Am I the only one who loves R.E.M.'s Around the Sun?

This album is usually cited as the worst album the band has ever produced. While I'll agree that it doesn't hold up when stacked against the rest of their catalog, that's not to say that there are some really really good songs on it.

I've been listening to it a lot lately and I have come to appreciate it. The mood, the slower-paced stuff, the production, etc. does take a while to get used to. But I like how it works better as an album, a collective whole. I think they were doing what they truly wanted to do at the time. I think once they saw the mixed/poor reviews about it following its release, they decided to disown it in a away, vowing to make more uptempo stuff thus "returning to their roots" with Accelerate.

So, anyone else out there who really really likes this one?

 

You are not alone, I really like it.

 

It's mostly awful.

 

Yes you are..

 

It's really just a bland, boring album--and it's nowhere near approaching their usually high standards. I'm so glad they finished off their career with a couple of strong albums.

 

I think it's a fine album. Not stellar, but there are some perfectly good songs on it. I think it gets bashed more for what it isn't than what it is.

 

Some great songs here; I really love "The Outsiders" and "High Speed Train" in particular. I vastly prefer Around the Sun to Accelerate, which for me was completely flat. (Collapse into Now was a bit better IMO.) Stipe was right in that recent interview when he said that the band was really derailed by Bill Berry's departure, but Up, Reveal and this record were respectable documents of them trying to find their way into a new direction organically and openly. The problem is that after Around the Sun they sort of gave up on finding that natural progression and tried to force their sound to be what the audience seemed to want to hear. That's the sort of pandering move they never made in the '80s and '90s. I know others see this differently.

That said, I do find Around the Sun extremely spotty. I just appreciated, then and now, that it didn't seem like they took the easy way out on it -- it's a subtle, odd album and not at all what they were expected to deliver, as shown by how much disdain there is for it even now. (At the time that Up and Reveal were released I loved both but these days I realize that about half of Up is terribly mawkish, and while Reveal has moments I still think are absolutely beautiful, it's just so overbaked. Both are also far too long -- hearing it few days ago I couldn't believe how each song on Up just seems to drag on forever and ever.)

 

Michael Stipe himself has admitted that UP was too long:

When I’ve interviewed Peter and Mike over the years, they’ve talked about how when Bill left, it shifted the working dynamic – that Peter and Bill tended to be the guys who wanted to show up and get it done.

Bill’s nickname was I Go Now. He always wanted to be somewhere else. He couldn’t wait for the end of a song, both in the studio and live. He’s the guy who was always speeding to the finish line. That was a great tool for us and we lost that – so our first thing out of the box as a three-piece, “Up,” is a record that’s two songs too long with songs that are over five minutes long. We needed a great editor and we weren’t in the head space – we weren’t able to even look each other in the eye to be able to make that happen. “Up” is kind of a mess, but it’s a glorious mess.

http://www.salon.com/2011/11/14/michael_stipe_why_r_e_m_called_it_a_day/

 

I completely agree with this. I think the problem is that since it's an R.E.M. album, it automatically gets compared to everything else that came before it. And had ATS gotten positive reviews I don't think R.E.M. would have pulled a retread with Accelerate. I was a big fan of Up so when they began to craft material that was a bit different in nature to the usual fare, I was always exited to see where they would go with it.

The ATS songs came across very well when played live, so I think most of the criticism comes from Pat McCarthy's less-than-energetic production. But it kinda fits, really.

 

Leaving New York, The Outsiders, and one or two others...other than that, a lot of crap. Their worst effort.

 

I hated it at first, but it has become one of my favorites from the Warner Bros. years.

