\\\///\\\/// It's the ongoing R.E.M. SUPER SUMMER POLL of POLLS \\\///\\\///

Not only deadlier but smarter too! The results of all the album-by-album REM polls have been sorted and culled and it's time to have a hopelessly-ambitious, possibly doomed poll to end all REM polls...!

I used the album-by-album polls as a substitute for the usual nominations thread, with some boring mathemagical manipulation: The top three finishers from each album were included (just one each from Chronic Town [an EP] and the rarities category). If there was a tie, the album got one extra slot. To control for high finishers on albums nobody liked, I culled out anything that didn't get at least three votes. Then, to avoid neglecting very well-liked songs that were squeezed out on REALLY popular albums, I ADDED anything that made at least as much as the median of the #3 finishers (7 votes and up). This turned out to be a small set of wild-cards, but the point was just to make sure nothing really beloved got left out because it was on an album with even MORE beloved stuff.

Confused yet? Well, the point is that we now have a large enough list of generally well-liked R.E.M. songs - with a few surprising dark horses - to make this an interesting contest.

THE NOMINEES ARE:

(don't go back TO) ROCKVILLE
Ages of You
Beat A Drum
Carnival of Sorts (Box Cars)
Country Feedback
Crazy
Cuyahoga
Daysleeper
Disturbance at the Heron House
Drive
Driver 8
E-Bow The Letter
Electrolite
Fall On Me
Feeling Gravitys Pull
Find the River
Finest Worksong
Fretless
Gardening At Night
Harborcoat
Hope
Imitation of Life
King of the Road
Kohoutek
Leave
Leaving New York
Let Me In
Losing My Religion
Moral Kiosk
Near Wild Heaven
Nightswimming
Orange Crush
Perfect Circle
Pretty Persuasion
Radio Free Europe
Sad Professor
Shaking Through
Sitting Still
So. Central Rain
Strange Currencies
The Lifting
The One I Love
These Days
Turn You Inside Out
What's The Frequency, Kenneth?
Wolves, Lower
World Leader Pretend
You Are The Everything
WILDCARD (specify)

Email ballots to remp✧✧✧.i✧✧@gm✧✧✧.c✧✧. Please DON'T post them in the thread - I won't compile them and it takes the fun away for everyone else!

I am about to go away on a long trip - if there are enough ballots when I get back to regular computer use (late July/early August), I'll do the results then; if not, this keeps on rolling...so, spread the word! Tell non-ILX REM fans about it! Get them to join ILX and check out all the great ILX REM threads, etc etc! This should be a lot of fun.

Ballot format - copy and past the following text and type in your songs.

My ILX username:
#1 (15 pts)
#2 (14 pts)
#3 (13 pts)
#4 (12 pts)
#5 (11 pts)
#6 (10 pts)
#7 (9 pts)
#8 (8 pts)
#9 (7 pts)
#10 (6 pts)
#11 (5 pts)
#12 (4 pts)
#13 (3 pts)
#14 (2 pts)
#15 (1 pts)

Obviously, you get up to 15 choices. Your #1 song gets the most weight in the poll (15 points) and your #15 gets the least (1 point). You can pick fewer than 15 if you want; you're just discarding those other slots. To reduce ballot-stuffing, please only one ballot per ilxor - so you do need to give your ILX name!

If you want, you can use the WILDCARD slot to throw in a maximum of ONE song that didn't make the nominee list. But you can't tell anybody what it is! I think it'd be fun if something outside the margins ended up placing high due to an unspoken consensus. Anyway, just make sure you type WILDCARD in your ballot, followed by the song.

Okaaaaaaaay, that's it - I hope this is fun for everybody! If this thread goes dormant I'll revive it when I can just to keep it out there. I don't know that ILX has quite the number of REM fans as it does other things but I think with a little crossover to other boards, etc., this could be an entertaining exercise...

Wow, not sure what happened with the formatting there. The email address should be remp✧✧✧.i✧✧@gm✧✧✧.c✧✧. That's

r e m p o l l
DOT
i l x
AT
gmail.com

Man, I applaud your thoroughness and look forward to the results.

First ballot received! This is very novel and exciting for me.

Windout

I'm sending mine in a few minutes here..

I'll send one tonight; it's a surprisingly hard list to pick from as it doesn't contain many of my favorites, and so my picks are making me look like the kind of REM fan I don't want to be.

Yeah, it's tough. My ballot made me feel like the stereotypical "they peaked with Chronic Town and Murmur" kind of dude, but hey, those are my faves.

yeah, for me add Reckoning to the list; but I'm really not like this, honest!

I recently picked up Reckoning on vinyl and have been listening to it heavily the past few days. I probably should have waited a few days to vote. d'oh!

Ballot in. Pretty random order once I picked my fifteen, tbh.

I'm pretty sure the only unspoken consensus about my WILDCARD (#8 with a bullet) is that 'people with taste' hate it, but I'd love to be proved wrong.

wildcard = #2 'tongue'

I hope ebow doesn't win

Ballot in. Hope e-bow doesn't actually win, but it's on my list, it's a good song.

