It had been a while since I had listened to my CD of Life's Rich Pageant. So when I threw the new 25th anniversary remastered CD into my Bose Wave radio, I wasn't sure how it compared to the old one.
I listened to the album A LOT when it first came out. How I even came to own it is actually kind of a funny story. I'll cut to the chase. I wanted Robert Palmer's Riptide for Christmas, but my younger brother bought me Life's Rich Pageant instead, because it was better. And what do you know, he was right!
Listening to this album again reminded me of how I listened to R.E.M. back in the day, on vinyl. I really had no idea what any of the songs were about, and for the most part couldn't understand what exactly Michael Stipe was singing.
A lot of phrases of the songs stuck in my head back then..like "this is where we walked, this is where we swam, take a picture here, take a souvenir." "My sweet hyena..." "Run and turn into butter."
After I listened to the CD I put my old one in for comparison purposes, and sonically, the new one is a big improvement. If you're just going to load it onto your iPod, I'm not sure its worth rebuying..but if you have a good stereo or even a Bose CD player like I do, it's worth it to get the upgrade. The remastering sounds great...not different, just better..less tinny, more full.
The bonus CD that came with it was a disappointment. It's made up of 19 songs from a previously unreleased concert, and for the most part sounds too much like the record..and includes early versions of some stuff that would show up on later records! The last song is kind of interesting. "Get On That Way" is an earlier version of "What if we Give It Away," so I guess it's somewhat cool to hear it with different words.
A big fan of R.E.M.? Go buy this 2 CD set. A so-so fan who already owns the CD? Keep the one you've got. Just discovering the band and want to see what the fuss was about before they started singing stuff like "Shiny Happy People?" You should go buy this. They really were quite good.
And so much better than Robert Palmer singing "Addicted to Love."
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The singer sounds like a raspy blues dude who's definitely been around the block a few times....but surprisingly, Jamie N. Commons is only 23 years old!
He was born in England, but...
Last week, I decided I would try one new, healthy food a week, and asked my facebook friends to make some suggestions.
The first thing I tried was mango. I'm sure I've had other mango flavored things, and mango as part of something else, but...
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Hail From: Boston
Song: 'The Wheel'
Album: Diamonds From The Penny Arcade
Sounds Like: Hole, Pearl Jam
In Their Words: "Alchemilla had been trying to write a ballad for a little while but it wasn't happening. There...
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The drinking song couldn't have been any better, or any less fun. We had a blast through out the whole process, and our performance rocked.
This week is an easy...
So the story goes Michael Jackson completed this song while watching cartoons with Paul McCartney. We'll just let that sink in for a moment.
Not sure what cartoons they were watching, but it must have worked because this song made it to number 2...
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