I'm pretty sure their entire current tour is sold out. Pretty impressive for a band most of us had never even heard of a year ago at this time. For those that may have missed it, NPR did a piece on them this afternoon during All Things Considered. It was neat to hear them talk about some of the artists they would cover in clubs, like going from Sabbath to Otis Redding, for instance.

It doesn't just go for kids, it goes for adults as well. Regarding the recent threads here about how rock is "dead", it seems that those of us that know that it isn't are in the minority. I guess I shouldn't be surprised since this is a board devoted to a band that for all intents and purposes, ended in 1980. On a more uplifting note, the Hopscotch Festival folks will be announcing their schedule in less than one week.

Axl Rose Refuses Rock Hall of Fame Induction With 1,038-Word Open Letter (Spin)

Lee Bains III and the Glory Fires, now on tour with the Alabama Shakes. Lee Bains III is also a member of The Dexateens.

Only thing is, we didn't have the option of drawing on nearly infinite playlists via features like "shuffle" on iTunes and iPods. The closest thing to that was creating our own mixtapes.

Very nice and informative read from The Telegraph. Personally, I know that I held off on mp3's for a very long time. That is, until someone gifted me with an iPod Shuffle. I had no idea at the time how that would change the world of listening to music for me. At first, I thought it was a good thing but now, I'm not so sure. These days I have a very bad tendency to rip my new album purchases to iTunes and then file the CD (and/or vinyl record) away, only to never listen to them. That isn't always the case but oftentimes it is. On a very similar note, Johnny Marr talks about the listening experience of vinyl albums vs. mp3's in this clip that was recently posted on the Record Store Day website.

The first single from Bonnie Raitt's new album, Slipstream, which came out yesterday. A reggae-tinged remake of the late Gerry Rafferty's "Right Down the Line".

Live stream being carried by MTV now. You can watch it here if you so desire.

Gary Clark, Jr. performing "Shotgun Man" on KEXP. Gary's entire KEXP performance.

The new World Party box set which is out today. To read more about it as well as an interview with Karl Wallinger, click here.

Thanks, I thought I'd remembered reading that somewhere. The fact that it got played so much on MTV (and VH1) after he died only added to the spookiness of the whole thing.

"Trampled Underfoot" may be their most danceable song but I'm not sure I would call it (or anything they did) "Disco". "The Crunge" reminds me more of James Brown than anything else which would be Funk and not necessarily Disco. The entire album? So that would mean "I'm Gonna Crawl", a Blues tune if I've ever heard one is actually a Disco song? Then again, I don't hear any Disco in "Fool In the Rain" either. What follows the whistle is Samba. Not all music that you can dance to is considered "Disco".

Mike Farris (formerly of the Screamin' Cheetah Wheelies) and The Roseland Rhythm Revue featuring The McCrary Sisters covering Mary Gauthier's "Mercy Now".