I'm pretty sure the only unspoken consensus about my WILDCARD (#8 with a bullet) is that 'people with taste' hate it, but I'd love to be proved wrong.

Your WILDCARD is "Shiny Happy People" and I claim my five.

I forgot to put in a WILDCARD but if I had, it _would_ have been "Shiny Happy People."

Surely the WILDCARD is Radio Song?

Eight ballots so far, with five wildcards - of which two are for the same song already! There could be a surprise contender...

I've got a feeling there are a couple of wildcard choices that could end up pretty high. There are at least two perennial live favourites that don't appear here for one.

haha I actually love Shiny Happy People but neither that, nor Radio Song, are it.

I've voted, but hardly ever venture over here from ILE so will probably never know the result.

Recommend bookmarking this thread - it will be a long time before the results appear but I'll revive this when that day comes.

I've voted, but hardly ever venture over here from ILE so will probably never know the result.

Use site new answers. It'll blow your MIND!

Yeah, it's tough. My ballot made me feel like the stereotypical "they peaked with Chronic Town and Murmur" kind of dude, but hey, those are my faves.

But they did peak wi . . . oh, never mind.

Carnival of Sorts (Box Cars)

This is A+ good, hard to beat. Actually, I have a lot of nostalgic attachment to Electrolite
, too, for some reason.

ballot sent; should be fun to see this when it's done!

Hey everybody, just a reminder - please cut and paste the ballot from the OP, or failing that, type out "15 points:" rather than "#1" - I'm alt-tabbing between gmail and excel, and it's a lot easier to keep it straight in my head with just the number of points. Thanks!!

That being said - 14 ballots in and every time I think a consensus is emerging the numbers shift under me. Lots of fun.

I'm hoping that people are including a sentence or two about some of their picks. It's one of my fave things about the other mega-sized polls on ILX.

ah, yes, should have done that

If I vote for Furry Happy Monsters as my wildcard, will that get counted as a Shiny Happy People vote?

I didn't include any sentences, but I could send those if Doctor Casino thinks having these from people would be cool.

Sentences would be great! ILX is such a great generator of good reads of songs.

Furry Happy Monsters would get counted separately, just in the hopes that enough people would pick it to put it on the charts....

(But I'd probably list the combined one too just for the sake of fairness.

OK! I'm sort of maybe back online, so let's get this rolling again! If you haven't voted, go for it...if you have, tell a friend!

Enough results yet? I finally found a semi-cheap copy of Chronic Town so I've been playing it nonstop the past few days..

Still gathering, I think - there are a few specific holdouts I'm waiting on (esp. James Blount) and it wouldn't hurt to rack up a few more ballots - we're at I think 17 ballots, which isn't bad for a poll this narrow...but I'd still love to see a few more come in. Thanks again to everybody that's participated, though; I haven't forgotten you!

How is this coming along? If you'd still like song-by-song comments, I could provide that.

I was sitting down to fill this out and realized that like 90% of my fave REM tracks weren't nominated. :/

yeahhhhh

:( Yeah, I think in the end the translation from nuPoll to old-school Poll doesn't quite work, although it is fun to do all the album-by-album threads. But I still think the results will make a nice list of stuff, so get those ballots in...if you feel like it I mean.

Euler - I think I may go the route of pulling misc quotes from old ILX threads etc - but with enough pauses between each result to leave room for praise and song in this thread too...

General update: up to around 20 ballots, which is looking pretty good - but the copy of Excel on this machine is locked pending some kind of registration/product key whatnot, so it may be a bit longer...sorry guys!

ok I'll get things started then.

#1 "Leaving New York" REM's best song, with songwriting worthy of Diane Warren.

UPDATE: we have a working copy of Excel now and the poll is back in business! I will start posting results this Monday! If you haven't voted you still have a chance!

\\\///\\\/// It's the ongoing R.E.M. SUPER SUMMER POLL of POLLS \\\///\\\/// [Started by Doctor Casino in June 2009, last updated Thursday, October 29, 2009 11:25 PM by Doctor Casino] 1 new answer
REM downsized [Started by piscesx in August 2008, last updated Thursday, October 29, 2009 11:19 PM by Daniel, Esq.] 2 new answers

:-(

lol. Yeah, I haven't voted yet.

I have to go back and read the rules on how to vote. It's a near-impossible poll for me, anyway.

I'll vote.

Yay!

Yeah, if I did this over again I would just make it open season on all songs - would still be impossible to pick obv!

(P.S. after this winds up I just might do THE BEATLES on account of there haven't been enough threads. And it would be awesome.)

okay i'm-a vote but lifes rich pageant got robbed

Wanna vote! Will send ASAP. Most everything I L>3VE is on this list, and I'm a typical earlier=better hater fan, so should be pretty easy to put a ballot together.

Can we use as many WILDCARDS as we want (or is there a limit)?

SEND ED IT!

