REM's Finest - Day 1

Album - Chronic Town (1982)

Highlight - Carnival Of Sorts (Box Cars)

Reason - Their first EP following the success of a one-off single, found the nascent powers REM would come to wield in their later work.  Carnival Of Sorts, mostly a mumble of snatched words with a stirring choris marked them out as a band with a future.

Stipe Gayness Factor - 0.  Barely aware of his own genitals, Michael's emerging gayness was decades off.