Every R.E.M. Album Ranked From Worst to Best

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This definitive ranking of R.E.M.’s discography first appeared in 2017, several years after the band called it quits. It will remain not only to commemorate all the great music R.E.M. has given us over the years but also to burn like a candle — and keep vigil — just in case we one day get to add to it. Either way, we’ll keep going back to Rockville until it truly is the end of the world.

It’s been over 40 years since R.E.M. played their first show, a friend’s birthday party in an abandoned church in Athens, Georgia, on April 5th, 1980. It’s hard to believe that a band with a catalog we kept holstered, cocked, and ready throughout our adolescences have turned such an advanced age. (We also must acknowledge that we’ve been drifting through a slightly emptier world for some time now without Athens’ favorite sons.) This was a damn fine band when they were at the height of their powers, and they were nearly as fine when they officially hung it up in 2011.

You can’t make that claim for many bands. Then again, R.E.M. wasn’t like many other bands. And looking back through their body of work, you also realize they were far from a perfect band. But what made them special was a singular momentum that allowed them to evolve, adapt, and carry on. They always seemed to be figuring things out rather than polishing what they’d built and perfected.

The toll of popularity, rigors of touring the globe, losing a founding band member, pressures to follow up both groundbreaking and career-stalling records — none of these challenges, or any others, seemed to ever keep Michael Stipe, Peter Buck, Mike Mills, and Bill Berry down for very long. In fact, the band made a habit of coming back and feeling more indispensable than ever — gifting us albums, songs, and performances that once taken in can never be truly taken away.

We grew up on them, we grew with them, and now we’re growing old together… and we feel fine.

— Matt Melis

15. Around the Sun (2004)

Runtime: 55:21 (13 tracks)

The Song I Love (Best Song): Nearly every song off of Around the Sun works better live (listen to the R.E.M. Live release), but one that actually works just fine in studio-recording form is a deep cut in an album full of them: “The Ascent of Man.” It has more passion in the chorus than you’ll find on any other track here. The chorus technically has lyrics, but it’s dominated by Stipe wailing “Yeah” with added syllables over and over again. If not indisputably intense, it’s at least going for it, which is more than anyone can say for the rest of the album.

The Worst Song Ever (Worst Song): A wise man once said that if you throw a dart at a map of the world, you’ll hit the world. I think that analogy works here, and to be honest, I think I made it up. Anyway, let’s see (randomly points at track listing on Wikipedia entry). Eureka! It’s “Wanderlust,” a listless song that aims for “Stand” or “Shiny Happy People” goofiness but ends up, for lack of a better expression, generic as fuck. The mix is so dialed back we’re wondering if they forgot to finish it. This is a familiar feeling throughout.

Harmonycoat (Best Harmonies): “Leaving New York” has a good harmony section in its back half that is curiously only performed by multiple recordings of Stipe. This isn’t a rare instance. In the decade that followed drummer Bill Berry’s departure, Mike Mills’ vocal harmonies disappeared. We could still hear him during tours, so it wasn’t a physical issue, but we never got him on record. You’d figure after losing a quarter of your band, you’d want to double down on familiarity, but hey, I’m just a listener. Check out the track on R.E.M. Live to hear the fully realized version.

Mine Smell Like Honey (Stipe-iest Lyric): “Leaving was never my proud.” –“Leaving New York”

Imitation of Life (Best Music Video): The victor goes to “Aftermath,” which features band members acting out in front of what is obviously a green screen for no reason. Stipe leaves his apartment, “walks” down the street, hops in elevators, “runs” down glitchy pathways. The rest of the band joins him as the video goes on, but the real reason why it’s the best video is because Peter Buck’s wearing striped pajamas during the proceedings, holding a book on DNA. Why? Who knows? The “Aftermath” video has a unique association to Around the Sun’s history: it’s not predictable.

Reckoning (Analysis): Personally, I could go to bat for every R.E.M. record … except this one. Hell, we here at CoS were just about universal in Around the Sun coming in dead last. Say what you will about Up and Reveal, but at least those records had focus, a connection, a mission statement. Producer Pat McCarthy worked on those as well as Around the Sun, but instead of feeling ethereal, the band’s unlucky 13th album feels lost in space. Buck perfectly captures the whole experience: “[It] sounds like it did because we were bored of playing the songs over and over again for no reason.” R.E.M. would correct its course going forward. It would have been awful to go out on Around the Sun. You could say it would have been (puts on sunglasses) “The Worst Joke Ever.” — Justin Gerber

14. Reveal (2001)

Runtime: 53:43 (12 tracks)

Any Sides With That: Side one – “Chorus Side,” Side two – “Ring Side”

The Song I Love: Trying to be kind, but “Imitation of Life” is the proverbial oasis in the middle of the desert. It’s the equivalent of pronouncing the patient dead a half-hour ago and then all of a sudden finding a pulse. It’s quirky, bursting, and utterly lovely — a lone blossom in that aforementioned desert.

The Worst Song Ever: Does someone have a seven-sided coin to flip? At a certain point, you start to lose the ability to differentiate between quiet, whispered songs that sound as though the band went out for a smoke break and just left a recording playing on repeat. I’m not even going to attempt to play this game. Life’s too short.

