Document Exhumed

Next in alphabetical line for my R.E.M. immersion is 1987's Document.

I blogged about this album on it's 20th anniversary and it's probably my third or fourth favorite album of theirs after Murmur, Automatic, and possibly Fables. It was the record that "broke" them commercially, breaking the Billboard Top Ten and spawning a top ten single. "The One I Love" entered the Top 40 the same week as the Dead's "Touch Of Grey" and peaked at the same position (#9).

Document was the first R.E.M. album produced by Scott Litt, and seems like a conscious effort to tighten their sound for wider commercial appeal. The BBC/VH1 Seven Ages Of Rock documentary on the "U.S. Alternative" said the album was "proto-grunge" that set the stage for bands like Nirvana. I've never heard that before, but Document was a bit grungier than the R.E.M. albums before it.  Apparently Litt and the band were aiming for something closer to their live sound, and they succeeded at that.

Strange as it may sound, Document was one of the albums that fueled my interest in classic jazz. I liked Steve Berlin's sax solo on "Fireplace", which apparently came about when they told him to sit back and play something like John Coltrane. Peter Buck said this in an interview in the Tower Records Pulse magazine interview where he listed Coltrane's Giant Steps as one of his "desert island discs". I was reading this at Tower Records so I browsed over to the jazz section and picked up the tape of Giant Steps for $4.99. Tower Records was a godsend in the pre-internet days. All the records you could ever need, in almost any genre, all in one place.

When I listen to Document these days, it's a little disheartening that a lot of the songs are still topical and apropos twenty plus years later. Instead of a period document of the Reagan years, it's still a picture of right here right now. In fact, things were more innocent back in the late 80s. Arms for hostages? Pshaw! It's not like Reagan started an illegal war in Central America and kept U.S. troops there for five years. There were a lot of silly things about the 80s (like mullets and acid-washed jeans) but I'd still take RWR over GWB any day.