Artist	Song
The Smiths	Please, Please, Please Let Me Get What I Want
from The Sound of the Smiths (Deluxe Edition) [Remastered] (2008)
Echo & The Bunnymen	Lips Like Sugar
from Echo & the Bunnymen (2004)
The Replacements	Left of the Dial
from Tim (Expanded Edition) (2008)
The Church	Reptile
from Starfish (1988)
The Smithereens	Behind the Wall of Sleep
from Especially for You (1992)
Hüsker Dü	Don't Want to Know If You Are Lonely
from Candy Apple Grey (2008)
The Dream Syndicate	Tell Me When It's Over
from The Days of Wine and Roses (2005)
The Plimsouls	A Million Miles Away
from Everywhere at Once (1992)
Green On Red	Death and Angels
from Gas Food Lodging / Green On Red (2006)
The dB's	Bad Reputation
from Ride the Wild TomTom (2006)
Let's Active	In Little Ways
from Big Plans for Everybody (2007)
Guadalcanal Diary	Trail of Tears
from Walking In the Shadow of the Big Man (2005)
10,000 Maniacs	What's the Matter Here
from In My Tribe (2007)
The Long Ryders	And She Rides
from The Best of the Long Ryders (2006)
Three O'Clock	Jet Fighter
from Sixteen Tambourines/Baroque Hoedown (1983)
The Rain Parade	This Can't Be Today
from Emergency Third Rail Power Trip (2006)
The Loud Family	The Come On
from Slouching Towards Liverpool (1994)
Blake Babies	Out There
from Sunburn (2001)
Galaxie 500	Blue Thunder
from On Fire (1989)
Thin White Rope	Wire Animals
from Moonhead (1987)
True West	Hollywood Holiday
from Hollywood Holiday Revisited (2007)
The Bats	Calm Before the Storm
from Daddy's Highway (2004)
Absolute Grey	Notes
from Greenhouse (2007)
SUNBIRDS	No Sun No Shadow
from No Sun No Shadow (2003)

Comment:

Like London before it and Seattle after, all ears were glued to the South, where the guitar — if not the Confederacy — was destined to rise again. [i]Murmur[/i] and [i]Reckoning[/i] producer Mitch Easter polished his jangle-genius spurs fronting Let’s Active; while the band never really had a hit, the intoxipop of “In Little Ways” sparkles like a new Rickenbacker’s candy-apple finish. Like R.E.M., the Replacements navigated their career using two compass points: the nearly mythical power popsters Big Star, and that precious, non-commercial slice of radio at the FM dial’s far left end. Their two-stroke-engine-powered “Left of the Dial” is a love letter both to Let’s Active guitarist Angie Carlson and the college stations that made their celebrity possible. And R.E.M.’s British kissin’ cousins, the Smiths, rocketed from indie to icon with a murky, moody mix of tortured-artist pop. In the sad bastard lament “Please, Please, Please, Let Me Get What I Want,” Morrissey again confuses the stage with the psychiatrist’s couch, while Johnny Marr’s downy-soft wash of guitar under the vocal makes misery seem absolutely [i]delectable[/i]. From Galaxie 500 to Echo & the Bunnymen, rockers worldwide followed R.E.M.’s lead, reaching out to new audiences by reaching inside their (often tormented) psyches.

Feedback: