The R.E.M. album-by-album Thread (2015)

Discussion in 'Music Corner' started by candyflip69, Apr 8, 2015.

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  1. mx20

    mx20 Enthusiast

    Location:
    Raleigh, NC
    I think Can't Get There is an early example of REM trying to branch out and surprise their fans with something out of the fanbase's comfort zone. These attempts were often not successful (IMO), but probably necessary to them to progress. My least favorite of these "betcha thought we couldn't do it" recordings might be Radio Song, but this thread hasn't gotten that far yet!
     
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  2. Grendel13G

    Grendel13G Member

    Location:
    Fresno, CA, USA
    Ack! I can't believe I missed this thread until now. OK, jumping in...

    This is exactly how I feel about Reckoning and Fables. When I'm in the mood for early R.E.M., I almost always reach for Murmur or Life's Rich Pageant. It might be because I bought Reckoning and Fables at the same time (I didn't get into R.E.M. until 1991, when I was in junior high school), but I have a hard time keeping the two albums straight. I think there's a low-key 'sameness' that permeates both albums that keeps me from getting excited about them.

    That said, I think they're both good albums (just not great, like Murmur and Life's Rich Pageant) that hold together as albums while featuring some standout tracks. Speaking of Fables in particular, "Maps and Legends" is one of my favorite R.E.M. songs.
     
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  3. J_D__

    J_D__ Senior Member

    Location:
    Huntersville, NC
    I like "Can't Get There From Here" but, the band most have a low opinion of it since it wasn't played live since?.. 85 or 86?
     
  4. ARK

    ARK Forum Miscreant

    Location:
    Charlton, MA, USA
    Also wasn't on that 2-CD comp from 2011.
     
  5. Mogens

    Mogens Forum Resident

    Location:
    Green Bay, Wis.
    I've always thought of "Shiny Happy People" and "Stand" as ironic pisstakes.
     
  6. Grendel13G

    Grendel13G Member

    Location:
    Fresno, CA, USA
    Given that these were the songs (along with "It's the End of the World...") that got me into R.E.M. as a wee lad, perhaps they were intentionally written to cater to the 11-year-old demographic? ;)
     
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  7. George P

    George P Notable Member

    Location:
    NYC
    I may be in the minority, but I have always loved Radio Song. And to me, it made perfect sense. Stipe and KRS are both outspoken, intelligent, political lyricists working in an industry that often sought to suppress such qualities. Plus, they were both staunch vegetarians. So to me, this wasn't weird, simply very cool.
     
  8. Byrdman77

    Byrdman77 Forum Resident

    Location:
    Leigh On Sea, UK
    Fables is my favourite R.E.M album. For me it's the conclusion of a magical trilogy. R.E.M would never be the jangly Rickenbacker Byrdsian band again after Fables.

    Side one – "A Side"
    1. "Feeling Gravitys Pull" – Stunning opener, weird angular guitars, dream like, with a very peculiar ending.
    2. "Maps and Legends" – Classic jangly R.E.M
    3. "Driver 8" – Fantastic single with great lyrical imagery
    4. "Life and How to Live It" – Love Stipe's strange vocalisms in this one - letting loose
    5. "Old Man Kensey" (Jerry Ayers, Berry, Buck, Mills, and Stipe) – The ONLY thing wrong on this album is that Old Man Kensey goes on a little too long, still a real moody song.
    Side two – "Another Side"
    1. "Cant Get There from Here" – Oddball song but somehow it works
    2. "Green Grow the Rushes" – Sublime song - like a sun drenched dream
    3. "Kohoutek" – Very underrated, this song just washes over you - like the fact Michael namechecks himself too
    4. "Auctioneer (Another Engine)" – A much needed uptempo song that has great lyrics and a terrific guitar line from Buck
    5. "Good Advices" – Hippy stoner rock and I absolutely love it - one of the best
    6. "Wendell Gee" – Beautiful song that was a taste of much to come (Feels like an Automatic track for me)
    The whole thing is so cohesive, so moody, so beautiful - I don't think they ever bettered it as a whole.
     
