REM

R.E.M. – Collapse Into Now – 2011 Everything on Collapse Into Now sounds like something else. By that I mean there are melodies that harken back to other melodies in REM’s past. I guess this shouldn’t be a surprise, after all, songwriters aren’t fonts of infinite combinations. The ear and Continue Reading

R.E.M. – Accelerate – 2008 Well, this is different. Did someone have a sitdown with Mikey and shake him and tell the boys, “Hey! Dummies! No One is buying your records. We pay you to sell records. Not to masturbate in the studio. Get us something we can sell!” Because Continue Reading

R.E.M. – Around the Sun – 2004 Peter Buck said that for him Around the Sun “… just wasn’t really listenable, because it sounds like what it is, a bunch of people that are so bored with the material that they can’t stand it anymore.” Well, that just about says Continue Reading

How do you answer the world when your first album as a trio is roundly, soundly and decidedly shunned by everyone? You “go back to your roots”. Or you say you’re gonna do that and then you do whatever the hell you want and call it music. R.E.M. – Reveal Continue Reading

R.E.M. – Up – 1998 For years I’ve always felt that Michael Stipe wanted REM to be the American Radiohead. Employing the latter’s engineer for Up cemented that idea. I’ve owned this CD since 98 when it came out. I’ve never, ever, ever listened to it. Wish me luck.By the Continue Reading

R.E.M. – New Adventures in Hi Fi – 1996 When New Adventures came out my brother asked me what I thought about it and my answer was “I wish REM would stop recording their sound checks.” That was my initial response. Turns out I was right about that, too. Unbeknownst Continue Reading

R.E.M. – Monster – 1994 (My apologies for the scattershot writing below, I am listening to the record while writing about it at the same time. Not quite a liveblog, but close.) I always liked “What’s the Frequency, Kenneth. It was precisely the attitude and power I had been hoping Continue Reading

R.E.M. – Automatic for the People – 1992 After all that over production the year before, all of which led to the biggest sales number an Athens, GA college rock band could have imagined, REM went back in the studio and stripped themselves down to the bare core. Automatic for Continue Reading

R.E.M. – Out of Time – 1991 REM had put out a record every year from 1982-1988. But the touring for their major label debut was exhaustive and they wouldn’t enter the studio for another couple years after Green. The result? Their first massive international smash. Everybody had this record. Continue Reading