REM: Classic or dud?

^^So OTM

I don't know if this was intentional or just a coincidence, but looking at R.E.M.'s discography, aside from being able to divide their discography into three distinct periods (IRS/peak WB/post-Berry WB) with five albums in each period, the albums usually go in a pattern of 3 albums in a particular style, followed by "R.E.M. being a rock band" albums:

Early "jangle" era: Murmur, Reckoning, Fables
First "rock" period: Lifes Rich Pageant, Document
Mandolin and waistcoats era: Green, Out of Time, Automatic For The People
Second "rock" period: Monster, New Adventures In Hi-Fi
Electronic, Pro-Tools slickness era: Up, Reveal, Around The Sun
Third "rock" period: Accelerate, Collapse Into Now

mm interesting.

It's almost like they had this itch they had to scratch every three albums, before heading off into a different direction again.

not sure i buy the breakdown to be honest - the last two sets definitely are "trios" in my mind, yeah, but Document and Green have always been much closer in my mind than Green and Out of Time, and to me the IRS records are all pretty diverse anyway - like, there's "rock" before Lifes Rich Pageant, and steps towards the 'mandolin period' on Document, especially "King of Birds."

I do buy the idea of them as a band that tended to get restless and tired of their current (recorded) sound periodically. Might be interesting to think about big tours as part of that process, though.

Yeah, I definitely think the tours (or lack of in the case of Out of Time/Automatic For The People) had a hand in influencing the style of the music at times... particularly on Monster, which was deliberately made for the stage.

I was struck a couple nights ago, listening to Automatic, how much of its material really could have slotted onto Out of Time. In my mind, they've always been two very distinct albums - OOT bright, sunny, a little silly; AFTP moody, classicist, evening music. There's definitely some big differences (notably the string arrangements noted above) and I think the theme and mood of AFTP hang together clearly as their own thing. But just like how you could swap a few Sgt. Pepper's songs onto Revolver and have them fit right in, there's stuff on AFTP - "Sidewinder" and "Man on the Moon" in particular - that would sit just fine alongside "Shiny Happy People" and "Me In Honey." Maybe this is really obvious to everybody but me though!

there's "rock" before Lifes Rich Pageant

Indeed, the pre-Chronic Town "party band" period is almost all rock numbers, and pretty great ones, too -- "Just a Touch" I think dates back to that era in some form.

from the pitchfork interview with the author of the new book on the replacements:

I think it was partly out of pride. Maybe they [the replacements] were too proud in some instances to do the whole major label, dog and pony show that you had to do then to be successful. Also, it comes down to communication. That wasn’t in their nature—they were a very uncommunicative band among themselves. Paul and Tommy and Bob never really sat down and said, "okay, here’s what we’re doing," "here’s our one-year plan and our five-year plan," or "here are the lines that we are willing to cross or not cross." That conversation just never happened.

I talked to Peter Buck and he sort of talked about a similar moment—a crossroads in R.E.M.’s career where they had to make that decision. And they did have that conversation about how they were gonna move forward with their career, and what they were willing to do, and if they were just gonna be this kind of band or were they gonna really go for it? I think articulating that certainly helped [R.E.M.] and not articulating that in the case of the Replacements hurt them in some ways.

anyone know about the REM meeting thing, when it was, any details?

My impression from reading the book was that REM were very much committed to communicating with one another and making decisions democratically (in obvious contrast to the Replacements). There must have been a lot of meetings like that throughout the life of the band.

I would probably guess that meeting happened after Document and before Green.

I remember hearing it was after or right before Fables

I'd guess after Fables, too -- the next album had enunciated vocals and used Mellencamp's producer.

REM also had Holt and Downs to turn to

Jesperson was out of the Replacements circle by 86

http://www.stereogum.com/1867772/michael-stipe-will-make-his-debut-solo-tv-performance-on-fallon-next-week/news/

His nose piercings makes it look like he's got perpetual boogers.

This tweet was trending which made the observation that Stipe's in stag ran is nothing but selfish with him and an alarming array of celebrities, and the camera is always focused on Stipe. It's true and it's hilarious.