Harmonycoat: Stipe goes it alone here as far as we can tell, and, as far as we know, there is no truth to the rumors that Mike Mills had a trial membership in a monastery during these sessions and was practicing his vow of silence. Simply put, times had changed.

Mine Smell Like Honey: “Now, sweet/ You’re so sugar sweet/ You may as well have had ‘kick me’/ Fastened on your sleeve” — “All the Way to Reno (You’re Gonna Be a Star)”

Imitation of Life: Johnny Cash played in prisons. R.E.M. opted instead for a Brooklyn Catholic high school in the video for “All the Way to Reno (You’re Gonna Be a Star)”. As clever as the life-on-repeat zooming of “Imitation of Life” remains, nothing bests seeing Michael Stipe, Peter Buck, and Mike Mills take to the halls of Bishop Ford Central with the help of Michael Moore and four student camera persons. Whether it’s watching the band float through the hallways alongside students, Buck and Mills getting their dreams of being musicians shot down by a guidance counselor, or Stipe instigating a food fight, the song, particularly its refrain of “You’re gonna be a star,” coupled with the faces of so many bright, young people can’t help but feel inspiring. It really is the band at their most beautiful.

Reckoning: If Up was R.E.M. at its most experimental as it searched for a new identity following Bill Berry’s departure, Reveal finds a band that sounds confident and assured in what they have settled upon. From the swirling atmospherics of opener “The Lifting” and the chirping glitches of follow-up track “I’ve Been High,” Reveal makes known that it’ll be an album that floats rather than soars. That’s not necessarily a negative attribute on its own. However, the album’s painfully consistent polish, tempo, and quiet hum bleeds together to the point where it’s a challenge to differentiate between songs and not succumb to boredom.

Only “Imitation of Life,” with its warm chug, manages to ground itself in something unique and memorable — just as a song like “The Great Beyond,” also from this time period, found its magic in a building chorus that mandated sing-alongs. The real shame here is if many of these songs were to pop up in an R.E.M. playlist, they’d perhaps charm or offer a welcome change of pace or atmosphere. On Reveal, they’re resigned to simply being track numbers on a long, snoozy record. — M.M.

13. Up (1998)

Runtime: 64:31 (14 tracks)

Any Sides With That: Side one – “Up Side,” Side two – “Down Side”

The Song I Love: Unlike Reveal, Up’s got some truly magnetic experiments, like the blissful ASMR vocals and Chinese scales of the opening “Airportman” and the skittering, electronic Leonard Cohen homage, “Hope,” but the most fully realized song is still the one that most resembles classic R.E.M., the woozy waltz of first single “Daysleeper,” with its “talk of circadian rhythms” for a nocturnal worker whose nights are “colored headache gray.”

The Worst Song Ever: “Diminished” uses an unsettling lounge backdrop to spin a first-person narrative of a guilty defendant, but for once, Stipe isn’t oblique enough, and lines like “I watched you fall / I think I pushed” and “Can I charm the jury?” are just painfully on-the-nose, especially for six minutes. Monster’s “You” was a creepier character study.

Harmonycoat: Latter-day R.E.M. began to lose interest in harmony around this time, but the unabashed Beach Boys homage “At My Most Beautiful” delivers what its title promises.

Mine Smell Like Honey: “And you want to cross your DNA/ To cross your DNA with something reptile” — “Hope”

Imitation of Life: “Daysleeper,” a stop-motion animation of hundreds of still photos, disappointingly works better on paper, so the homoerotic and angular blue glow of “Lotus” takes this prize easily, as it’s the sexiest performance Michael Stipe has ever given.

Reckoning: In the wake of Bill Berry’s 1997 departure, R.E.M. didn’t just take the opportunity to use technology such as drum machines to reassess what R.E.M. was. They used technology to reassess how they could create beautiful sounds: “Why Not Smile” used the same chintzy materials as “Everybody Hurts” to arrange a sort of lullaby, but they went off the rails with various noises and percussion presets and synthesized harpsichord. “Daysleeper” took a page from Beck’s playbook and put a found field recording in the bridge, and tracks like “Suspicion” and “Diminished” utilized vibraphones for half-successful mood pieces.

It’s easily the band’s most experimental record, and its greatest virtue is its unforced nature; even completely alien ideas like “Airportman” were totally sincere and warm in their embrace of new frontiers. It was the Zooropa to Reveal’s Pop. — Dan Weiss

12. Collapse into Now (2011)

Runtime: 41:05 (12 tracks)

Any Sides With That: Side one – “X-Axis,” Side two – “Y-Axis”

The Song I Love: The glam-rocking Peaches duet “Alligator_Aviator_Autopilot_Antimatter” is a total head rush, but the way the furious “All the Best” kicks in after the spacious anthem “Discoverer” opens is maybe this band’s most intense recorded moment since Document, and the claustrophobic minor chords really push home the lyric (“I’ll give it one more time/ I’ll show the kids how to do it/ Fine, fine, fine”) quite literally about a band at its end pressuring themselves to make one last go of rocking out when they know they no longer can.

The Worst Song Ever: Collapse into Now has fewer outright duds than any post-Berry R.E.M. album, but the drab and uninteresting “Me, Marlon Brando, Marlon Brando and I” commits the unholy sin of never once making the listener invested in learning what’s up with that title.

