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www.churchonthursday.com
R.E.M.
In Time: The Best of R.E.M. 1988-2003
Some Major Label
2003
During the 1980's R.E.M. managed--for better or worse--to
crash into the mainstream, while
equally great and influential contemporaries of theirs, such as Husker Du
and The Replacements, never sold enough records to justify being on a major
label and eventually self-destructed. However, the period from the mid-90's
to the present hasn't been as commercially kind to R.E.M.--as the downward
spiral in sales of their last few albums demonstrates. When a band is outsold
by its imitators and only forty-something Rolling Stone critics give
a fuck anymore, it is faced with three options: break up, release a live album
(for die-hard fans) or put out a "Greatest Hits" or "Best Of"
CD. Thus, we have In Time: The Best of R.E.M. 1988-2003.
I'm not really sure what the purpose of this album is, as "Best Of" CDs are usually just glorified mix tapes. If you are a huge R.E.M. fan, you probably have all this stuff already--except for the two new songs (which, I guess, are intended as incentives to buy this disc). The band might even realize that you probably sold your copies of Monster, New Adventures in Hi-Fi, Up and Reveal (if you made it that far) on eBay, so now they're offering you a few of the better songs from each. That's the best thing about In Time--not all the material after Automatic For The People sucks. For example, "E-Bow the Letter (a duet with Patti Smith) and "Electrolyte" from New Adventures in Hi-Fi, rank with the band's finest work. However, the inclusion of "Everybody Hurts", the apalling "Stand" and "What's the Frequency, Kenneth?" drag the collection down. R.E.M. should have released The Best of R.E.M. after Automatic for the People and NOT including What's the Frequency Kenneth? I might buy that. Another working title I had in mind was 1993-2003: The Mediocre Years.
The two new tracks on this CD ("Bad Day" and "Animal") are barely worth having. "Bad Day" hearkens back to R.E.M.'s 80's heyday, reminiscent of their material from Life's Rich Pageant. It's pretty good, in a they-are-repeating-themselves kind of way. Then again, it was written in 1986. "Animal" on the other hand, is a wholly different breed. It's a mishmash of 70's Glam ala T.Rex, 60's psychedelia ala the Beach Boys' weirder stuff, and...I don't even know. It ends up sounding like Moby with a bad Ecstasy hangover.
No one can deny that "Nightswimming", "Man on the Moon" and "Losing My Religion" are great songs--even if you're sick to death of hearing them. As far as the rest of this collection is concerned, the quality and relevance of the band's work is open for debate. In Time serves as an average introduction to a once-great band that's running out of time.
--Felix Thursday