Recently, Bauke and Mertens conjectured that the local statistics of energies in random spin systems with discrete spin space should in most circumstances be the same as in the random energy model. We review some rigorous results confirming the validity of this conjecture. In the context of the SK models, we analyse the limits of the validity of the conjecture for energy levels growing with the volume of the system. In the case of the Generalised Random energy model, we give a complete analysis for the behaviour of the local energy statistics at all energy scales. In particular, we show that, in this case, the REM conjecture holds exactly up to energies $E_N<\b_c N$, where $\b_c$ is the critical temperature. We also explain the more complex behaviour that sets in at higher energies.