Harmonycoat: Built on some glockenspiel and one of Peter Buck’s prettiest arpeggio figures in years, “Every Day Is Yours to Win” is a little goofy in the lyric department, but it all comes together lovingly on those “hey-ya!” refrains with Mike Mills’ help.

Mine Smell Like Honey: “You’re going to take the leading chair at the fairground/ You’re going to sing the praises of your fruit” — “Mine Smell Like Honey”

Imitation of Life: The outlandish, multi-colored outfits alone in “Alligator_Aviator_Autopilot_Antimatter” will make you wish Michael Stipe and Peaches started working together ages ago.

Reckoning: Accelerate rocks harder and with a more desperate edge a lot of the time, as far as R.E.M.’s last-ditch attempts to reclaim their rock mantle go, in part because of its political restlessness. But Collapse into Now is fuller and more comfortable in its mission, which was to make an R.E.M. record for no one but the band themselves. There’s no forced nostalgia, only happy returns to familiar comforts. It might’ve been a better record if it was shorter on ballads like “Oh My Heart” or an “E-Bow the Letter” retread like the Patti Smith duet “Blue,” but it wouldn’t have been as honest of one.

It’s the most at ease the band had sounded since New Adventures in Hi-Fi, especially Michael Stipe, who sounds so confident it doesn’t even matter that his lyrics are often the weaker half of full-force delights like the sub-two-minute “That Someone Is You.” — D.W.

11. Fables of Reconstruction (1985)

Runtime: 39:44 (11 tracks)

Any Sides With That: Side one – “A Side,” Side two – “Another Side”

The Song I Love: A lot of good here, but the winner is “Driver 8.” After the dreamlike “Feeling Gravitys Pull” and brooding “Maps and Legends,” “Driver 8” is the first track to kick into (ahem) eighth gear. It’s vintage R.E.M. from its jangly guitar intro to its choral harmonies. Like many of their great songs, its upbeat tempo is misleading. The material here is no less dark than the rest of Fables: “Take a break Driver 8/ Driver 8 take a break/ We can reach our destination/ But we’re still a ways away.” Note to self: do not record an album in rainy London.

The Worst Song Ever: It’s gotta be a toss-up between “Cant Get There from Here” and “Auctioneer (Another Engine)” Don’t @ me! The latter has a lame chorus, but the former is lame throughout. Stipe takes on a country bumpkin affectation, but the joke wears thin fairly early on. This is an example of producer Joe Boyd unsuccessfully capturing the wit that permeates more successful R.E.M. records. The guitar is uninspired despite the speed. The vocals clash against the rhythm. It’s a mess and not a deliberate one. Long story short: It’s no “(Don’t Go Back To) Rockville.”

Harmonycoat: Strong harmonies aplenty, but let’s focus on opening track “Feeling Gravitys Pull,” which is also notable for being one of two tracks not to use apostrophes in its title (see “Worst Song”). The song is nothing like the openers from the first two R.E.M. albums, as the band’s vibe turned towards southern-gothic-by-way-of-London for album No. 3. Murky and mysterious verses give way to lovely albeit still-mysterious choruses, with Mills’ repeating “looking down” while Stipe sings of the easy task of holding his head straight. I’m underselling it here, but it’s all quite gorgeous.

Mine Smell Like Honey: “The air quicken tension building inference suddenly” – “Life and How to Live It”

Imitation of Life: Though they became famous for the format starting around Document, the band very rarely appeared in music videos during their I.R.S. years. For Fables, they finally relented and released a couple vids. “Feeling Gravitys Pull” and “Life and How to Live It” are videos that feature the band in a series of sequenced pictures/stills from a live performance. The former works best. The combination of certain frames lingering longer than others and the off-putting, bright lighting scheme successfully sync with the track’s uneasy tone. Just don’t seek out the “Cant Get There from Here” video. That is all.

Reckoning: The band was unhappy during the recording of Fables due to rainy weather, adjusting to life as strangers in a strange land, and not gelling with producer Joe Boyd. However, time has been kind to Fables. It has a couple clunkers and pales in comparison to the rest of their I.R.S. output (including the Chronic Town EP), but it does succeed in separating itself from what came before. The band would not be pigeonholed. Ryan Adams’ favorite R.E.M. song happens to be “Kohoutek,” a track that best defines Fables as a whole: indecipherable, involving, murky, and mysterious. Sweetness follows, but this is arguably the band at their darkest. — J.G.

10. Accelerate (2008)

Runtime: 34:39 (11 tracks)

The Song I Love: “Living Well Is the Best Revenge” is the hardest-rocking R.E.M. song since “Wake-Up Bomb” off New Adventures in Hi-Fi. And it only gets better when you find out it’s a merciless put-down of shamed scumbag Bill O’Reilly, with Stipe brilliantly turning the sexual predator’s own slogans against him (“I’m not one to sit and spin” or “Don’t turn your talking points on me”). At a blazing three minutes and change, revving up to this track is indeed living well.

The Worst Song Ever: The relatively bloated “Sing for the Submarine” breaks the band’s tacit promise to get right to the point, but the insights into Stipe’s songwriting process, as well as the trivia-night fun of spotting allusions to other R.E.M. songs, give the song a pass. However, there’s no such bonuses to redeem the speed bump that is “Houston.” Sorry, we have a problem.

