Miracle Legion were a Connecticut-based band that immediately sprang to life on the heels of a post-R.E.M. guitar rock boom, chiefly because lead singer Mark Mulcahy's voice bore an uncanny resemblance to Michael Stipe's, and the arpeggio guitar structures were akin to Peter Buck's. But the band -- Ray Neal (guitar), Jeff Wiederschall (drums), and Steven West (bass), and later just Mulcahy and Neal -- ultimately became unique in its own right. The Backyard EP, released by the small Incas Records label in 1984, was an immediate college radio hit, and the band rode high on its p...