ON THIS DATE (28 YEARS AGO) April 9, 1984- R.E.M. Reckoning is released. # ALL THINGS MUSIC PLUS+ 4.5/5 # allmusic 5/5 # Rolling Stone (see original review below) Reckoning is the second album by R.E.M., released on this date in 1984 by I.R.S. Records. Released to critical acclaim, it reached number 27 in the United States—where it was certified gold by the Recording Industry Association of America in 1991—and peaked at number 91 in the United Kingdom. Produced by Mitch Easter and Don Dixon, the album was recorded at Reflection Sound Studio in Charlotte, North Carolina over 16 days in December 1983 and January 1984. Dixon and Easter intended to capture the sound of R.E.M.'s live performances, and used binaural recording on several tracks. Singer Michael Stipe dealt with darker subject matter in his lyrics, and water imagery is a recurring theme on the record. After its debut album Murmur (1983) received critical acclaim, R.E.M. quickly began work on its second album. The group wrote new material prodigiously; guitarist Peter Buck recalled, "We were going through this streak where we were writing two good songs a week [...] We just wanted to do it; whenever we had a new batch of songs, it was time to record". Due to the number of new songs the group had, Buck unsuccessfully tried to convince everyone to make the next album a double record. In November 1983, the band recorded 22 songs during a session with Neil Young producer Elliot Mazer in San Francisco. While Mazer was briefly considered as a candidate to produce the band's next album, R.E.M. ultimately decided to team up again with Murmur producers Mitch Easter and Don Dixon. R.E.M. started recording Reckoning at Reflection Sound in Charlotte, North Carolina, on December 8, 1983. The group recorded over two eight-day stretches around Christmas 1983, separated by two weeks of canceled studio time that allowed the band to play a show in Greensboro, North Carolina, go out to see a movie, and shoot a video in the studio. While the studio diary listed 16 days for recording, the album sleeve later claimed the album was recorded in 14 days, while in interviews Buck at times commented that the album was recorded in 11 days. The producers both disputed that the sessions were that short; Dixon insisted that they were at the studio for at least 25 days (during which he worked eighteen-hour days), while Easter said, "When I read 'eleven days' I thought, what the fuck! It was twenty days, which was still short, but it's not eleven." ORIGINAL ROLLING STONE REVIEW Murky yet emotionally winning, brainy but boyishly enthusiastic, R.E.M.'s debut album, Murmur, burst onto the pop scene last year with minimal fanfare. Though some critics lumped the Athens, Georgia, quartet with the big-guitar bunch (the Alarm, Big Country), R.E.M.'s approach was more delicate and pastoral. Their sound was a curious fusion of vocalist Michael Stipe's bookish, still-wet-behind-the-ears pretension and guitarist Peter Buck's cheerful folky energy. The tunes aside, there was something positively seditious in a song like "Laughing," where an engagingly bright acoustic guitar arpeggio accompanied a lyric like "Laocoon ... martyred, misconstrued." Stipe's words may largely have been indecipherable, but Murmur was consistently intriguing. In short, the best LP of 1983. On Reckoning, R.E.M. has opted for a more direct approach. The overall sound is crisper, the lyrics far more comprehensible. And while the album may not mark any major strides forward for the band, R.E.M.'s considerable strengths — Buck's ceaselessly inventive strumming, Mike Mills' exceptional bass playing and Stipe's evocatively gloomy baritone — remain unchanged. If Murmur showed Buck to be a master of wide-eyed reverie, Reckoning finds him exploring a variety of guitar styles and moods, from furious upstrumming to wistful finger-picking. "Letter Never Sent" displays Buck at his sunniest, whirling off twelve-string licks with hoedown fervor, from a lock-step part in the verse that recalls early Talking Heads, to a cascading, Byrds-like riff in the chorus. Buck proves to be an equally infectious keyboard player; his echoey chords slide easily underneath Stipe's cry of "sorry" on the album's single, "So. Central Rain." And on "7 Chinese Brothers," Buck does it all: curt, distorted background chords, icy piano notes, warm chordal plucking and high-string riffs that drone as Stipe sketches, in a mournful hum, the fairy-tale story of a boy who swallowed the ocean. Yet, for all that aural activity, the song flows with elegiac grace. Stipe, whose voice is usually mixed way back, comes up front for "Camera," an enigmatic account of failed love that's enhanced by an eerie single-string solo from Buck. While less powerful than Murmur's "Perfect Circle," this ballad demonstrates a surprising degree of emotional depth in Stipe's singing. On "(Don't Go Back to) Rockville," a more traditionally structured country rocker, Stipe stretches himself even further, singing in an exaggerated, down-home twang. There's an off-the-cuff feel to much of Reckoning — even some of the band's jams and coproducer Mitch Easter's exhortations are preserved on side two. Unfortunately, improvisational songwriting has its pitfalls. The group, for example, could benefit from a tougher drum sound. Bill Berry shows a deft touch on the cymbals in the peppy "Harborcoat," but the martial beats of "Time after Time (Annelise)" are about as threatening as the Grenadian army. Stipe's amelodic singing also poses problems at times. While the band tends to use his voice as an instrument, his vocalizing in such songs as "Second Guessing" and "Little America" seems out of place, unsatisfying. As a lyricist, Stipe has developed considerably over the past year. In "So. Central Rain," he notes, intriguingly, that "rivers of suggestion are driving me away." Yet he still waxes pedestrian on occasion, as in "Pretty Persuasion," which finds him griping, "Goddamn your confusion." His erratic meanderings may give the band some hip cachet, but they are an impediment that will prevent R.E.M. from transcending cult status. With skill and daring like theirs, the tiniest commercial concessions — some accessible lyrics from Stipe and a major-league drum sound — could win this band a massive audience. Even without those changes, however, R.E.M.'s music is able to involve the listener on both an emotional and intellectual level. Not many records can do that from start to finish. "Jefferson, I think we're lost," cries Stipe at Reckoning's end, but I doubt it. These guys seem to know exactly where they're going, and following them should be fun. ~ Christopher Connelly TRACKS: All songs written by Bill Berry, Peter Buck, Mike Mills, and Michael Stipe except where noted. Side one – Left "Harborcoat" – 3:54 "7 Chinese Bros." – 4:18 "So. Central Rain (I'm Sorry)" – 3:15 "Pretty Persuasion" – 3:50 "Time After Time (AnnElise)" – 3:31 Side two – Right "Second Guessing" – 2:51 "Letter Never Sent" – 2:59 "Camera" – 5:52 "(Don't Go Back To) Rockville" – 4:32 "Little America" – 2:58 1992 I.R.S. Vintage Years reissue bonus tracks "Wind Out" (With Friends) – 1:58 "Pretty Persuasion" (live in studio) – 4:01 "White Tornado" (live in studio) – 1:51 "Tighten Up" (Archie Bell and Billy Butler; cover of Archie Bell & the Drells, 1968) – 4:08 "Moon River" (Henry Mancini and Johnny Mercer; cover of Audrey Hepburn, 1961) – 2:21 2009 Deluxe Edition bonus disc (Live at the Aragon Ballroom) "Femme Fatale" (Lou Reed; cover of The Velvet Underground, 1967) – 3:19 "Radio Free Europe" – 3:54 "Gardening at Night" – 3:38 "9–9" – 2:48 "Windout" – 2:13 "Letter Never Sent" – 3:03 "Sitting Still" – 3:13 "Driver 8" – 3:28 "So. Central Rain" – 3:23 "7 Chinese Bros." – 4:27 "Harborcoat" – 4:34 "Hyena" – 3:26 "Pretty Persuasion" – 3:49 "Little America" – 3:23 "Second Guessing" – 3:07 "(Don't Go Back To) Rockville" – 4:30

