“I was writing some songs that had fake Peter Buck riffs”

I thought this was funny, from the AV Club’s interview with Decemberists frontman Colin Meloy:

AVC: How did you meet Peter Buck [of R.E.M.] and decide to collaborate?
CM: He’s kind of a Pacific Northwesterner these days. I think he splits his time between Seattle and Portland. He’s in The Minus 5 with Scott McCaughey, who’s a local man about town who we rub elbows with. And he’s in Robyn Hitchcock’s band, The Venus 3, and they came out and did some dates with us on the Hazards Of Love tour. So we’ve crossed paths quite a bit. And each time we hang out with him, I don’t stop expressing my undying love for his guitar-playing. I mentioned that I was writing some songs that had fake Peter Buck riffs, and I thought maybe he would think it was funny to come and play them. And he did, and he was very kind.

Um yeah:

Can you say “The One I Love”?

Hey, if you’re going to ape someone, you could do far worse than R.E.M.

(And yes, that’s Gillian Welch doing backing vocals.)

The album is really good, IMO.