their progression is not as noticeable as other bands.

[2:31] Like, you know, with the last week's episode, we were talking about there were moments that reminded us of future R.E.M. songs and albums. That's right.

And the jump between this EP and their debut album isn't huge. It's not a huge jump.

But like with each album, they do change and they're, you know, adding different sounds and different production and, you know, even like Michael's getting more confident And I thinkwith, with the lyrics, but it's, yeah, it's like they started from a great place and then only got better and better over time.

Yeah. In a sports parlance, they're like a blue chip prospect.

You know, at this point. I'm not quite sure what that means, but, you know, I'm sure you're right about that.

[3:21] Well, shall we talk a little bit about Stumble? Yeah. So it's the last song on Chronic Town.

And it's also the longest song on Chronic Town. It is. It's like by a long shot.

Yeah. It's like over five minutes long, which, you know, we'll probably get into it after we We listened to the song, but I personally don't think it needed to be five minutes.

I think it could have been shortened a little bit. And I think that's something that the band will take into account more on future albums.

I mean, they're not a band that has a typically long songs, at least that I can remember.

No, I don't think so either. Maybe once you get to New Adventures in Hi-Fi, there's some that are a little meandering. Yeah, there's one in particular that's seven minutes long, yeah. Yeah.

[4:10] But yeah, it's kind of a weird song because it's really lightweight for a five-minute song. It's very playful.

Maybe the most playful on the album.

I can see that. Okay, continue. It also seems like it has maybe the least importance when it comes to lyrics as well.

It's very repetitive, isn't it? Yeah, and I think that's where the five minutes kind of is to its downfall a little bit. Yeah, they could have been more economical.

Yeah, they repeat the parts a good bit more.

I think there's still some interesting lyric aspects, and there are a couple of bridges.

So, like, there's parts of the song that aren't just, you know, verse, chorus, verse, chorus.

Like, you know, there's other bit of songwriting that goes into the song.

[5:04] But, yeah, I mean, it's just kind of, it's a feel-good song to me.

It's kind of like a Guardian of Night, but it's just not as tight to me.

I can agree with that. Yeah, it does meander a little bit.

Yeah, and again, if this song was on the radio today, I would prefer it to almost anything that's probably on the radio today.

[5:27] There's no doubt. It's very funny. I was listening to Chronic Town with my wife.

I may have already shared this anecdote, but I remember saying to her, does this sound 40 years old to you?

And she was like, not really, but she's like, you probably need to ask our kids.

Wow. Well, they might have a different answer. That's true. But yeah, I agree.

It does not sound dated. Even the production, for the most part, on all these songs on Chronic Town and Murmur, they sound...

And Murmur, well, when we get to Murmur, there's kind of a reason why the band went into that album with certain expectations.

But yeah, I mean, everything sounds smooth and sounds fresh, even if you listen to it today.

Yeah, I would agree. Should we give it a spin? Let's give it a spin and we'll talk about it after. All right.

[11:51] Alright, well, that was Stumble, last song off of Chronic Town.

JD, what do you feel about this song? I'm curious of where you would rank it on this short EP.

It's interesting, because it's very sing-along, so there's nothing offensive about this song at all.

Maybe the duration. But there's certainly nothing offensive about it, but it's probably fourth or fifth for me.

Yeah, I would agree with that, too. But I will say before, you know, doing this podcast, before doing this episode, it's not a song that I would go back to outside of listening to the wholeEP all the way through.

But now I'm thinking of like playlists that I would put the song on because it has a really good feel.

I mean it kind of begins the song begins with a lot of like the kind of weird sound effects that they would have and Some of the earlier songs like yeah later for Europe like there's someweird kind of sounds and then you hear Michael laughing And I believe he says we're great, Yeah, like it sounds like they're having fun, and I think he says the word teeth which I don'tThey were must have been having a conversation or something like when they were starting the the recording, but yeah Yeah.

[13:09] You know, you have that beginning guitar riff that I'm not sure how he's playing it, but it almost sounds like harmonics at time, which I love guitar harmonics. Yeah.

And, you know, it has a really poppy, breezy kind of feel to it.

Very poppy, very breezy. Yeah. You know, Peter's playing those arpeggios.

[13:33] Mike's bass line. It's not like the most distinctive bass line he's ever played, but it has a real like galloping rhythm to it.

I have the word pulsating written down. Yeah, yeah.

Kind of, you know, it just between his bass and Bill's drums, it has a great energy to it.

It's like driving. But at the same time, when Michael starts singing that melody, it's not like an in-your-face, it's not like Wolves Lower, where it's kind of dark and fast and driving in thatsense.