Ah, I'm stuck without a Judge's Decision re: the permitted number of WILDCARDS.

If you want, you can use the WILDCARD slot to throw in a maximum of ONE song that didn't make the nominee list. But you can't tell anybody what it is!

Got it. Now I hope I am correctly understanding the email address.

In any event, "Sent"!

Hm. Email got kicked-back.

One of my law partners calls me a "techno-peasant." I'm not that bad, but I'm not totally computer-savvy, either. I'll try again.

Daniel, Esq - I don't seem to have received yours... double-check email address I guess?

Oh! And, for your review, the back catalog:

Boxcars are POLLing out of...REM's "Chronic Town"
Now that it's remasterd and everything lets do an R.E.M.'s Murmur poll
R.E.M. - Reckoning POLL
Feeling Gravity's POLL: REM's "Fables of the Reconstruction"
Don't POLL On Meeee (It's Gonna POLL): REM's "Lifes Rich Pageant"
It's The End Of These POLLs As We've Known Them: REM's "Document"
Dreams, they comPOLLcate my life: REM's "Green"
And Your Feet Are POLLing 'Cause The Earth is POLLing: REM's "Dead Letter Office"
The World Is POLLapsing Around Our Ears: REM's "Out of Time"
The Sidewinder Sleeps, Sleeps, Sleeps In A POLL: REM's "Automatic For The People"
You Wore Your ExPOLLtations Like An Armored Suit: REM's "Monster"
Your Eyes Are Burning POLLs Through Me: REM's "New Adventures In Hi-Fi"
I Ate The POLLtus: REM's "Up"
POLL The Way To Reno: REM's "Reveal"
Leaving Was Never My POLLed: REM's "Around The Sun"
SuPOLLnatural, SuPOLLserious: REM's "Accelerate"
I'm POLLshin' an Elephant Up The Stairs: REM's Non-Album Singles, Rarities, B-Sides, Etc.

Hoping my (just-completed) second attempt worked. So far, no bounce-back.

You're in! Thanks.

Doc, you got my ballot I sent a long time ago, right?

I think so - does Z S stand for Za_____ Sc___?

Yep, thanks!

Sent in my ballot! I'm surprised that there were so few votes for the Accelerate poll that none of the songs even made the noms. Supernatural Superserious is pretty great! I don't think it would have made my ballot but...

Accelerate = meh.

I enjoyed Accelerate but I'm not sure any of it deserves a place in this poll, especially given that neither It's The End Of The World As We Know It or Man On The Moon made the nominations cut here (although I think the former could conceivably win as a wildcard entry, Goran Ivanisevic style).

I couldn't believe Life and How To Live It didn't make the poll. That could be another wild card dark horse.

If allowed, almost my whole ballot would be "wildcards."

Yeah, in hindsight I should have allowed two or three wildcards. There is already one wildcard pick in the top thirty though and another not far behind, so don't give up on 'em!

I would have thrown a few points to Supernatural Superserious though - really solid track IMO, although the bridge feels tacked-on.

brontosaur, I don't have a ballot under your username FYI...

not that this means anything but looking over the old polls i would have voted for a lot of the 4-vote tracks

Same here, plus some really low-scoring things like "Belong." So it goes I guess. Maybe in ten years or so, after R.E.M.'s unexpected, late-period string of mind-blowing comeback albums, we can do this over again...

It didn't get bounced back so I figured it must have went through. Thanks for the heads up, I'll resend it now. Let me know if it doesn't get through.

The noms actually covered what most of my picks would be. I could have used a couple more wildcards, but being a big fan of the WB years lots of that stuff made it. Even "Beat a Drum" which I didn't think was that popular. What is crazy to me about the lack of Accelerate stuff is that only 6 people bothered to vote in the poll, versus 18 people in the Around the Sun poll. I'd take all sorts of songs off Accelerate over "Leaving New York". Such as, "Supernatural Superserious", "Mr. Richards", "Horse to Water", or "I'm Gonna DJ". Even "Red Head Walking", a bonus track off the deluxe edition, which reminds me of the playful R.E.M. that we haven't heard since Monster.

I'm excited to see the results!

No way dude, "Leaving New York" is #1, just you wait and see. You don't need me to tell you now that nothing can compare.

*GROAN*

I'll say this: The poll's "wildcard" option made me reevaluate R.E.M.'s early, unreleased material (stuff even before Chronic Town). What a fantastic, innovative band, way back when.

Mercurial future, forget the past.

B-52's s/t is '79, I'm sorry to say.

wrong thread ;-)

wrong thread, sorry. brontosaur, I got your ballot.
xpost

Forty minutes left to get your votes in! I have possibly hopeless notions of kicking off the countdown tomorrow; if not then, the next day for sure...

You got mine, right? It was a while ago...

Keeping my fingers crossed for my wildcard "Worst Joke Ever" to make the list!!!

Euler, no worries, I've got it.

\///\/// It's the ILX SUPER SUMMER R.E.M. POLL OF POLLS RESULTS THREAD \///\///