The World Is POLLapsing Around Our Ears: REM's "Out of Time"

Never, ever got the hate directed at "Shiny Happy People." I was indifferent to this album for years despite loving "Low," "Me in Honey," and "Country Feedback," but returning to it at the beginning of the decade I was struck by how beautifully the strings are arranged, how warm Stipe and the band sound, and how the songs are more concrete than ever without losing their mystery. Christgau nailed it:

Hiding political tics behind faux-formalist boilerplate, pop aesthetes accused them of imposing Solidarity and Agent Orange on their musical material, but in fact such subjects signaled an other-directedness as healthy as Michael Stipe's newfound elocution. Admittedly, with this one beginning "The world is collapsing around our ears," I wondered briefly whether "Losing My Religion" was about music itself, but when Stipe says they thought about calling it Love Songs, he's not just mumbling "Dixie." Being R.E.M., they mean to capture moods or limn relationships rather than describe feelings or, God knows, incidents, and while some will find the music too pleasing, it matches the words hurt for hurt and surge for surge. The Kate Pierson cameos, the cellos, and Mark Bingham's organic string arrangements are Murmur without walls--beauty worthy of DeBarge, of the sweetest soukous, of a massed choir singing "I Want To Know What Love Is."

Jawbox's cover of "Low" redeemed that song for me.

Nonetheless, I voted for "Texarkana".

Near Wild Heaven

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

I'm going with "Near Wild Heaven," but this is where I got off the R.E.M. bus. At this moment they irrevocably turned the corner. The sound of a band that enjoyed playing together completely vanished, replaced by the sound of utter indifference, a complete lack of tension and excitement, and absolutely everything that made them special gone forever.

I mean, for me their peak was Reckoning and their too-fast-for-the-rails live shows around that time. When touring ground down their resolve, that listlessness transferred over to their studio work in the worst way(s).

wow how did I miss this poll? I've been on the road a lot lately I guess.

I absolutely love this album, have since the day it came out. I voted for "Endgame" over "Near Wild Heaven", for the gorgeous arrangement and the feel: I spend about 30% of my life feeling like this song. Is that a flugelhorn? I dare not say anything else for risk of making a fool of myself.

these clothes don't fit us right

I still think it's "Losing My Religion," although I really wouldn't mind if I never listen to it again.

which button means the whole album is terrible?

"Country Feedback" for how evocative the line "these clothes don't fit us right" is...

swear I wrote that without seeing mookie's post.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

Nice spread of results! Thanks for participating everybody.

How many people's second choice was "Belong"?

I would have voted for "Belong" third.

Today is the kind of day where all I want to hear is the chorus of "Belong," over and over. Clear open blue sky, her breath, this song...Belong. OOOOoooooooOOoOooOOOOO

Ha, "Radio Song" got lots of love, relatively speaking, and it's not just one of the worst R.E.M. songs, but one of the worst songs from a major act, ever.

This album and "Green" always surprise me when I put them on. "Document," too, to an extent. One third great, one third not, and one third songs I forgot were on there but which I'm happy to hear again once in a while.

favourite deep cut on this is probably Texarkana

The storm it came up strong
And shook the trees
And blew away our fear

^ what i would've voted

half a world away
losing my religion
near wild heaven
country feedback
texarkana
me in honey
shiny happy people
endgame
belong
radio song
low

It would have been between 'Half A World Away' and 'Near Wild Heaven' for me. Unsure which one I would have went for.

Their worst Bill Berry-era album

I'm going to keep posting this bit of rongness

OK, how about "Stipe's worst Bill Berry-era album, rescued by Mills"?

I think you meant to say "Green."

Well OK, Green plus Monster would complete the trilogy-of-the-lessers, but at least Stipe showed up for the whole album on those two.

"worst Bill Berry-era album" works for me

no "Hairshirt"s or "I Remember California"s or "The Wrong Child" on OOT though.

There are some good songs on OOT but probably not any I love as much as my favorites on most of their other albums, and I just hate the sound of it, almost as much as some of those anemic later albums. Automatic mines the same basic sonic territory in a way that manages to be both plainer and much, much richer.

At the time I certainly would have agreed with you. Automatic is the only good Scott Litt-era REM thing I never listen to (I wouldn't skip, say, "Monty Got a Raw Deal" if I heard it on someone's mix though).

i'd really like to know what someone in 2012 who had no sense of REM would make of this album

it probably would sound like the world collapsing around his ears

i mean berry-era REM is just so youth-defining that it feels surreal to picture hearing it for the first time already having a sense of musical history, but this album in particular is like Led Zep dipped in dork sauce with a dash of KRS-1.

for an album of strings, bass runs and mandolins kicked off by lite rap-funk it really wound up aptly named

tbh I have no idea how REM will play to "millennials."