It's still breezy, but it's not a slow, breezy song. It's upbeat.

It gets you moving. Yeah. Yeah.

I can see early on at shows, people really getting up and dancing to this one.

The funny thing, too, about that is, from the research I did, I think the song was only played about 12 times live.

Are you kidding me? I think it's like the one song on the EP that didn't get a lot of live plays.

It was only played 12 times between 1981 through 1984. Wow.

[14:40] Wow, and then they retired it. Yeah, and they came back, like I've been saying in all the past episodes.

[14:48] In their later tours, 2007-2008, they brought back most of the songs from this EP except for this song, which I can kind of see why, because unless they played maybe a shorterversion of this song, it's just a song that I feel, live today, people wouldn't appreciate.

Back in the 80s, I think this song would have slayed live, but maybe not in today's times um interesting lyrically i really don't know what the song's about no me neither i have no idea imean just i i mean i love the phrase you know we'll stumble through the yard it just sounds like something you would say or do when you're younger yeah um but and then there's he singsthe line we'll stumble through the apt which is i found two Two things it could be. Okay.

It could possibly be the Athens Party Telephone, which at the time was a number set up by Mike Lachowski, lead singer of the band Pylon.

[15:52] I had no clue. Nice nugget, buddy.

Yeah. So apparently that's what it could have been. But I also read some things online where people thought it could have, If APT could have stand for the Athens Public Transit.

[16:09] Athens Public Transit. Here, I thought it was apartment. Like the short form for apartment.

That's the thing. Like the band, you know, Michael's never said what the song's about.

A lot of their, especially the earlier songs, he even says they don't make sense.

So APT might not even be an abbreviation. It could really mean nothing.

And it could mean apartment. It just works phrasing-wise.

Yeah, it just sounds good. Yeah. So, and then later on, you know, there's some lines that I have no idea what they mean. Like, force fields, explorer racing.

No idea. I have no clue about that. Yeah, like, it makes no sense.

[16:49] But he does kind of talk about graveyards again, which, again, with a million, he had mentioned before that the song was about death.

So, but I don't buy it with this song. I think this song is just random words.

Word word solid word solid yeah basically yeah but um it does have a pre-chorus where peter he goes from the arpeggios more to like a faster kind of chunkier guitar riff which remindsme of something like you'd hear on reckoning like um seven chinese bros like it has that kind of feel to it you know yeah so i you know i i do like that between the different, phases of thesong chorus verse pre-chorus like there's different parts um they just they maybe don't stand out as much as on some of their other songs.

[17:40] Yeah, I had difficulty discerning the different parts of this song.

I think the progression kind of stays the same, except for when you get to the big bridge.

But for the most part, yeah, I think the root notes are the same progression through the verse and chorus.

It's just the way Peter plays where he changes it just slightly, which if you play music, you're going to notice it more. But if you don't play music and you're just a casual listener, yeah, it'snot going to sound totally different.

[18:13] What do you think about sequencing? You know, I think with an EP, it's kind of hard to sequence it.

And I do think it's not as important for an EP.

But because this is like their debut outside of Radio Free Europe, it does matter more.

But i think with this five minute song i actually think this is where you put it.

[18:40] Because i i guess if you weren't a fan of this song you could skip it and then you're done with the ep you know right if the song was shorter then i think you could have rearranged ithink if the song was like a three minute song you maybe could have swapped it with gardening a night and gardening a night would have been a nice closer for the ep i think so too like ialways love the idea and this is in my own head but i love the idea of the last song of a record, being something that leads you into the next record in a way and i know that that's like, nextto impossible but there's something that i you know like i'll often look for breadcrumbs or clues inside of a song to see if I can link it to the next record in any way.

And I think Gardening at Night would work better heading into Murmur than Stumble.

Yeah, it does sound a bit more like something you would hear on Murmur, Gardening at Night. It does kind of remind me of Sitting Still.

[19:49] Not note for note, but it just has the same energy.

Where stumble is kind of i don't know if we really get another song like stumble if going through the rest of their discography like they have oh they have playful songs on the next twoalbums at least, um fables it gets a little weird but i don't know if you get something that's this kind of just.

[20:14] Like it's just light like it doesn't have a lot of weight to it the lyrics really don't seem like they mean anything you know and so in that sense i do agree with you like i do thinkgardening a night is a better you know transition from their very first release to like our their first big boy record you know debut um i will say the song does have you know it has acouple little bridges but the big bridge happens kind of right in the middle of the song um where it like kind of gets quiet for a second but then you have like these backwards guitars ithink it's some like reverse guitar effect going on and you have some like kind of eerie background noises and like and then michael's doing this like spoken word bit which yeah i havenot read this biography but But there's a biography about the band called It Crawled from the South.

