 REM I was an REM obsessive for many years – ask my old roommate how many horrible REM b-sides I subjected him to over until he finally moved in with someone who listened to "stuff he could shake his ass to" – and even I have to acknowledge that Up is probably their worst album. But I'm still enough of a true believer to think that REM's worst is still not worthless. And I might as well shake things up by saying that I genuinely see Green and Life's Rich Pageant in the same category as Up. I will agree that Up does have the worst start of any REM album, and, indeed, one of the worst starts of any album I've ever heard (up there with The Joshua Tree). The first three songs are awful … the overdrawn Eno-lite of "Airportman" finds them desperately wanting to be Radiohead and failing. The lyrics of "Lotus" are comically bad (reprinted in the booklet for the first time, sadly … reminding me that I lost all respect for this guy the moment he started actually speaking and proved that the enigmatic posturing was hiding a staggering shallowness). And the go-nowhere, melody-free "Suspicion" is way too long and uneventful to be track three on ANYBODY'S album. But then "Hope" is pretty good, finding the band trying on a different musical style (loops and keyboards) and, in my mind at least, succeeding. "At My Most Beautiful" is good too – sure, yeah, it's a vapid Beach Boys rip-off, but it sounds great, and it's done with much more love and class than a lot of similar homages. Although come to think of it, it basically rewrites "You Are the Everything" off Green. "The Apologist" and "Sad Professor" are fine, especially the latter, which is another track that recalls "classic"-sounding REM. Unfortunately, Stipe's lyrics, once seemingly evocative and powerful, are CRAP through and through here. As much as I hate to say it, Stipe is either out of ideas or the ideas were not there to begin with, and we were all fooled by the much better melodies of the more inspired earlier albums. "Sad Professor" is really not much to talk about. It's so obvious at this point they are going through the motions of being a "forward-thinking" band, but they're running on fumes, floundering in the absence of an anchor in drummer Bill Berry and a second opinion in engineer Scott Litt. "Walk Unafraid" and "Daysleeper" are the two biggest highlights here, both inherently great enough to merit keeping this CD out of the sell-back pile. The remainder of the disc ranges from pleasantly psychedelic ("Parakeet") to quite annoying (the cloying "Why Not Smile") or arbitrarily odd (the solo Michael Stipe cut "I'm Not Over You" … hey, you with the bald head: step away from the guitars). And a couple are damn ridiculous ("Falls To Climb" … woof). The collapse of REM on this disc might be traced to Monster, on which it seemed like this formerly subtle supergroup started to believe their own hype … that cup has now runneth completely over. The songs are too long, the melodies stiff and incorrigible, and the band members cranky and defensive. I want to hope for another late-period wonder like Automatic For The People. But I find myself making the desperate plea to the band on behalf of its stupidly loyal fans (myself included) to JUST QUIT. Just ask the Monkees … diminishing returns is the inevitable rule once band members start leaving.
Review by POW! & PAL |