I gotta ask students what if anything REM mean to them: maybe this irreconcilable combo of obscure and earnest

Not just earnestness, though. I think there's real human content in R.E.M.

Am I the only person who thinks there's a salvagably decent song inside "Radio Song"? The breakdown with Stipe singing the "everything to show/everything to hide" part over JPJ's immaculately-arranged strings really is beautiful.

I do. The only song I'm meh about is "Belong." Right now, that is.

I think "Radio Song" is great, always have.

can any of you hardcore heads help me make a playlist of every REM song with slap bass?

"Finest Worksong" comes to mind.

yeah i think Document through "Ignoreland" is the halcyon era of fonky REM

all day long

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oL6Gsm1AOmY

never understood the appeal of hearing one of the band's most plodding songs done in a big muff alt-rock style

I think the question about millennials would have to do with the stylistic context of the album, but I don't think it goes deeper. Are people hearing it for the first time going to understand the historical context of '91 and R.E.M.'s own trajectory? Because there's a richness to R.E.M.'s thing; there's a richness to their roots and what they were trying to do with this album. That's in danger of being lost in too much fretting over their "dorkiness" or whatever.

REM's context is kind of lost to time, especially since now remembrances of 80s college rock and 90s alt-rock are so explicitly tied to bands that were only part of one or the other (and U2 left a bit bigger of a footprint that they don't have the same problem)

People will have to explore it to understand the context, but you hear slap bass and mandolins and you wonder why they would. I have to remind myself that someone will hear "Me in Honey" and they've got their reason to explore it right there.

Hahaha. The song I woulda voted for got zero votes.

I can't listen to this album anymore but thought about 3/4 of it was pretty good at the time (last time I thought that of an REM album, too.)

It's certainly no FABLES.

I don't know about worst Bill Berry-era REM album, but it's definitely somewhere down in the bottom half of the pile for me!

I love "Radio Song", Stipey "rap" & all.

I didn't see this thread yesterday but weirdly I was thinking then about "Losing My Religion" & how it was an odd megahit, & then I remembered its outro & sighed.

I still think this is my favorite REM album, after all these years.

4 years ago I might have blindly voted "Country Feedback" based on memories alone but after hearing this album in it's entirety today at an event (in the bg), I was struck most by "Half A World Away".

so many of my weirdo friends skipped school to buy this on release day that one of the principals thought something was going down and we all had to talk to the counselor and have our mental health confirmed

Yer old.

tempus fugit dept.: released 30 years ago today. a rare song in that I can recall exactly where & how I first heard it (my freshman dorm room; on WFNX) & what I first thought ("that's pretty good--wonder if it'll be a hit, there's a lot of mandolin on it") pic.twitter.com/ejEksBvfGm

— Bowiesongs (@bowiesongs) February 19, 2021

Pitchfork Mark, in the replies, wants to make sure the world knows he's lukewarm on the song.

30th for the album

ffs

I am listening to this album in full for the first time ever right now. “Radio Song” and “Shiny Happy People” are universally reviled as the band’s nadir when “Endgame” and “Belong” are RIGHT THERE?!

Fucking hell is “Me in Honey” a great song.

I like Me In Honey as a closer, there are two or three more obvious choices but they made the right decision

"Belong" rules

otm

“Radio Song” and “Shiny Happy People” are universally reviled as the band’s nadir

Is this true? “Endgame” is kinda weak as a “song,” but I guess it sounded ok at the time, as some texture…

i like endgame, would like it better if it had been arranged/produced in the style of pretty much any other era of good REM though, and if it lost the "lead" vocal

I haven't listened to radio song on purpose in years, but I heard it on the radio, and I kind of thought, eh, if it had no KRS One it might be okay.

"Belong," "Shiny Happy People," and "Radio Song" are all better than "Losing My Religion"

(none of these are as great as "Me In Honey" obviously, I'm not a madman)

Oh I just realized I have already said all this in this thread again and again over the years, sorry

I like "Half a World Away" and could do without every other song on this. R.E.M.'s weakest record.

Texarkana -> Country Feedback -> Me in Honey

greatest 3 song run in their catalog imo

The top two are correct. In fact I might even go so far as to say they're all time top 5 REM for me

I think I like every song on here. Even Radio Song I really don't mind. I can give or take LMR though

Give or take? Take or leave

Went looking for Spitting Image's 'Whiny Crappy People' parody but it's not on Youtube. I recall it had Mike Mills as the lead vocalist, playing double bass like in the SHP video. Why?

Texarkana -> Country Feedback -> Me in Honey

greatest 3 song run in their catalog imo

― Western® with Bacon Flavor, F