  9. candyflip69

    candyflip69 What's good?! Thread Starter

    Location:
    Melb, AUSTRALIA
    'Cuyahoga' on the very next album?
     
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  10. Byrdman77

    Byrdman77 Forum Resident

    Location:
    Leigh On Sea, UK
    I meant consistently - they would revisit the sound throughout the rest of their career but those first 3 albums jangle all the way :)
     
  11. candyflip69

    candyflip69 What's good?! Thread Starter

    Location:
    Melb, AUSTRALIA
    A lively performance from Michael, already using eye liner, and a shock of bleach blonde hair.

     
  12. S. P. Honeybunch

    S. P. Honeybunch Presidente de Kokomo, Endless Mikelovemoney

    I have always said that Germans love R.E.M.
     
  13. Fastnbulbous

    Fastnbulbous Doubleplus Ungood

    Location:
    Washington DC USA
    Listening to this album again, it occurs to me that the theme of exploration, disorientation, discovery, distance etc. permeates. Album title aside, I don't see this is a "concept" album -- Stipe's lyrical vision is too impressionistic (or maybe just unfocused) to achieve such a result -- but it can't be a coincidence that we run across:

    Time and distance are out of place here
    Down the way the road's divided ... Maybe these maps and legends have been misunderstood
    We can reach our destination, but we're still a ways away
    Can't get there from here (I've been there I know the way)
    Stay off that highway, word is it's not so safe ... Green grow the rushes go, the compass points the workers home
    Home is a long way away
    etc.

    Very spatial, and very well suited to the music, which is sometimes sparse, sometimes lush, sometimes distant, sometimes intimate, and as consistently strong as REM ever got in my opinion (though their next album is also excellent). To open with such an off-key number as "Feeling Gravity's Pull" shows remarkable self-confidence at a time when many bands were still in a synth-pop disco mode. Most bands probably would've opened with a safe, solid number like "Driver 8" but REM were still a few years from playing it safe, which may explain the whole London excursion.

    Someone earlier described "Kohoutek" as sounding unfinished or something to that effect. I agree that it's not a complicated tune -- three chords basically -- and as usual you can't know for sure what the hell Stipe is singing about beyond some vague allusion to a comet. But REM has never relied on chromatic acrobatics or lyric profundity in their songsmithery. What "Kohoutek" lacks in sophistication it makes up for in sheer ballsiness of execution. I simply love that dropped D that Buck bends throughout (it could almost be a Neil Young tune circa Tonight's the Night) and for all his vagueness of enunciation Stipe's falsetto crooning is memorable. Only a band that's truly arrived in its full artistic form could get away with numbers like this.
     
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  14. kouzie

    kouzie Forum Resident

    Location:
    Batavia, IL
    R.E.M. will always be my favorite band, though I rarely listen to them anymore. But I've listened to them (especially in my influential years) enough to last a lifetime. That being said I still spin Chronic Town - Lifes Rich Pageant a few times a year and they hold up incredibly well. We had an early VCR and when I was a kid, I taped Letterman almost every night and watched it after school the next day. Radio Free Europe and (the then untitled) So. Central Rain were my introduction and I was hooked for life. I immediately (had my mom) run me out to the store to buy Chronic Town and Murmur. Got Reckoning as soon as it was released, but too young to see that tour. So it was the Fables tour that I was finally able to see the band live for the first time. My high expectations were surpassed after the first song.

    It was hard for a 15/16-year-old to embrace the darkness of Fables (especially compared to Murmur/Reckoning), but these days (ha!) , push-comes-to-shove, it might be my favorite of theirs. I love that they tried to expand their sound, but what they came up with could only have been done by Buck/Berry/Mills/Stipe.