Harmonycoat: Slamming one of the worst presidents in US history via song can be cathartic and even enjoyable, but Mike Mills climbing on the bandwagon toward the end of “Man-Sized Wreath” turns this scathing polemic into a protest you can dance to.

Mine Smell Like Honey: “Don’t turn your talking points on me/ History will set me free/ The future’s ours, and you don’t even rate a footnote now!” — “Living Well Is the Best Revenge”

Imitation of Life: With a couple video’s worth of computer-based visual vomit, we’ll go with “Supernatural Superserious,” which simply captures the band backstage, in rehearsals, and out and about with each other engaging fans and playing songs. It’s a reminder of how human and likable these three always were — traits that never go out of style.

Reckoning: After three albums of mixed-bag experiments, hazy atmospherics, and even some band-confessed apathy, R.E.M. fans may very well remember where they were when they first heard lead single “Supernatural Superserious” or dropped the needle on “Living Well Is the Best Revenge” for the first time. Facing pressure to regain their rock and roll swagger, the band channeled their political frustrations and turned out a record that, like its recording process, wastes zero time dilly-dallying.

It’s a scathing half-hour that flexes muscles, spits venom, and delivers put-downs to everyone from George W. Bush to Bill O’Reilly. A couple clunkers like “Houston” turn up and some opportunities go missed (“Hollow Man”), but if ever the band rose to the occasion and silenced their doubters, Accelerate was that album. — M.M.

09. Green (1988)

Runtime: 41:01 (11 tracks)

Any Sides With That: Side one – “Air Side,” Side two – “Metal Side”

The Song I Love: Green is the commercial version of Murmur, showcasing every style this band can do well, only this time in arena-ready hi-fi, so this depends on whether you’re in the mood for their bubblegum peak “Stand,” their unassailable and deeply goofy version of a “Yummy Yummy Yummy” (which Stipe has gone on record as preferring to The Beatles), or “The Wrong Child,” one of R.E.M.’s most emotionally affecting songs, about a child burn victim going to public school for the first time. You try and keep it together when Stipe sings, “I’m not supposed to be like this, but it’s okay.”

The Worst Song Ever: There are no terrible songs on Green, but the oblique, yet affecting “Hairshirt” is one sparse mandolin ballad too many, in the company of the admittedly mawkish “The Wrong Child” and the campground swell of “You Are the Everything.” It’s the one arrangement here that kind of repeats itself.

Harmonycoat: The circular folk-in-the-round structure of “The Wrong Child” leads to Stipe’s yearning lead and Mike Mills’ emulsifying counterpoint crisscrossing in all sorts of hypnotic ways, with no drums to steal the focus from the fascinating tangle of colliding words.

Mine Smell Like Honey: “Run a carbon-black test on my jaw/ And you will find it’s all been said before” — “Hairshirt”

Imitation of Life: Green was probably R.E.M.’s peak for videos, as it’s extremely difficult to choose between the supremely silly “Stand” clip, which is like They Might Be Giants meets the B-52’s, and the brooding cinema of the black-and-white, torso-laden “Orange Crush.” So why not split the difference with “Pop Song 89,” which is also black-and-white and torso-laden, supremely silly, and found Michael Stipe censored on MTV along with the topless women he dances with because “a nipple is a nipple.”

Reckoning: Green is R.E.M.’s most eager-to-please album, their first time trying to write actual pop songs for the purpose of delighting a pop audience, and yet it’s just as experimental as Document and a major stretch from any music they ever made on I.R.S., with the funk-metal of “Turn You Inside-Out” and bouncy pogo-jingle “Get Up” marked by weird instrumentation (vibraslap! Pedal steel! Exactly 12 music boxes because Bill Berry had a dream foretelling it!). It’s just that every song happens to rest on expert verse-chorus-verse (except for first single “Orange Crush,” ironically, which has only one verse repeated and I guess kind of a chorus). And the explicitly political “World Leader Pretend” still has the power to chill you in 2017, maybe even more so. — D.W.

08. Lifes Rich Pageant (1986)

Runtime: 38:23 (12 tracks)

Any Sides With That: Side one – “Dinner Side,” Side two – “Supper Side”

The Song I Love: Overlooked by the mainstream for three records, Lifes Rich Pageant began to see the band get some attention beyond the college radio format, and “Fall on Me” deserves much of that credit. A glistening arrangement with a soaring chorus and harmonies, it’s impossible not to fall instantly in love with this single.

The Worst Song Ever: Keep your shorts on. We know “Underneath the Bunker,” which sounds like a Tom Waits rumba from the same era, serves as little more than an experimental interlude and lasts less than 90 seconds. Still, if we’re going to drop one track from Pageant, it’s “Bunker” overboard every single time.

Harmonycoat: Mills and Berry bring so much vocally to Pageant, but nowhere does the backing elevate a song more than on “The Flowers of Guatemala”: raising Stipe up, keeping him company, and offering a soft landing. It’s the type of song that few bands other than R.E.M. could even conceive of let alone actually pull off in the studio. Gorgeous.

