R.E.M. Out of Time released

Out of Time R.E.M.

Released: March 12, 1991 Peak: 12 US, 11 UK, 19 CN, 4 AU, 13 DF Sales (in millions): 4.0 US, 1.79 UK, 18.0 world (includes US + UK) Genre: alternative rock

Tracks: Song Title (date of single release, chart peaks) Click for codes to charts. Radio Song (with KRS-One) (10/12/91, 43 AR, 28 UK, 18 DF) Losing My Religion (3/9/91, 4 BB, 6 CB, 3 GR, 4 RR, 28 AC, 1 AR, 1 MR, 19 UK, 6 CN, 11 AU, 2 DF, sales: 0.5 million) Low (8 DF) Near Wild Heaven (8/17/91, 27 UK, 65 AU, 35 DF) Endgame (instrumental) (39 DF) Shiny Happy People (with Kate Pierson) (5/18/91, 10 BB, 8 CB, 4 GR, 10 RR, 48 AC, 8 AR, 3 MR, 6 UK, 5 CN, 19 AU, 18 DF) Belong (36 DF) Half a World Away (38 DF) Texarkana (5/18/91, 7 AR, 4 MR, 39 DF) Country Feedback Me in Honey Total Running Time: 44:08 The Players: Bill Berry (drums, percussion, etc.) Peter Buck (guitar, mandolin, etc.) Mike Mills (bass, piano, keyboards, etc.) Michael Stipe (vocals)

Rating: 4.081 out of 5.00 (average of 28 ratings) Awards: (Click on award to learn more).

About the Album: “Though R.E.M. titled a later album Monster, this 1991 smash was the true monster, with the little Athens, Georgia, quartet graduating once and for all from its jangling independent-rock roots.” AZ “The supporting tour for Green exhausted R.E.M., and they spent nearly a year recuperating before reconvening for Out of Time. Where previous R.E.M. records captured a stripped-down, live sound, Out of Time was lush with sonic detail, featuring string sections, keyboards, [and] mandolins.” AM “The scope of R.E.M.’s ambitions is impressive, and the record sounds impeccable, its sunny array of pop and folk songs as refreshing as Michael Stipe’s decision to abandon explicitly political lyrics for the personal.” AM “Peter Buck put down his Rickenbacker and picked up a mandolin, while Mark Bingham’s sugar-free string arrangements and Kate Pierson’s guest vocals added the kind of ethereal beauty rarely heard on a rock record.” TL “Rather than treat the most overdone of emotions directly, Michael Stipe took an oblique approach, writing impressionistic lyrics about the way love manifests itself in loneliness (Belong), regret” TL – on “the haunting Country Feedback” AM – and, most famously, obsession” TL on “the masterpiece Losing My Religion.” AM There’s also the “dark-and-dreamy Low” AZ and “Mike Mills’ Byrds-y Near Wild Heaven” AM. “There are also odd but successful experiments, like ceding the opening Radio Song to rapper KRS-One (with Stipe playing the moaning straight man) and going peppy for the surprisingly nonsarcastic Shiny Happy People.” AZ “The album is more notable for its production than its songwriting,” AM but should also be noted for its timing. It “hit the mainstream-rock audience when it was most primed for uneasy angst. (Nirvana’s Nevermind was released a few months later).” AZ

Resources and Related Links: DMDB encyclopedia entry for R.E.M. AM AllMusic.com review by Stephen Thomas Erlewine AZ Amazon.com essential recording, review by Steve Knopper TL Time Magazine (11/13/2006). “All-TIME 100 Albums” by Josh Tyrangiel and Alan Light Other Related DMDB Pages: First posted 7/31/2011; last updated 6/18/2024.

 

R.E.M. charted with “Losing My Religion”

Losing My Religion R.E.M.

Writer(s): Bill Berry, Peter Buck, Mike Mills, Michael Stipe (see lyrics here) Released: February 19, 1991 First Charted: March 9, 1991 Peak: 4 US, 6 CB, 3GR, 4 RR, 28 AC, 13 AR, 18 MR, 19 UK, 6 CN, 11 AU, 3 DF (Click for codes to charts.) Sales (in millions): 1.5 US, 0.6 UK, 2.1 world (includes US + UK) Airplay/Streaming (in millions): 1.0 radio, 1261.02 video, 1363.23 streaming

Awards: Click on award for more details.

About the Song: “With a jangly-guitar sound that was equal parts rock and folk, cryptic yet compelling lyrics, and the quirky charisma of lead singer Michael Stipe, R.E.M. steadily built a cult following until their 1987 breakthrough” SS with top-10 hit “The One I Love.” However, the song that became the band’s biggest hit happened four years later. “Alternative rock as a genre remained on the fringes throughout” MM the 1980s but “Losing My Religion” was a turning point in that it “primed the market for grunge’s breakout…and created a model for…independent rock bands that strive to succeed without selling out.” MM It was a “morose ballad dominated by a mandolin,” TB not exactly the record label’s choice for a lead single. MM The instrument’s “very distinctive sound and emotional quality grabs listeners immediately.” SS Peter Buck, the band’s guitarist, started playing around with the instrument afer 1987’s Document and used it to write two songs for the 1988 Green album. He came up with some other chords that he hung onto until the band went into the studio to record Out of Time. That was the basis of “Losing My Religion.” MM On top of that, “Stipe’s beautiful, yearning voice sings about indecision and regret and fear in an abstract lyric.” TC Stipe said, “I wanted to write an unrequited love song, like the Police’s ‘Every Breath You Take.’…I wanted it to be unclear whether the relationship in the song was real or a figment of the protagonist’s imagination. I created a character so shy and insecure that he questions every one of his moves and choices.” MM The phrase “losing my religion” is used in the South that refers to losing one’s temper or being at the end of one’s rope. The Times, a UK publication, called it “the first existential pop song ever to make the American Top 10.” HL Warner Bros., R.E.M.’s record label, was not sold on releasing such an “unconventional track” as the first single WK in support of the group’s 1991 album, Out of Time. Stipe himself said, “There’s no chorus, there’s no guitar, it’s five minutes long, it’s a fucking mandolin song. What kind of pop song is that?” TC However, the company got the song established via a “critically-acclaimed music video,” WK and airplay on modern rock and album rock radio stations before promoting it to mainstream radio. One Top 40 radio station director said, “the record crosses the boundaries of being just an alternative record.” WK Resources: DMDB encyclopedia entry for R.E.M. TC Toby Creswell (2005). 1001 Songs: The Great Songs of All Time. Page 143. HL Michael Heatley and Spencer Leigh (1998). Behind the Song: The Stories of 100 Great Pop & Rock Classics. Blandford Books: London, UK. Page 118. MM Marc Myers (2016). Anatomy of a Song. Grove Press: New York, NY. Pages 317-23. RS500 RollingStone.com (4/7/2011). “The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time” SS Steve Sullivan (2013). Encyclopedia of Great Popular Song Recordings (Volumes I & II). Scarecrow Press: Lanham, Maryland. Pages 146-7. DT Dave Thompson (2011). 1000 Songs That Rock Your World. Krause Publications: Iola, WI. Page 31. TB Thunder Bay Press (2006). Singles: Six Decades of Hot Hits & Classic Cuts. Outline Press Ltd.: San Diego, CA. Page 249. WK Wikipedia Related Links: Last updated 6/19/2024.