38: Begin the Begin / Robert Dean Lurie

Begin the Begin is the first biography of R.E.M. wholly
researched and written since they disbanded in 2011. It offers by
far the most detailed account of the group's formative
years--their early lives, their first encounters with one
another, their legendary debut show, early tours in the back of a
van, initial recordings, their shrewdly paced rise to fame.


The people and places of the American South are crucial to the
R.E.M. story in ways much more complex and interesting than have
previously been presented, claims Robert Dean Lurie; he explores
the myriad ways in which the band's adopted hometown of Athens,
Georgia--and the South in general--shaped its members and the
character of their art. The South is much more than the
background here; it plays a major role: the creative ferment that
erupted in Athens and gripped many of its young inhabitants in
the late 1970s and early '80s drew on regional traditions of
outsider art and general cultural out-thereness, and gave rise to
a free-spirited music scene that produced the B-52's and Pylon,
as well as laying the ground for R.E.M.'s subsequent breakout
success.


Lurie has tracked down and interviewed numerous figures in the
band's history who were underrepresented in, or absent from,
earlier biographies--they contribute previously undocumented
stories and cast a fresh light on the familiar narrative.


ABOUT ROBERT DEAN LURIE


Robert Dean Lurie is a writer and musician based in Tempe,
Arizona. He received his MFA in Creative Writing from the
University of North Carolina Wilmington and is the author of
"Begin the Begin: R.E.M.'s Early Years," "We Can Be Heroes: The
Radical Individualism of David Bowie," and "No Certainty
Attached: Steve Kilbey and The Church."


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