Rob is best known as one-fifth of London Pop Noir wonders Luxembourg, although he does a nice sideline in solo stuff too. His principal interests are jumping around on stage and watching all of the Ghostbusters films, and he has been lucky enough to make most of his adult life about both.
"R.E.M. are my absolute favourites.
I can hear my life in any number of city bands, but R.E.M. are the only ones who can speak to both that and my countryside upbringing. While I hesitate to draw too many parallels between Athens GA and Frisby-on-the-Wreake, I can hear the crop fields and big skies of the latter in great swathes of the R.E.M. back catalogue, and it always hits me like a welcome hug from the past when I hear it. So much of my visual memory is tied to Green, Automatic and Monster: Hours watching the yellow light of a gritting lorry vanish across the valley into the night, cars passing on a sunset road seen from the back seat, a six-mile walk home across the fields starting at midnight. All magical.
I was honoured to be asked to contribute to this compilation and then daunted by having to choose a song! In the end I went for I Wanted to be Wrong from Around the Sun, the album widely considered to be the band's nadir. As the kind of fan who can find something to love in any era of R.E.M., I always wondered if the perceived failure of Around the Sun had more to do with the production, and the since-admitted confusion of the band with regards to finishing the album, than the songs themselves. With that in mind, this is my attempt to do I Wanted to be Wrong as if it was written and released by the R.E.M. of 1989. The R.E.M. of Green and Tourfilm.
It's a noble enough ambition, anyway. I hope you like it."
thelondonrobbritton.bandcamp.com
luxembourgpopnoir.bandcamp.com
thelondonlaverne.bandcamp.com