Tag Archives: r.e.m.

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Song of the Day #202: ‘Nightswimming’ – R.E.M.

automatic1I’m leaping over four albums now — Life’s Rich Pageant, Document, Green and Out of Time — to reach my second-favorite R.E.M. record, Automatic for the People.

The band was huge by this point. They had big hits with ‘The One I Love’ and ‘Stand’ but then reached new heights with the unexpected blockbuster ‘Losing My Religion.’ Who could have predicted that a song about loneliness and uncertainty driven by a mandolin riff would top the charts?

So there was a lot of interest in how R.E.M. would follow up the smash success of Out of Time, and what they did was release an instant classic.

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Song of the Day #201: ‘Maps and Legends’ – R.E.M.

fables‘Maps and Legends’ is the first R.E.M. song that I remember experiencing. The year was 1988 and I was a sophomore in high school. My sister had discovered R.E.M. in college, I guess, and was obsessed with the song ‘Green Grow the Rushes’ on their third album, Fables of the Reconstruction. She has always been one to focus in on a single song and play the hell out of it (currently, it’s Vampire Weekend’s ‘Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa‘), a trait my daughter’s apparently inherited.

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Song of the Day #200: ‘So. Central Rain’ – R.E.M.

reckoningFor my second single-band theme week (actually fourth, counting the two Beatles weeks I did several months ago) I am turning to another of my very favorite groups, R.E.M.

I’ll proceed chronologically today through Friday, as I did with Belle & Sebastian, hoping to demonstrate how the band’s sound has changed (or hasn’t) over the years.

Kicking the week off is ‘So. Central Rain,’ which I consider in many ways the quintessential R.E.M. song. Though their debut album Murmur was a critical success and a breakthrough for them, it was their second album Reckoning, and this song in particular, that really defined their sound.

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R.E.M. – Accelerate

AccelerateIt’s a difficult challenge for a great, established band (or solo artist) to put out new material. When you have a dozen albums behind you, filled with classic songs, how can you avoid the let-down of comparisons to your storied history?

Accelerate is R.E.M.’s 15th studio album and viewed in that light it is something of a disappointment. There is no ‘Half a World Away’ here. No ‘Nightswimming.’ No ‘Driver 8,’ ‘Can’t Get There From Here’ or ‘Fall On Me.’ No ‘So. Central Rain’ or ‘Rockville.’ How could there be, really? Those songs, and many others, are among the all-time greats, written and recorded over a decade in one of those creative bursts that has to have a beginning and an end.

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