Mine Smell Like Honey: “I know you don’t love that guy/ ‘Cause I can see right through you.” — “Superman” (they’re not Stipe’s words, but they’re still pretty damn Stipey)

Imitation of Life: The pickings are relatively slim here. We can either dangle upside down, feel nauseous, and never quite be sure of what we’re looking at during the video for “Fall on Me,” or we can watch a subdued performance of “Swan Swan H” in what looks like a condemned and gutted old theater. If pressed, we’ll go with the latter for the same reason we look at old yearbooks: the funny haircuts.

Reckoning: You can imagine Pageant as the fulcrum of a seesaw straddled by Michael Stipe, with one side of the plank representing the band’s past and the other the mainstream success to come. Too tricky a visual? Basically, Pageant is the link between the college-radio-darlings version of R.E.M. and the group that would soon be arguably the biggest band in the world a few years later. Gone are the denser textures, friendlier pop structures are leaned upon, and Michael Stipe’s voice takes its place closer to the forefront.

Out of the gate, barnburners like “Begin the Begin” and “These Days” flex rock muscles rarely seen prior, and cuts like “Fall on Me” and “The Flowers of Guatemala” show the band capable of packaging their songs in the finer wrapping that mainstream audiences appreciate. It’s a transitional record first and foremost, but one that could be celebrated even if it was the ends rather than the means. A year later, Document would perfect the formula with newfound aggression to boot. — M.M.

07. Monster (1994)

Runtime: 49:15 (12 tracks)

Any Sides With That: Side one – “Head Side,” Side two – “Tail Side”

The Song I Love: With an album like Monster, the best songs are the sexiest ones, which in this case means the literal “Tongue,” an allegedly cunnilingual Prince tribute entirely in falsetto, sparsely aided by piano and big, fat Hammond B-3 organ accents. But don’t, well, sleep on “I Don’t Sleep, I Dream” either, in which Stipe growls, murmurs, and sidles his way around a terse and contained verse and a heady glam-rock chorus where he almost shrieks like AC/DC’s Brian Johnson.

The Worst Song Ever: “King of Comedy” isn’t as bad as it first sounds, a murky Bowie pastiche based on the De Niro film that may be the only song to ever meet the description “disco dirge,” and it’s interesting enough in how Michael Stipe coyly addresses his sexuality on it. So maybe it deserves more credit than, say, the by-the-numbers Stooges-lite of “I Took Your Name.” But it’s nobody’s favorite song on Monster.

Harmonycoat: In no way is Monster the R.E.M. album to discuss harmonies. But arrange the gorgeous soul tune “Strange Currencies” differently, with a doo-wop group instead of distorted feedback, and you may have something as classy as “Everybody Hurts” on your hands, if “Everybody Hurts” was about unhealthy obsession and male entitlement, anyway.

Mine Smell Like Honey: Either “I know all about the warehouse fire/ I know squirrelies didn’t chew the wires” — “Star 69” or “Let me kiss you on the mouth/ All my childhood toys with chew marks in your smile” — “You”

Imitation of Life: Monster’s more well-known videos, like “What’s the Frequency, Kenneth?” and “Bang and Blame” are stylish and spirited, but kind of the usual. So it’s the little-seen “Crush with Eyeliner” clip, with Japanese twentysomethings lip-synching and air-guitaring their way through the alleged Courtney Love tribute, that really pops out from the bunch.

Reckoning: For some reason, Monster was the album where people started to get bored with R.E.M., despite it being their hardest-rocking set ever at the time, thanks to grunge stomps like “Circus Envy” and “Star 69,” but despite the many studies of obsessive characters, attitudes to cop, and chameleonic sexual personas, there was plenty of tenderness, too. “Let Me In” was a sincere plea that Stipe never got to sing for his suddenly-gone friend Kurt Cobain, and “Tongue” is a sweet and earnest sex come-on, even if its origins are rather, well, tongue-in-cheek. Monster had multitudes; even its supposedly throwaway rockers contained some of Michael Stipe’s most vivid imagery and portrayals of the celebrity inner struggle. A creeping epic like the album-closing “You” had the power to disturb you like very little that this band had ever released before. — D.W.

06. Out of Time (1991)

Runtime: 44:08 (11 tracks)

Any Sides With That: Side one – “Time Side,” Side two – “Memory Side”

The Song I Love: The easy answer is “Losing My Religion,” the cool answer is “Country Feedback,” but my answer is “Me in Honey,” if only to give it the spotlight it rarely receives. Stipe has said it’s a response to 10,000 Maniacs’ “Eat for Two” pregnancy plot, only from a male POV. There is panic, there are histrionics, but instead of going the “Brick” route, “Me in Honey” delivers a bit more of an upbeat ending, at least for the moment. “That’s a part of me!” is cried out before the B-52’s Kate Pierson returns for the chorus. Pop majesty.

The Worst Song Ever: It’s “Shiny Happy People,” but by God is this song tailor-made to rope 10-year-olds into a lifelong love for the band at an early age. It’s a gateway drug, and you can take my word for it. I was one of those kids! The band hates it, but they were able to find new appreciation thanks to Sesame Street, where they reimagined the song as “Furry Happy Monsters”. The goofiness fits better over there. (P.S. I’ll hear arguments for “Radio Song” claiming this entry, but if you mention any of the Mills songs, we will have problems!)

