could have predicted how a guitar band from Athens, Georgia would turn into the biggest international alt-rock darlings of the 1990s—and yet, that’s exactly what R.E.M. did. The lo-fi genius of their eternally mumbly/jangly first single, “Radio Free Europe,” released as a 7-inch 45 on their local indie label Hib-Tone in July 1981, essentially reset the song-arrangement table for what became known as college rock. Year by year, R.E.M. planted more than enough sonic seeds about where. Though ’s expansive sound palette took full advantage of a much-bigger recording budget, R.E.M.’s world domination vision instead came to fruition on their more refined, more stripped-down second Warner Bros. release, the unequivocal worldwide smash hit, March 1991’s .
