Anyhow, after quite a run of 'one and done' in the car, I finally had a combination of car time and disc length that didn't allow a complete listen of an album in one day. Consequently, I've had this album in my car for two days, and almost two complete listens. Just as well, as it had been a while since I'd put it on.
Disc 145 is...Out of Time
Artist: R.E.M.Year of Release: 1991
What’s Up With The Cover?: Not much. An R.E.M. banner on top of some kind of watery background.
How I Came To Know It: Like everyone else not living under a rock in 1991, I heard "Losing My Religion" on the radio, and saw the video on MuchMusic. I really like that song, but for years "Shiny Happy People" kept me from buying this album - I only broke down a few years ago, after Sheila's other R.E.M. discs put me in the mood to hear a little more.
How It Stacks Up: We have six R.E.M. albums, so the collection is significant, but far from complete. Noteably missing is "Green", which was the album preceding this one. Of the six we do have, I'd put "Out of Time" 3rd.
Rating: 3 stars.
R.E.M. was a pretty big deal in the late eighties and early nineties. While I never minded hearing them, I never really went out of my way to get their music. Sheila changed my mind with a couple of listens of "Automatic For The People" and "Document" - both very good albums.
"Out of Time" is a step down from those, but it still has its moments - some good some bad.
At the apex, we have "Losing My Religion", instantly recognizeable, and still fresh almost twenty years after its release, this is a wonderful mood piece about losing faith in the things that matter to you - I don't think it necessarily is speaking only about religion, although I think that is definitely on the list.
This song's video also inspired a generation of people to affect "Michael Stipe" dancing. You know - where you kind of wave your hand around your head while you bend over slightly and put on your best anguish-face. Strangely, it has never really caught on.
At the nadir of this record sits "Shiny Happy People". Equally instantly recognizeable - equally overplayed in its day. However, instead of a song of substance, we get a goofy "be happy" song, the only redeeming quality of which is the background vocals of B-52 Kate Pierson.
Even the video for this song is awful. The Geeky dude in the band (which Wikipedia tells me is Mike Mills) grinning like an idiot overdosing on Ecstasy, and Michael Stipe riding a stationary bike. Bring back the tortured dancing and the bleeding angels!
Anyway, roughly midway between "Losing My Religion" and "Shiny Happy People" this album lies, and it does all right there. The music itself isn't terribly interesting. I am really into 70s rock guitar right now, and I found myself wondering how R.E.M.'s guitar player stays interested, working the same basic background riff over and over again for 3-4 minutes at a time with no opportunity to wail.
However he does it, the atmospheric quality it creates works well with Stipe's unique vocals. I enjoy this atmospheric sound most on "Belong" the chorus of which is just Stipe going "oh - oh oh - oh" over and over again. Somehow Stipe puts emotional honesty into his oh ohing, though, and so I forgive it it's pop sensibilities.
What I can't forgive is the weird rapping that happens on "Radio Song". Right in the middle of a passable pop hit, some bizarre, totally non-funky college radio interpretation of rap music rears its ugly head. This was actually a minor epidemic in 1991 - and anyone who knows the Rush song "Roll The Bones" knows what I'm talking about.
For all you Rush fans out there - I like "Roll the Bones" as much as the next guy, but that rap stuff in the title track is a painful and disastrous failure. That both crimes happen in 1991 leads me to believe there was something in the water. Some kind of algae bloom, or ergot epidemic.
Final verdict - "Out of Time" has good moments, and a few silly ones and at the end of the day, is a solid, but not excellent record.
Best tracks: Losing My Religion, Belong, Country Feedback, Me In Honey
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