R.E.M.

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  • Year:
    2007
  • Inducted by:
    Eddie Vedder (Pearl Jam)
  • Category:
    Performers

Introduction

Out of the underground and into the arena.

R.E.M. is the indie band that went on to sell out stadiums; their arrival marked the beginning of alternative rock. They’re strange, poetic, guarded and mischievous—we wouldn’t have it any other way. 

Hall of Fame Essay

2007

Anthony DeCurtis

For a while in the early eighties, it sometimes seemed that nothing in the world of music was as important R.E.M. Maybe even outside the world of music, too.

This was well before the band had enjoyed million-selling albums, huge radio hits, and groundbreaking videos. Devotion to R.E.M. was far less clinical and far more intimate than such quantitative measures.

Indeed, for years it seemed that everybody who loved R.E.M.’s music had personally met the members of the band, or at least seen them perform in the dingy new-wave clubs and out-of-the-way holes-in-the-wall the band played relentlessly.

Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony Program Cover 2007
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