Intro to MONSTER

  At midnight on September 27, 1994 I bought my first fresh R.E.M. album, MONSTER.  I drove the 15 miles to Manchester, NH with my friend Christy and we sat in the parking lot expecting the midnight madness sale at Strawberries to be crazy.  I think when the doors opened there were only about ten customers.  Of course!  They had a million copies of the damn album, why would anyone shop for it at that late hour?  I bought the cassette ... don't laugh, my car only had a tape player ... it was 1994, okay?  Christy bought an official book with the CD in the back and a bunch of photos which she gave me a year later.
  We had already heard 'Kenneth,' so I remember sitting in the car as 'Eyeliner' played and thinking that this was the first new song from R.E.M. that I had heard from music that I personally purchased ... plus I was one of the first people to hear it at all!  Christy enjoyed that track, but as the album went on she was less and less impressed, while I was more enthralled.  This was the beginning of the end of her fandom, even when we went to see the band live the next year and could not believe that we were in the same room as the four men from Athens, GA she was slipping away from the group.  I couldn't get enough.
  Buck said while recording that the goal was to put all the mandolins, banjos, and dulcimers away and simply rock out.  Was Monster a response to Nevermind and the burgeoning alt rock movement started in Seattle and sweeping the country?  Did the band feel pressure to get back on the Rock and Roll track after a couple of brilliant Adult Contemporary albums?  The very movement that the band had a hand in inspiring was taking off and it was time to rear back and turn up and let it rip.  Plus, they were now being influenced themselves by this young group of musicians.  The songwriting called for this type of heavy hand, but you can be sure that the start of the sound was Buck.  There's no way he didn't have a wall of sound and a million effects to play with.  Most of the guitar tracks on this album are very simple, but heavily layered and effected.  The result is pretty astounding, but I'd love to hear an acoustic version of this album ... I think the songs would stand up ...
   Also, in looking back at this album I think it's the most obvious in terms of concept album. I usually point to this album when I describe R.E.M. as an art-house band. Highly conceptual and obsessed with the mystique of the Velvet Underground, I believe that this type of offering is what the band always saw themselves as--a creation of theme and style, treating each song and album as a work of art. This is what Peter means when he says a song doesn't fit the feel of an album. When they were crafting the sound of each incarnation of the band, the product was at the forefront of their minds and each album has a concept. It's why even when the albums are uneven, they still work.
  First up ... WHAT'S THE FREQUENCY KENNETH ...

THE AUTOMATIC BOX SET: FIRST WE TAKE MANHATTAN

  A little time has passed since my last post.  I am going to wrap up the Automatic Box here even though there is one more CD to transcribe because I want to get started on Monster.  I will someday revisit these other songs, but for now here is the last and my favorite cover.  The band introduces a very heavy guitar sound to this Leonard Cohen cover and the results are brilliant.  I like Cohen, but this version gives the song an edge that his 80's synth pop sound just couldn't accomplish.  The links below will actually ask you to go to YouTube directly ... but well worth it to hear how the versions differ ...

FIRST WE TAKE MANHATTAN

They sentenced me to twenty years of boredom
For trying to change the system from within
I'm coming now I'm coming to reward them

First we take Manhattan

Then we take Berlin

I'm guided by a signal in the heavens
I'm guided by this birthmark on my skin
I'm guided by the beauty of our weapons

First we take Manhattan

Then we take Berlin

I'd really like to live beside you baby
I love your body, and your spirit, and your clothes
But you see that line there moving through the station
Oh I told you, oh I told you, oh I told you I was one of those

You loved me as a loser but now you’re worried that I just might win
You know the way to stop me but you don't have the discipline
How many nights I prayed for this, to let my work begin

First we take Manhattan

Then we take Berlin

I don't like your fashion business mister
I don't like these drugs that keep you thin
I don't like what happened to your sister

First we take Manhattan

Then we take Berlin

I'd really like to live beside you baby
I love your body, and your spirit, and your clothes
But you see that line there moving through the station
Oh I told you, oh I told you, oh I told you I was one of those

Did I thank you for those items that you sent me?
The monkey and the plywood violin
I practiced every night, now I'm ready

First we take Manhattan

Then we take Berlin

Oh, remember me?  I used to live for music
Remember me?  I brought your groceries in
Its Father's Day and everybody's wounded

First we take Manhattan

Then we take Berlin

  Pretty simple fuzzed out guitar with feedback throughout.  I tabbed the beginning and the end, but after the end where I stopped, Buck just doodles around the same notes as the song fades ... 

FIRST WE TAKE MANHATTAN

Intro

Guitar 1

e|----------0----|

B|-0-1h-1-3h-----|

G|-----------2---|

D|---------------|

A|---------------|

E|---------------|

Intro

Guitar 2 (x4)

e|-----0-0-0---|

B|-----1-1-1---|

G|-2---2-2-2---|

D|-2---2-2-2---|

A|-----0-0-0---|

E|-----0-0-0---|

Verse

e|-0---0-0-0---0---0-0-0---|

B|-3---3-3-3---1---1-1-1---|

G|-2---2-2-2---2---2-2-2---|

D|-0---0-0-0---2---2-2-2---|

A|-------------------------|

E|-------------------------|

Chorus

e|-3---1---0------0------|

B|-3---1---0------1------|

G|-4---2---1------2------|

D|-5---3---2------2------|

A|-5---3---2------0------|

E|-3---1---0-------------|

Bridge

e|-0---0---3---1---3-0---0---0----|

B|-1---1---3---1---3-1---1---1----|

G|-0---0---0---2---0-0---0---2----|

D|-2---2---0---3---0-2---2---2----|

A|-3---3---2---3---2-3---3---0----|

E|-0---0---3---1---3-0---0---0----|

Bridge

e|-0---0---0---3---1---0------0---------|

B|-1---1---1---3---1---0------1---------|

G|-0---0---2---4---2---1------2---------|

D|-2---2---2---5---3---2------2---------|

A|-3---3---0---5---3---2------0---------|

E|-0---0---0---3---1---0----------------|

Outro Lead (Am-G)

e|-------------------------------------|

B|-0-1h-0----1-3-1-0-1--------0--------|

G|-------0-2------------2-0-2---2>4-7--|

D|-------------------------------------|

A|-------------------------------------|

E|-------------------------------------|