Harmonycoat: “Near Wild Heaven” is as close as R.E.M. ever got to a full-on Beach Boys tribute, and I’ve heard Reveal! Mike Mills takes the lead in this slice of pop heaven designed for the coffee-shop crowd (the video even takes place in one), with drummer Bill Berry and relegated-to-ooh-wee-ooh’s Michael Stipe harmonizing and singing backup. Berry sings “Living inside” atop Mills’ “Near wild heaven” while Stipe echoes the latter. Those aforementioned ooh-wee-ooh’s also play a big part, and there’s even a bah-bah-bah-bah-bah-bahh during the breakdown. The band was always at their best when everyone contributed.

Mine Smell Like Honey: “This flower is scorched, this film is on” – “Country Feedback”

Imitation of Life: Director Tarsem garnered some acclaim for his visuals in 2000’s The Cell and 2006’s The Fall, but his breakthrough came in the early ‘90s thanks to the “Losing My Religion” video. Stipe wanted a simple shoot, but Tarsem’s piece was heavily influenced by the works of writer Gabriel Garcia Marquez, director Andrei Tarkovsky, and painter Caravaggio. To dumb ol’ me it looks like a guy dancing around an empty, leaky house while some paintings come to life! The video won awards, and the song itself was a hit in an era of Nirvana and gangster rap. Anything is possible.

Reckoning: Peter Buck has gone on record saying he’d like to take a couple tracks off and replace them with “Fretless” and “It’s a Free World, Baby,” but I disagree. Those songs aren’t as good as he thinks they are, and we’ve established I’m a know-it-all. Out of Time took the mandolin-drenched songs on Green up a notch (or dialed them further down). Band members traded off instruments and Stipe wrote a bunch of love songs for the first time, all in an effort to take them out of their comfort zone. It worked. R.E.M. finally had major commercial success 10 years into their career and would ride the wave for the next few years. They unplugged as everyone else plugged in. They were the exception to the rule, and they wouldn’t have wanted it any other way. — J.G.

05. Reckoning (1984)

Runtime: 38:55 (10 tracks)

Any Sides With That: Side one – “L,” Side two – “R”

The Song I Love: Hard to choose when you’ve got tracks like the propelling opener “Harborcoat” and rockabilly “(Don’t Go Back To) Rockville,” but the winner from an album full of winners is “So. Central Rain (I’m Sorry)”. The song is full of heartbreak and regret, heightened by Stipe’s refrain of “I’m sorry” and Buck’s mournful (it’s the best adjective I could come up with) guitar. All of this leads us to a climax complete with clanking piano, cymbals crashing, and Stipe wailing. How else would a song like this close out? Not a fun time, but it has yet to wear out its welcome.

The Worst Song Ever: Here are the lyrics to Pavement’s “Unseen Power of the Picket Fence”: “Flashback to 1983/ Chronic Town was their first EP/ Later on came Reckoning/ Finster’s art, and titles to match/ ‘So. Central Rain’, ‘(Don’t Go Back To) Rockville’/ ‘Harborcoat’, ‘Pretty Persuasion’/ You were born to be a ‘Camera’/ ‘Time After Time’ was my least favorite song/ ‘Time After Time’ was my least favorite song.” Have to agree with Stephen Malkmus here. This track is a rough ending to Side A, but fortunately Side B makes up for it. “Time After Time” is more “Mold Soundz” than “Gold Soundz.”

Harmonycoat: Love that chorus in “Harborcoat,” but the harmonies throughout the verses in “Pretty Persuasion” give it the edge. Stipe was fortunate to have not one but two harmonists in the band for well over a decade, and Reckoning’s fourth track is a good example of this melodic marriage of musicians. Berry and Mills are singing the same lyrics as Stipe here but in a straightforward melody as opposed to Stipe’s occasionally abrupt vocals. It’s hard to explain in the written form, but you’re listening right this very moment, aren’t you? How are you not? Goddamn your confusion.

Mine Smell Like Honey: “There’s a splinter in your eye, and it reads ‘react’ (R-E-A-C…T).” – “Harborcoat”

Imitation of Life: We’ve mentioned how particular R.E.M. was when it came to making music videos in the early ‘80s. Another exhibit for the hypothetical court case in favor of this claim is the “So. Central Rain” video. Here, Berry, Buck, and Mills mime playing behind screens with only their shadows seen thanks to backlighting. As for Stipe? He’s front and center and sans screen, but there is no lip-synching or miming going on. He insisted upon singing live, so the music video has the original music from the recording with fresh, new vocals. Video is earnest as hell and we love it.

Reckoning: Reckoning avoided the sophomore slump entirely, proving that Rolling Stone’s rewarding of Murmur for Album of the Year was no fluke. It’s crazy that this was released only one year later, and it’s nearly as strong as its predecessor. The only dud is the Pavement-condemned track mentioned above, but the rest is great. I can’t sign off on this entry before mentioning the one-two punch of “Second Guessing” and “Letter Never Sent” that open Side B. They will never be mistaken as singles, but are so much more than filler. I guess that can define most songs from the band’s career. Reckoning showed that R.E.M. was a band to be reckoned with. I’ll see myself out. Jefferson, I think I’m lost. — J.G.