Omg phone.. instagram/selfies

everybody wants to look like randy quaid these days.

new trio album would be cool..

https://scontent-iad3-1.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-xfa1/v/t1.0-9/12512415_10154648763002137_8800919647456368064_n.jpg?oh=070c0a8643e5f38850c478b2f06948d1&oe=579432F7

https://scontent-iad3-1.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-xtp1/v/t1.0-9/12920278_10154648763272137_8608966430472296643_n.jpg?oh=6727ec608687c8d0a473aefb80377f03&oe=578A366A

https://scontent-iad3-1.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-xtl1/v/t1.0-9/11148732_10154648769407137_1367243612692242281_n.jpg?oh=5fd2b568894487fad702a4f26073999e&oe=5786757C

recently he seems to have started making more of an effort to actually get the whole of the other person's face in shot, if you go back the start through there are several weeks worth of photos of Michael Stipe and approx one third of another celebrity's head

https://www.instagram.com/michaelstipe/

So is Stipe a bear now?

a care bear.

I guess this is the point where I ask myself if I really would be all that interested in a Michael Stipe solo record.

it had to happen. once i brought it up on this thread. it was fate.

i imagine he'd need/want some help to do it and there'd be a lot of good people who would jump at the chance to work with him, so i can see some scenarios where it'd be an exciting prospect.

Fier Not Fig

You just watch the other members of R.E.M. make guest appearances now!

I was thinking this could make a good ILM precover. Then I got depressed ;_;

i think he likes Bernie Sanders

good to see celebrities don't get better memes than the rest of us.

Sounded good!

Doug McCombs for Tortoise is rocking the same look this days as well.

first sit down since the split, this looks like it might be pretty decent

http://www.mojo4music.com/media/2016/10/MOJO-277-cover-R.E.M-with-CD-595-400x566.jpg

http://www.mojo4music.com/24725/r-e-m-relive-key-breakthrough-mojo-magazine/

R.E.M: one of the shoegaze greats.

knew this would be Let Me In. I can't tolerate Monster much these days, but live versions of Let Me In are pretty good. Kind of stupid to put it in a shoegaze top tracks list, but then again, people put all kinds of non-ambient shit in Ambient lists, so fuck it.

It was just a small problem with the larger issue on that list.

That Mojo cover. How on earth did they save rock? And from what?

REM belongs 100 miles away from a shoegaze list. But that aside, this an excuse to say that Monster has become one of my favorites of their records. In retrospect it is a very odd-sounding record - totally of a piece with itself, but in the context of their catalog they never made another album that resembled it. Buck's guitar tone is totally unique compared to their other stuff.

(xp)

I'd hazard a guess that it was the usual rockist guff about how how the charts were infested with synths and drum machines, but Stipe and the boys kicked the door back open for guitar groups with the chiming majesty of Murmur, blah blah blah.

Except that Monster is full of fuzz, tremolo, and wah pedals.

monster is extremely gay imo

I started to lose interest around "Automatic..." which still has a couple of great tracks, after that: whatever. In the end I think they only made one classic: Fables of the Reconstruction/etc.

― O. Munoz, Wednesday, January 17, 2001 1:00 AM (sixteen years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Sixteen years on, this still rings most otm for me (though I do not hate Monster, nor NAIHF, good stuff on both; after that they lost me in their meddling mediocrity)

Going on six years now. This might be my favorite of the R.E.M.-archetypes-as-sendoff on Collapse Into Now. The fact that he's singing do it one more time over what is essentially "The One I Love."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0xfbsNl0CW0

Great interview🔗 w. the creators on this week's ep.

📹

Love Bill Rieflin's drums on that.

the worst thing about monster was stipe being all 'this is our return to PUNK ROCK'

it's a decent album

put pepper in my coffee

As a deliberate, slaved-over sonic exercise, Monster is REM's Mutt Lange record

Reckoning > Murmur > Chronic Town > Fables > Lifes Rich Pageant > Document > New Adventures > Green > Out Of Time

(never heard Automatic; disliked the singles so much that I never bothered with the rest of it)

― Montgomery Burns' Jazz (Tarfumes The Escape Goat)

I agree with this 100%, except, having already bailed on the band, never listened to Hi Fi either; maybe i'll give it a spin - thanks!