This is the Thread Where You Bash REM's Monster

It and a Pogues album are the only ones he owns.

I’m gonna bash the fact that the 2-disc version of the anniversary set consists of the original album + remixed album, and not the outtake disc (which you need to buy the 6-disc set to hear).

Exactly, I'm really annoyed by this move. Especially since it also breaks with the run they've had going of the 2-disc version either being packaged with a disc of demos or a live set. I have no desire to have the 2019 mix.

so this seems like a p radical remix? This clip has me excited

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=19hhctlleNo&feature=youtu.be

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=19hhctlleNo&feature=youtu.be

ugh, well Scott Litt on nixing altogether the staccato guitar on the choruses to WTFK

These remixes are both fucking terrible. I feel like one of those people that bash's Giles Martin's Beatles remixes (which I personally like); WTF is Litt thinking? These sound like boosted rough mixes where he looses almost every little touch that made the songs remotely palateable in the first place (I like this album more than most people but I'm not pretending it's one of their best ones. The remix seems to be aching to make it even worse).

Yeah, just did an A/B listen to "Let Me In" and... I don't think the new version does either the song, or Stipe's vocal, any favors.

(The new version is here.)

The new "Let Me In" is silly.

i'm iffy on listening to the remixes since the original album is so fixed in my mind production-wise, and it was an album i loved right off the bat. i thought it was wildly successful in what it intended to do, and its tepid reception had more to do with it not being the R.E.M. people wanted. Similar to what happened w/a lot of U2 fans in the '90s; both groups of disappointed fans missed out on some of their best work.

there was definitely a distancing effect on the rock tracks where the vocals were buried under layers of guitar overdrive. I can understand how that may have turned people off, but I thought it was pretty cool. "Fixing" the mixes now, just comes across as very unnecessary second guessing.

What will be your look this season?

https://i.imgur.com/WSy9a6j.jpg

haha, the Special Editions were exactly how I felt about the songs on the recent Stereolab reissues that had different fade outs or mixes or whatnot. I'm sure it applies here as well. The need to tamper with original works and "improve" them is frustrating, especially when the original gets erased.

Wait, is this new version replacing the original?

no

ok I can see tweaking levels on some of these tracks to get more separation or whatever but negating the whole point (drenching guitars) of something like Let Me In is just laughably stupid

nothing will ever replace the original because there are hundreds of copies of it in every retail establishment in the world, enough to last millions of years

I do kinda want to hear the remastered version of the OG mix.

See more of a point to the "Let Me In" mix than the Kenneth one. I like it OK.

the remaster has been on streaming services since they announced this. it sounds pretty good.

> nothing will ever replace the original because there are hundreds of copies of it in every retail establishment in the world, enough to last millions of years

Is anyone buying those hundreds of copies? CD stores have closed across the developed world, CD sales have plunged even online, and more and more people today don’t even own a CD player. As the world moves to streaming, it is certainly possible for remastered and reworked versions to obscure the original releases.

One of the best things around the original Let Me In mix was the extent to which Stipe's vocal sounded like it was drowning in the guitars. That and the organ line at the end. Obviously the remix dispenses with both those elements.

smdh

in the future all home will be insulated with copies of Monster

xpost exactly what I said before. everything good about the song got ditched in this! well not everything, the song itself is actually a good song. but everything good about the production. this just sounds like an unmixed version. it's stupid.

I like hearing Stipe's performance on it clearer. It's kind of like a Husker Du song. Very sad song.

Also: maybe it's just that one guitar on the original, just more processed.

Mills on guitar iirc

Buck on Farfisa

Berry on Heineken

Tambourine!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=19hhctlleNo

Haha, I thought so (but couldn’t resist the joke)

Stipe’s comments about the song at the time have always stuck with me, that he felt that if he too had become super-famous at a younger age, that he wouldn’t have survived it. R.E.M. were nice guys.

I'd like to hear Document with a little less of the eighties production, that's for sure.

xp xref “How to Disappear Completely”

lmao wait til y'all hear the "king of comedy" remix

make your money

nothing will ever replace the original because there are hundreds of copies of it in every retail establishment in the world, enough to last millions of years

― akm, Friday, October 11, 2019 10:04 PM (one week ago) bookmarkflaglink

lol seriously. there were always 3-4 copies of this album and new order's republic in every used CD bin in the late 90s.

And it's in 50% of the charity shops in Britain right now, alongside Free Peace Sweet, Onka's Big Moka and every Robbie Williams record.

SPICEWORLD

the Best Of Bread of the digital era

New interview, some good lines: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/amp/entertainment-arts-50206491

I like how they’re basically — “Scott’s new remix is whatever, we had nothing to do with it....”

The band built an app so you can A/B the two versions: https://www.engadget.com/amp/2019/10/29/rem-monster-25th-anniversary-remix-compare-web-app/

All these years later, I'm finding that "What's The Frequency, Kenneth?" not a highlight for me at the time, has totally held up for me. I want to sing along with it at the top of my lungs whenever I hear it.

lmao wait til y'all hear the "king of comedy" remix

In the vernacular of the era: "Could the vocal BE any drier and more upfront?"

https://66.media.tumblr.com/1ab7daff8828955c68405b62752224d5/tumblr_p4trcpBLJD1x4bi9zo6_250.png

I'll admit it's interesting to actually hear (parse) the lyrics of "Star 69" for the first time.

It sounds like they purposefully used the murkiest, lowest-quality dub of the original album they could find for purposes of that A/B listening page

Remastered 'Crush With Eyeliner' sounds tremendous.