04. Document (1987)

Runtime: 39:51 (11 tracks)

Any Sides With That: Side one – “Page Side,” Side two – “Leaf Side”

The Song I Love: All three singles off this record have gone on to become alt rock radio staples. They proved there was a larger audience out there for R.E.M. to reach. But for all the chart-topping power to choose among, something about “Disturbance at the Heron House” always calls to me. It feels like where a record like Reckoning and Monster might meet, confident and forceful but also reliant on a melodic twist or subtle vocal turn to reach its finest moments.

The Worst Song Ever: Asking someone to lop off a song from a near-perfect album ain’t exactly fair. But if it must be done, I never could quite stomach those creepy almost Les Claypool-style vocals on “Lightnin’ Hopkins.”

Harmonycoat: In the hands of most bands, “It’s the End of the World as We Know It (And I Feel Fine)” may have come off as a gimmick with its rapid-fire, stream-of-consciousness lyric spouting. In the hands of R.E.M., with Mills adding his soaring backing vocals down the stretch, it arguably became the sociopolitical anthem of a generation, right up there with Neil Young’s “Rockin’ in the Free World.”

Mine Smell Like Honey: “A simple prop to occupy my time” — “The One I Love”

Imitation of Life: The video feels as manic and “kitchen sink” as the song itself. And does anybody know what became of the skateboarding boy? Everyone always asks about the “Bee Girl.”

Reckoning: If Murmur and Reckoning were the apexes of R.E.M. Vol. 1, then Document was the first great record from Vol 2. Singles like “The One I Love” and “Finest Worksong” proved the band had the straightforward rock and roll muscle to conquer mainstream radio, songs like “Disturbance at the Heron House” and “Exhuming McCarthy” demonstrated the band’s ability to evolve while maintaining their roots, and tracks like “It’s the End of the World as We Know It (And I Feel Fine)” and “Fireplace” revealed a band crazy enough to take risks, consequences be damned. What’s more, the album made it clear that R.E.M. was a band that not only had a song in their heart, but often something vital to get off their chest. Simply put, chops and conviction make for music that can change the world. — M.M.

03. New Adventures in Hi-Fi (1996)

Runtime: 65:33 (14 tracks)

Any Sides With That: Side one – “The Hi Side,” Side two – “The Fi Side”

The Song I Love: “E-Bow the Letter” is the best song, but it’s also notable as the song that put the death knoll on any commercial success not only for the album, but for the band going forward. Believe it or not, radio listeners weren’t pining for spoken-word verses, Patti-Smith choruses, and e-bows on their FM dials. R.E.M. could have gone a more obvious pop route for the first single (ex. “Bittersweet Me”), but stuck to their guns as they (mostly) always have. Commercial failings aside, “E-Bow” is intoxicating with its darkness — the guitar device of its title adding to the mystery. Mainstream audiences weren’t ready.

The Worst Song Ever: You could argue for the inconsequential instrumental “Zither,” but the penultimate track on New Adventures, “Low Desert,” is as close to a “filler” track as you’re likely to find on album #10. For starters, it’s just too close in tone to the superior, livelier “Binky the Doormat” that appears only two tracks earlier. The lack of chorus and forced twang makes us thirsty for water even if it means drowning in the “Undertow.” Now that’s a good song. Ultimately, “Low Desert” gets in the way of the fantastic finish that is “Electrolite.” Just get to the end already.

Harmonycoat: Mills demands to “Go away!” work wonders in “Binky the Doormat,” but his frantic “I’m carried away!” beneath Stipe’s “Here it comes!” in the chorus for “Departure” reigns supreme. Like many tracks on New Adventures, the song was recorded during a soundcheck on the Monster tour, giving the recording a cavernous echo it could never have found in a proper studio. “Departure” is likely as close as I’ll get to skydiving — breathless and speeds through blue skies at speeds no human was meant to travel. A perfect, quick response antidote to the lengthy and intense “Leave” that precedes it.

Mine Smell Like Honey: “A bus plunge, avalanche, RV, vinegar cider.” – “Departure”

Imitation of Life: “E-Bow” wins again. In another unpredictable move, the band didn’t do themselves any favors with a darkly lit video for what was already a surprising first single. The band performs the song in a studio filled with dangling, greenish Christmas lights, intercut with shots of the band waiting around. Patti Smith travels in a bus, presumably on her way to reunite with her longtime friends from Athens. Unorthodox music video for any period in MTV’s history and somewhat defiant. In the end, “E-Bow the Letter” got the gorgeous video it deserved, regardless of the public’s lack of recognition at the time.

Reckoning: As alluded to earlier, a great many tracks on New Adventures were recorded at soundchecks. This freed up the band to create music that truly felt “in the moment” because said music truly came from specific moments. Overproduction would plague the band’s future projects in the years that followed, but tracks like “Departure,” “The Wake-Up Bomb,” and “Electrolite” soar. Hell, studio-recorded tracks “E-Bow” and “Be Mine” are some of their best songs period.

This marked the last album with producer Scott Litt and most notably drummer Bill Berry, who left the band to pursue farming full time. The band would struggle to find themselves in the years that followed, but as for New Adventures in Hi-Fi? It remains the band’s most underrated album and a minor masterpiece. — J.G.