    On a related note, I've picked up up tons of rare R.E.M. items over the years (vinyl, promo-items, related...), but one of the coolest things I have is an original copy of Brivs Mekis' "LIfe: How to Live" book that I got from a dealer in Atlanta for about $20 in 1992. Just for grins I looked it up on the internet and see there's a copy on eBay right now for $1999.99. That's completely crazy. Crazier is that I still don't think I'd part with my copy.
     
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  15. Good assessment of all three songs. Shiny is clever and clearly designed for radio play. Can't just kicks ass and grabs your attention.
     
  16. Well I'm an American with German descent so maybe that explains why I love them.
     
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  17. dirkster

    dirkster Senior Member

    Location:
    McKinney, TX, USA
    I used to do the exact same thing! Nice to know someone else had the same idea for pre-DVR time shifting. I missed the REM episode though. Saw a lot of other cool performances however. Things just weren't as scripted out in those days.
     
  18. Canadacrowe

    Canadacrowe Forum Resident

    Location:
    Ottawa, Canada
    I got into R.E.M. around LRP, and then more so with Document, and then went backwards in purchases. Fables is still one of those odd albums for me that I never really got into, though if I was making a best of would include Maps and Legends and Driver 8. Then when I go back and actually listen to it, which I did after reading this thread, I recognize it is a very good album. The guitar in Feelings Gravities Pull is pretty cool, different then anything Peter did before or after, and the addition of the cello really adds to the bottom end. Kohoutek also has a really simple but nice solo, and around the 2:20 mark a great piece with some classic Peter Buck guitar, cool drum fill and the bass kicks in. Listening today, it's much more of a transition album then I ever give it credit for -- some very accessible, clear lyrics (opening tracks) and then some mumbling and vagueness.

    I should pick up a vinyl copy and compare -- I find the CD a bit murky, but that may just be the production.
     
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  19. cc--

    cc-- Forum Resident

    Location:
    brooklyn
    the guitar figure on "Feeling Gravity's Pull" is very Gang of Four ... I'm hearing other specific post-punk references as I listen to these albums again. They sometimes sit oddly with the Byrdsy and folky strands in the music.
     
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  20. krock2009

    krock2009 Forum Resident

    Location:
    Philadelphia, PA
    The band(or at least Stipe) is on record saying "Pop Song '89" was a complete pisstake.
     
  21. FLF

    FLF The insurgency began and you missed it.

    Location:
    Southern Oklahoma.
    Pretty good catch on a $20 copy of Brivs Mekis book. I don't want to burst the price bubble necessarily, but anyone that thinks they'll get $2000 for it is nuts. I'm pretty sure I've seen 3-4 copies of it sell for under $200 in the last couple years. Still, it's worth something, but nowhere close to what some ebay shark is asking for it.

    I'm with you...I wouldn't part with it either.
     
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  22. Fastnbulbous

    Fastnbulbous Doubleplus Ungood

    Location:
    Washington DC USA
    Buck seemed determined to break out of the southern-twang box of the first two albums with an increasingly raw, edgy sound. This would continue with still more volume, distortion and even feedback with the opening track to Lifes Rich Pageant.
    I'm glad this song is getting so much attention. It is an unassuming number that builds momentum and just grows on you.
     
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  23. kouzie

    kouzie Forum Resident

    Location:
    Batavia, IL
    It was my "Beatles on Ed Sullivan" moment.
     
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  24. HFR

    HFR Well-Known Member

    There's one of these on every album up until Monster, when their new status as Big Important Rock Stars stops them from having fun in public. Some of them transcended their initial joke status.

    Narrator (pre-album, later a B-side for a Bill solo single)
    Jazz Lips (record for Chronic Town)
    We Walk
    Don't Go Back To Rockville
    Bandwagon (B-Side)
    Can't Get There From Here
    Underneath The Bunker and Superman
    It's The End Of The World...
    Pop Song '89 and Stand
    Shiny Happy People
    The Sidewinder Sleeps Tonight
     
  25. George P

    George P Notable Member

    Location:
    NYC
    Up until Monster? What about Circus Act?
     
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