News Roundup 2011: September

R.E.M. took everyone by surprise by deciding to call it quits. They said "To our Fans and Friends: As R.E.M., and as lifelong friends and co-conspirators, we have decided to call it a day as a band. We walk away with a great sense of gratitude, of finality, and of astonishment at all we have accomplished. To anyone who ever felt touched by our music, our deepest thanks for listening." The move was particularly surprising considering that they had released a brand new album just a few months beforehand, but their minds were seemingly made up and they have repeatedly confirmed that nothing whatsoever would get the band back together in the future.

They left us with a final compilation album and a trio of new tracks which they had recorded shortly after their last album.

Canada's bizarre eight month radio ban on Dire Straits' Money For Nothing was lifted in September. The story goes that in February 2010 one listener complained to the Canadian Broadcast Standards Council that the radio station CHOZ-FM played the unedited version of the 1985 hit, which of course contains the ironic use of the word "faggot" three times. In January the song was banned outright. However, that decision was overturned on the basis that "the composer's language appears not to have had an iota of malevolent or insulting intention."