With all of those flowers on stage it always struck as a wake, especially after MTV played it nearly constantly in the weeks following Cobain's death. As for the covers, this is my favorite from the album, their version of "Plateau" by the Meat Puppets.

If Gene Simmons keeps on running his mouth I doubt they'll ever get in and for good reason. That said, I they are (or were) deserving of the honor on influence alone, which is the chief criteria for induction. It doesn't have anything to do with an artists' musical abilities (or lack thereof).

If you're a current subscriber to Rolling Stone you have access to all of their back issues online.

Considering this thread is 76 pages deep this has in all likelihood been posted before. If so, here it is again. http://youtu.be/m_wtkJ8j1Uc http://youtu.be/ll3osZF_b9I

As if we needed any further proof that Gene Simmons is a fucking idiot, here's a quote from the previous Rolling Stone article I posted a link to where he's whining about Kiss not being inducted into the Rock n' Roll Hall of Fame: ...and quote from a current Rolling Stone article where he's pushing a restaurant he recently opened: So in one breath, Madonna's part of what's wrong with the Rock n' Roll Hall of Fame because she's a "disco artist". In the next, she's "a true rock star".

I wasn't really expecting anything more beyond the 02 so I can't say that the momentum has slowed for me at all. I used to listen to Zeppelin quite a bit growing up in the 70s and on into the 80s and 90s but somewhere along the line other bands and artists started to get more of my attention listening-wise. Then, sometime in the early 00s I started revisiting their music again. Strangely enough that's roughly when the archival releases (Led Zeppelin DVD and How the West Was Won) came out, which prompted me to visit this board. Considering most of the message boards and email lists I used to follow have come to a crawl (or an absolute halt) in the wake of Facebook and Twitter, it's a wonder there's still any life here at all.

REMHQ has posted a brief piece by their manager Bertis Downes which celebrate the 32nd anniversary of the band that also includes links to several articles about them that were posted upon the news of their disbandment back in September of last year.

This is one of my favorite albums of the 90s. Prine had released a couple records (Aimless Love, German Afternoons) in the mid 80s as imports only which made them pretty difficult to find. In fact, I didn't even know about them until years later. Thankfully, he threw us a bone with John Prine Live in '88 which reminded folks that he was still around. I wouldn't call The Missing Years a "comeback" record as Prine never truly went away but it was a reminder of just how great of an artist he still was.

I probably heard it on the local rock n' roll radio station and I'm sure my initial reaction was one of disbelief. I remember I kept asking one of my older brothers if he'd heard any new news on the radio in the weeks following Bonham's death. One day he just said,"he's still dead". Of course, I stopped asking after that. A few years prior to that I was looking forward to seeing Skynyrd when they were scheduled to play North Carolina on the Tour of the Survivors but that obviously never happened as history took it's course with the plane crash in Mississippi. I had missed Zeppelin when they played Greensboro in '77 so I was looking forward to them touring the U.S. on the heels of In Through the Out Door. Bonham's death was tragic enough as it was but never getting to see them live was salt in an open wound. That's one reason why I revel in others' experiences, especially one of my older brothers who saw them when they played Dorton Arena in Raleigh in the early 70s (he also saw the Jimi Hendrix Experience there).