An Autumn Harvest

It is an abundant fall for rock. Springsteen and Michael Jackson already, the first solo effort by the Band's Robbie Robertson and another album of guitar magic by Ry Cooder due within a month. The momentum does not stop with the big names, however. Some of the best music around is coming up from below superstar level.

R.E.M. is a Georgia band playing its way past cult status, and its new album, Document (I.R.S. Records), will serve as a tidy introduction to its flights of hard whimsy. Particular attention should be paid to a little ditty titled Its the End of the World as We Know It (And I Feel Fine). But these guys are not just wise-offs. Their King of Birds, with its overlapping rhythms and wisps of Indian instrumentation, is a distinctive anthem of musical independence.

The Brandos, on their Honor Among Thieves (Relativity), sing bold, head-on rock, Creedence Clearwater-style. Tunes like Gettysburg and Hard Luck Runner are of a type that has lately been called, somewhat pejoratively, "roots rock," but a band like the Brandos gives ample evidence that those roots run deep and still offer great nourishment.

The BoDeans should know. Their second album, Outside Looking In (Reprise/ Slash), produced by Jerry Harrison of the Talking Heads, is a tuneful advance over their exceptional debut last year, Love & Hope & Sex & Dreams. They give those roots a few strong twists, then tie them in tight rhythmic knots. Say About Love could almost come from some rediscovered master of a Buddy Holly session in Clovis, N. Mex. What It Feels Like moves like a cat burglar, sounds fresh as tomorrow and -- well, feels like the future.