Bittersweet Me

This is my official request to REM to ask them to stop. Please. Just stop.

REM will always be important to me. They have been a part of my life for so long I can't imagine a time when I didn't know or listen to REM. I have met so many great people because of them. I've become better friends with people because of them. I've had some of the best times of my life because of them. But it's time to stop.

New Adventures in Hi Fi was the last of the good albums. It was the last with Bill Berry. And I think that shows how well they worked as a quartet and how important input from everyone made them the band they were. Up was okay. I hated it on first listen but it grew on me. And now I look back on the album and know it was the the album of a band struggling to stay together. But the albums after that? Dear god.

Parts of Reveal I like, and there are some songs I can take. But Around the Sun is painful. Accelerate is much better even though I can't remember anything on it. But I know I listened to it more than I had the other two. But to me it showed some promise... Maybe the next album would be better.

I've read people say that this new album, slated to be released in the spring, is a return to old. I am sure at some point Michael Stipe will say it is the closes thing to Murmur they've ever done. Because Murmur is still one of the strongest and most influential albums they've made. In fact, they are cursed by how good it was (and is). Anyway, a couple of songs from the new album, Collapse into Now (one of the worst album titles, ever), have been released online. Any you know that? They suck.

Parts of them are Monster-like. And I'm okay with that. Parts of the music are okay and parts are "eh." But the lyrics are terrible. I mean terrible. And the combination of these terrible lyrics and music almost make my ears bleed, they are so bad.

Listen for yourself:

It Happened Today. With lyrics like, "It happened today / hip hip hooray" what is there to like? I think the music on this could be okay, but I felt like they used every single instrument and studio-fuck trick they could find on this one song.

And then there is Discoverer.




Now, I like the music. I do. But the lyrics make me cringe. They're lazy. He uses the phrase "Hey baby," and he rhymes. Ugh.

I prefer nonsensical Michael Stipe. I don't even mean mumbling Stipe. I don't have a problem with understanding what he says. But I prefer the mystery of not knowing exactly what he means because somehow that always made the songs more personal. But this straight-forward Stipe? No.

I think this is the last album on the Warner Bros. contract. Unless they've signed a new one. I really don't know. But if it is the last one on the contract, please let it be the last one forever. And I hope they go on a massive, "We're calling it quits" tour. Because I will go. I will travel cross-country to go with some of my closest friends, and I will have a blast. Because despite their shitty studio albums, they can still put on one of a hell live show.