Red Mosquito

2004-2013. Only one selection, so make it count.




It was a tough call between this and World Wide Suicide. I have a pretty similar relationship with both songs. They are each fast and aggressive numbers that came at a time where I was worried whether or not either band could be bothered to bring their A game anymore. In the end i'll give the nod to Living Well since I was more anxious for a great REM song (I like Riot Act a hell of a lot more than Around the Sun). In either case this was a fall in love all over again moment, and this may very well be the best fast song in REM's catalog. For that to come along at album 14 25 years in is remarkable.

I love everything about this song. The dirty riff, the vicious sarcasm, the take no shit aesthetic, the coiled anger, the rough and angular way the song chases after itself. It's a snarling, spitting dog trying to bite its own tail.

This version is from the amazing Live at the Olympia set of rehearsal shows where they are testing the works in progress that would become Accelerate.

just one song?

Just one.

I went to post one and realized it was 2002..thats my last favorite one

stip wrote:Just one.

I can't.

theplatypus wrote:

stip wrote:Just one.

I can't.

you must.

what if it was released before 2004 and i heard it last decade?

just go with your gut. Then you can spend the rest of the year regretting your choice and pick something else for the 2005-2014 thread.

--- wrote:what if it was released before 2004 and i heard it last decade?

that's kind of a gray area.

stip wrote:just go with your gut. Then you can spend the rest of the year regretting your choice and pick something else for the 2005-2014 thread.

everybody blurts

stip wrote:

--- wrote:what if it was released before 2004 and i heard it last decade?

that's kind of a gray area.

I wouldn't delete the song, but I wouldn't be pleased, either

stip wrote:

--- wrote:what if it was released before 2004 and i heard it last decade?

that's kind of a gray area.

spike wrote:

stip wrote:just go with your gut. Then you can spend the rest of the year regretting your choice and pick something else for the 2005-2014 thread.

everybody blurts

Find the Liver

good thread

You're just trolling for more YouTube videos that you can slaughter with your pen of justice, aren't you?

2013 was a bust. I'm hoping if we cast a wider net I'll do better.

I'd much rather just reserve my vitriol for the Beatles.

2013 was an amazing year for music and it's a shame that all you got out of it was Lightning Bolt.

I am probably going to get around to that Cvurches album eventually. It's not my fault there was so much crap in that best of 2013 thread.

All right, I will do my best.

I won't say this is my single favorite song from the last ten years, but going with my gut and not scanning my CD collection for confirmation, I will say pretty confidently that there isn't one I like better.


And because you're a lyrics guy:

Anda my love, wake up to your window, the day calls in billows
Its echoing moonlight onto the blue nightmare of your heart
In cozy red rainbow, its shaking off halos
And the memory of our sacred so and so

Oh, take my hand sweet, complete your release
Unbury your feet and married we'll be
Alone in receiving, ours is a feeling not that they would see
They dont know that we could be down where your cradle escaped the sea
And your raven haired mama caught told you so

We're hanging in the shadow of your family tree
Your haunted heart and me
Brought down by an old idea whose time has come
And in the shadow of the gallows of your family tree
There's a hundred hearts soar free
Pumping blood to the roots of evil to keep young

Only your mind, is it safe to say that weve waited patiently
Call me on time and recall the tune
That has placed us gracefully all into line
There's a garden grave and a place they've saved for you
I'll fall by your side though your silver haired mama throes told you so

We're hanging in the shadow of your family tree
Your haunted heart and me
Brought down by an old idea whose time has come
And in the shadow of the gallows of your family tree
There's a hundred hearts soar free
Pumping blood to the roots of evil to keep it young

And now well gather in the shadow of your family tree
In haunted harmony
Brought down by an old idea whose time has come
And in the shadow of the valley of your family tree
There's a hundred hearts soar free
Pumping blood to the roots of evil to keep us young

Perhaps not über fave but number one at this moment: