First heard Vic Ches­nut­t’s “Pan­ic Pure” on the b‑side of R.E.M.‘s mediocre ver­sion of “Sponge,” which sounds indis­tin­guish­able from any of the hard rock­ers on New Adven­tures in Hi-Fi. Her­sh’s ver­sion of “Pan­ic Pure” absolute­ly bewitched me. Here Hersh sings with Vic Chesnutt.

Been think­ing about Ches­nutt quite a bit late­ly. Part of it is that these songs meant so much to me my fresh­man year of col­lege and I feel guilty for not hav­ing explored his music fur­ther. Now that he’s gone I’m look­ing him up on YouTube and find­ing all these great clips that exem­pli­fy what a great pres­ence he had.

Lis­ten to R.E.M.‘s take on “Sponge” below.