How R.E.M. Is the Last Remaining Exemplar of the Gen-X Dream

They never sold out.

This week, R.E.M. was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame. They celebrated by playing “Losing My Religion,” their most popular song, live. It was the first time the band has performed together on stage since it disbanded in 2011, and the only video I’ve been able to find of it is low-quality footage shot by someone in the crowd with their phone. I hope that’s corrected soon, because if we don’t get a high-quality version of the only R.E.M. performance in 13 years, I’m going to throw a shoe through the wall.

It has been a week to fete R.E.M. Anthony Mason took a break from elbowing Dale Davis in the face to sit down with the band for a rare interview for “CBS This Morning” and visited with them in their studio space here in Athens, Georgia, the town I’ve lived in since 2013 and the town I love. It’s an excellent interview, all the more so because it’s so rare to get them to sit down together and do anything. In public, anyway.