There are two kinds of R.E.M. fans — those who used to love them and those who still do. To those reading this, I'll admit I fall into the former category. For me, the band lost huge credibility with their cash-rewarded move to big rock stardom. As happens with so many pop music acts, they stopped sounding lean and hungry, and began sounding bloated and satiated. The danger waned and the sap increased. REM is not alone in this. But they are, for me, the perfect poster children for this epidemic.
So obviously I was biased as I pressed "play" on this latest release, Collapse Into Now. Worse, I previewed the video album "trailer" on YouTube and actually thought for the first couple of minutes that I was listening to one long song. (It was actually a collage of a bunch of them, cleverly spliced to flow as one clip.)
The album certainly sounds like R.E.M. Stipe barks out his lyrics and Buck jangles and Mills melodically pins the understory. The mix is rocky and noisy enough. If you liked Accelerate, you'd probably like the beginning of this album, too. By the third song, some acoustic textures peek thorough and although Stipe still sounds self-important rather than his formerly uncertain self, the overall vibe is better than it has been in a long time. This is to say that the band does not sound particularly strained. They don't need to make a big statement here, they're just playing some decent songs. Plenty of other bands play decent songs. In order to appreciate this, you'll have to love R.E.M. to begin with. I want to.
This article appears in Apr 7-13, 2011.