Music Bloodline

Let's Active

1980s jangle-pop band led by R.E.M. producer Mitch Easter.

Biography

Mitch Easter gained fame in the 1980s as R.E.M.’s producer, but the multi-talented North Carolinan had some musical statements of his own to make with Let’s Active. Like R.E.M., they updated the jangly guitar sound of the Byrds for the New Wave era. Let’s Active released their debut EP, AFOOT, in 1983, showcasing Easter’s gentle-but-insistent pop tunes. The personnel changed drastically over the next couple of years, but Easter remained at the center, releasing three albums in the mid-’80s before ceasing operations around the end of the decade.