And apparently the author Marcus Gray stated that this bridge, the spoken word bit, came from a 1957 copy of the magazine Cavalier.

Of course it did. Like the most like unknown thing.

Apparently Cavalier was like a low budget version of Playboy.

Okay. So I don't know how much truth there is to that, you know?

[21:37] Um, it is interesting. Cause like in that little spoken word bit, he is, he does sing hips, hipster town.

I thought that was really interesting as well. Like when did that word become in fashion?

I don't know. Yeah. Like hipster was like, you know, at least over the last, what, 10 years?

Like, yeah, sure. Maybe 15, but yeah.

Like it was a word where it was like being used almost too much, you know, like, yes.

Yes but and i just like that word in this context because you know chronic town, like i don't know if that was just a coincidence or on purpose right um he also mentions um round aboutmidnight which uh is the title of a miles davis album did not know that either but again i i do any of these things actually make sense and fit with one another i don't think so.

[22:27] Like yeah i think it's a jigsaw puzzle i think it's just things that sounded good you know yeah and i think and they do sound good yeah i mean they're catchy i i've been this course ofthe song for the last week i've been like kind of just humming it in my head like you know it is very playful and it's addictive but it yeah it doesn't hold the weight to even some of thesongs off Murmur, you know? Right.

And I will say again, the playing on every instrument on this song is great.

After that bridge, there's like a variation to Mike's bass line where he does this like kind of little walk down at the end of the riff, which I love.

[23:10] And Bill, like during the choruses, he's doing those really big tom hits.

Yes. And like I said on the last episode, I think for this EP, Bill is kind of like the MVP. Right.

[23:23] I can see that, because the beginning of this song with the, like, it's almost like double time or something like that.

Like, it's, I don't speak music very well, so.

No, yeah, no, that's it. And he does that, I think, on a lot of songs on this EP, like, during certain sections, you know?

Like when you think of how mid-tempo the melody is, it really contrasts with the bounciness of the guitar, the pulsing of the bass, and that double time of the drums.

And then you get Michael coming in with like, it's very low tempo, you know?

Yeah. And yet it's incongruent with the rest of the song. Yeah.

Yeah. Not at all. And speaking of Michael, when I was listening to it this morning, the part where he sings ball and chain, for some reason, he sings it with a different, he makes it soundalmost a little southern in the way, just that line, which reminds me of where he gets to on Reckoning with Don't Go Back to Rockville.

Ah, yeah, I can see that. Yeah, like he it's kind of I so again It's you know, maybe a little sign of what's to come and you know, that's long reckoning definitely does not.

[24:50] Sound that's not the sound of the whole album, but Again, it's just little moments where I wonder when they're writing music down the road if he's like, oh, okay I sing that part andstumble where it was a little kind of southern accent Maybe I'll do that for this whole song, you know, I, Interesting. Well, when we have him on the show, we'll have to ask him.

Yeah. Was that your intention? Yes.

[25:13] Yeah. So, you know, I guess as we wrap up this song and this EP, I mean, I think I already know the answer, but, you know, if you had to pick a favorite, what song are you picking?I'm picking Gardening at Night.

And, you know, I think on our earlier episode, I said I'd probably pick Wolves Lower, but I think I got to go Gardening at Night, too.

Yeah. I don't know if it's because you persuaded me, but if I could only listen to one song from this album, I think I'd want to pick more of an upbeat, feel-good song, and that's Gardeningin the Night. Yeah, for sure.

For sure. Yeah, I think Stumble is actually a really good song.

[25:53] Kind of wish I had paid it more attention when I was first getting into the band.

But that could be said about a lot of their early work, because I worked my way backwards, where a lot of people work their way forwards.

I worked my way backwards as well, because I didn't become exposed to them really until Green.

And then I worked my way back to Document and fell in love with Document and stayed with Document for a long time.

And then Automatic came out, and I was just glued to Automatic.

So it was a little while before I got into Fables and Murmur and Chronic Town.

But, you know, Reckoning and the rest.

So, anything else to say about Stumble?

No, I think we covered it. I mean, it's a long song, but again, it's an earlier song, so I don't think there's a lot hidden within the song, and that's okay.

[26:46] We'll get to, I think, maybe even as early as Fables, you really get into some lore within the songs that is great, but this song and a lot of this EP is just fun.

It's just good music.

Agreed. well on behalf of Rico this is JD saying blink your eyes and we'll be back.