02. Automatic for the People (1992)

Runtime: 48:52 (12 tracks)

Any Sides With That: Side one – “Drive Side,” Side two – “Ride Side”

The Song I Love: “Everybody Hurts” gets a lousy rap by a cynical world. Skipped over by many and filed away as histrionic, over-the-top, overwrought, and too sentimental. This is a direct message from the band to young people out there who are listening and struggling to find reason to go on. It’s really the It Gets Better movement in a ballad. And while it’s not a song we need to hear most days, the point is that it’s always been there for us on the days when we and others have needed it most.

The Worst Song Ever: I wouldn’t change a hair on this album’s head. However, if someone threatened to harm a hair on my head, I’d drop “New Orleans Instrumental No. 1,” but even that seems like a minor crime against humanity.

Harmonycoat: As quirky as the strummy, mumbly “Man on the Moon” may be with its Elvis impressions and Stipe’s talk of board games, pranksters, and historical giants, nothing’s up the song’s sleeve come the chorus other than some of the best rallying vocals in alt rock history.

Mine Smell Like Honey: “When you’re sure you’ve had enough/ Of this life, well, hang on.” — “Everybody Hurts”

Imitation of Life: As gorgeous a song as any in the R.E.M. catalog, the video for the piano-based “Nightswimming” simultaneously reminds us of not only what once was, but what we can never regain. It’s a beautiful bummer.

Reckoning: Out of Time made R.E.M. one of the biggest bands in the world — at least while “Losing My Religion” remained on the charts and converting listeners around the globe. Perhaps the secret to Automatic’s success, then, was never does the band seem cognizant of the fact that the entire world was now listening. Just look at some of the singles. In what universe are songs like “Drive,” “The Sidewinder Sleeps Tonight,” “Nightswimming,” or “Find the River” hit songs? An emotional, straightforward plea to teens and a half-mumbled rock song about cult comedian Andy Kaufman are bound to be whiffs most of the time as well.

And yet this darker double-down on Out of Time remains the band’s most celebrated album. I can’t quite explain why. It’s one of those beautiful mysteries that solves itself as you listen to the record, but presents itself all over again when you take your headphones off. Everyone’s criteria for a perfect album differs, but the idea of being able to unlock something mysterious each and every listen some thousand listens later must tick off some box or another. — M.M.

01. Murmur (1983)

Runtime: 44:11 (12 tracks)

The Song I Love: “Sitting Still” is the quintessential R.E.M. song. Bill Berry and Mike Mills locked into the rubberiest and tightest folk-rock rhythm section to ever grace the charts. Peter Buck chiming away on those beautiful Rickenbacker chords taken apart so you can enjoy every jangling note. And Michael Stipe crafting a gorgeous and poppy anthem out of complete fucking nonsense (see below), sounding authoritative and deeply Southern and tearing away like John Lydon would over a three-chord riff except it’s caffeinated Byrds instead. “Sitting Still” best exemplifies every component that made R.E.M. great before you could understand what they were singing, and plenty of what made them great long after that, too.

The Worst Song Ever: Murmur doesn’t have anything that even comes close to being a bad song, not even its less celebrated tunes toward the end, like the truly enigmatic, Gang of Four-like “9-9.” So this slower version of “Radio Free Europe” is one of the few things about Murmur that could be more perfect had they opted to include the original Hib-Tone single version they debuted with, which is faster and wilder than the album’s re-recording. Classic song in any case. But Murmur deserves to open with its best rendition, not a slightly winded redux.

Harmonycoat: You can’t understand what the hell is going on in Michael Stipe and Mike Mills’ truly secret language that they hocket back and forth in the chorus of “Moral Kiosk,” but you won’t be able to get it out of your head anyway. Not that the parts you can understand, like “It’s so much more attractive/ Inside the moral kiosk,” make much more sense.

Mine Smell Like Honey: “Up to par and Katie bars the kitchen signs but not me in/ Set a trap for love, making/ A waste of time sitting still” — “Sitting Still”

Imitation of Life: R.E.M.’s early videos left something to be desired in their collegiate randomness, but the “hunger song” “Talk About the Passion” was their earliest political sentiment, and its video was an appropriately somber affair. Footage of homeless people intercut with various city and harbor scenes helped drive a point home that needed the extra push beyond its impressionism.

Reckoning: Before “Losing My Religion” or “Man on the Moon” or even “The One I Love,” Murmur was the reason people loved R.E.M., a quartet from out of nowhere (or Athens, Georgia) who arrived bearing the energy we loved about punk, the prettiness we loved about folk, the oddball intricacies and mysteries we loved about great rock and roll albums, and the instantly expert songs that anyone needs in a favorite musician. All four members of this band were essential to what they did, and they seemed good-natured and genuinely democratic, political without overreaching, and experimental without skimping on pleasure.

Tunes like the fist-pumping “Catapult” and the plaintive “Perfect Circle” and the childlike “We Walk” and the apocalyptic “West of the Fields” didn’t sound much like each other or much like what had come before, all distinct and all a bit confusing. How do you even describe a song like “Pilgrimage?” This band found their sound quickly and refused to let go of it until they quit. And yet they explored so much and took so many risks. Murmur was no less inventive than anything that came after. And even the strangest detours sound classic.

One of the greatest alternative rock albums of all time, before the genre even existed. And it pushed regular rock into more alternative places, too. Not bad for a bunch of mumblecore weirdos with bad hair. — D.W.

Every R.E.M. Album Ranked From Worst to Best
Consequence Staff

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