 

My opinions track by track:

Leaving New York - Love the vocal arrangement, hate the "leaving was never my proud" lyric. All in all a good song though.
Electron Blue - My favorite song on the album. Really like the lyrical theme, electronic sounds and the bouncy bassline.
The Outsiders- Another one I really like. Love the cold sound to it. I also think Q-Tip's rap fits the song perfectly.
Make It All Okay - This is like a Michael Stipe solo cut, the backing track is absolutely unimaginative and bland.
Final Straw - Decent protest song.
I Wanted To Be Wrong - Really like this one. Great lyrics. Prefer the rawness of the live versions, though.
Wanderlust - not terrible, but something that would have been a b-side for R.E.M. 15 years ago - on par with Bandwagon
Boy In The Well - A typical strong R.E.M. album cut
Aftermath - Album version blandly trudges along in an uninspired fashion. A faster paced outtake without the guitar solo has popped up on YouTube is much, much better.
High Speed Train - Another song that trudges along without a direction. Does not even feel like a fully formed idea.
The Worst Joke Ever - Bland, uninspired backing track kills the album version. The version on Live At The Olympia realizes this song's potential.
The Ascent Of Man - A charmingly goofy song that I really like. Peter and Mike are good on this one and it worked well live.
Around The Sun - Can't put my finger on why this song just doesn't work. It just doesn't take off.

 

I have to admit that I bought this knowing I'd probably be unenthusiastic about it, confirmed my suspicion, sold it off, bought it again when the price of used copies quickly dropped to a penny, sold it off again, and finally ended up with the disc when the last five Warner Brothers albums were released in one of those cheap boxes. So I've paid for an album I don't care for three times!

 

I love this album start to finish. I've said it before, but this album doesn't not deserve to get beat up as much as it does.

 

I agree fully that the album is attacked far more that it should be. I think that the major problem with it is that it takes several listens to really sink in, but once it does, I find it to mainly be very good.

The song writing is actually very strong on the whole, and my only criticism is that the production is a bit heavy in some places, although I feel that it works well on Electron Blue.

I can feel the effects of 9/11 all over the album; in my mind it sounds like a tribute to New York mixed in with the band's feelings of sadness and confusion after the terrible events of that day.

It would be great to hear a 'stripped down' acoustic version of the album, and it is also worth pointing out that many of the songs sound even better live, where they come to life.

I feel that if the rest of their albums were not so strong, it would not be attacked so much.

 

I like the songs. Hate the production. It is too compressed. There is no depth. Stipe's vocals are in the same plane as the background vocals and the guitar and everything else. The background vocals are not distinct from the main vocals and get lost. Instruments suffer the same fate. Everything is in the same sonic plane. No depth. I hate that style of production. I can't recall ever listening to the album all the way through.

On the other hand I like Up and Reveal. Reveal is more compressed than I would like, but it manages to have more depth. Still, the overall sound is too compressed and after more than halfway through the album "whoa, that's too much of that". I can't recall ever listening to Reveal all the way through. Up I actually quite like and listen to the entire album all the way through as part of my regular play rotation. I've even used songs from Up when demoing new gear. None of the songs on Up are too long. The album isn't too long.

 

I really like it despite being more vanilla than it's predecessors. I bought it when it came out and played it in my car for quite a while, never having read any reviews or web-based criticism. I definitely prefer it to Accelerate. I agree some of the songs sound better played live.

 

I like it, but don't love it. Certainly has its brief moments, but with time being limited, I don't play it these days.

 

No. I'm a fan of all of their albums. Around the Sun included.

 

Seeing the list of songs above, I can only remember Leaving New York. And REM were my favorite band for a loooonnng time.

 

I'm afraid I've never actually listened to the album so can't say. What I find interesting is people's reactions to albums that aren't up to the par of a band's best work. Particularly a band like REM that sets the bar so high. A band produces several stellar albums and (inevitably) some not so stellar. We dismiss the not-so-stellar albums as 'crap', albums that coming from any other band would probably constitute a high-water mark. It's interesting how most of us find it difficult take a record purely on its merits, without judging against what came immediately before or after.

 

What FLF said (post #14).

 

Yes, I think this is what did it for me. On my home system I never gave ATS a chance. But then my CD player crapped out in the car a few years back so I had to use my cassette player. The only tape I had in the car was ATS for some reason. I decided, "What the heck, it's R.E.M." and it played in my car for a month. Once that month was over, I was a huge fan of it.

It definitely takes repeated listening to fully appreciate its texture.

 

Agreed. I never paid that song any attention before hearing the live version. The difference between the delivery shows they weren't in the right frame of mind in the studio.

The first three tracks provide the album with a strong opening. If it had maintained that standard, it might be considered one of their best rather than worst.

 

No you're not. There's a guy two blocks down from where I live who really likes it too. He may of moved though.