Track Listing

1. Leaving New York
2. Electron Blue
3. The Outsiders feat. Q-Tip
4. Make It All OK
5. Final Straw
6. I Want To Be Wrong
7. Wanderlust
8. Boy In The Well
9. Aftermath
10. High Speed Train
11. The Worst Joke Over
12. The Ascent Of Man
13. Around The Sun

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #43270 in Music
• Released on: 2004-10-04
• Number of discs: 1

Album Description
Around the Sun is REM's first studio album since the acclaimed platinum Reveal in 2001. This eagerly anticipated album follows the success of last year's multi-platinum greatest hits collection, In Time: The Best of REM 1988-2003.

Around the Sun, REM's 13th album, was written by REM and produced by REM and Pat McCarthy. It features the evocative new single "Leaving New York" and 12 other new songs including the enigmatic, "The Outsiders", "Wanderlust" with its infectious chorus, and the epic tale of "Boy in the Well".

CD Description
'Around The Sun' is the thirteenth album from one of the world's most popular alternative outfits, REM. Michael Stipe, Mike Mills and Peter Buck have recorded what has been toutedby critics as their strongest release to date. It draws on the sounds of their previous releases and 'Leaving New York'- the first single to be taken from the album - is also included.

Customer Reviews

R.E.M. - Patience Is A Virtue.
R.E.M. have never been conventional by any means. You know that whenever they release an album, it's going to delight, frustrate, confuse, and embrace in equal measures. I consider this to be the magic of R.E.M., as they never quite release what you're expecting of them.

The 13th studio album, Around The Sun is such an album. Upon first buying it back in October 2004, I found it difficult to listen to the first time I played it. Then the second time. Then the third time, and so on. I consider this to be a good thing, as the listener is ultimately rewarded with repeated listens and the songs become more cohesive when given the patience and time they deserve.

I think it's only fair that R.E.M. are accurately represented here, because if you believe some circles, Around The Sun is a disappointing album. These 'untruths' are usually associated with record sales in America. If Around The Sun would've shifted 3 million copies in the United States, they'd be the media darlings of the press and certain British music magazines would be fawning over them again, like they did when it was 'cool' to like R.E.M. As it is, Around The Sun sold approximately 75 copies in the U.S. and because of the lukewarm reception, some of the U.K. music press gave the album a kicking, offering up meagre ratings, or average reviews at best.

Where are all the R.E.M. sycophants now? Having leeched the band for every available inch of column space during 1991-1992, they've long since switched their fawnings to the 'next big things'. Good riddance to them. It'll be interesting to read this review again in 10 years, when Coldplay's star has long since faded and the music press are giving Chris Martin a kicking for being an over the hill angst ridden thirty-something who hasn't released a decent album since 2002.

It's fair to say R.E.M. can't win. After two 'difficult' albums in media terms, Michael Stipe writes an honest set of lyrics that becomes Around The Sun, with the classic R.E.M. sound evident in every song. Ironic then the press dismiss the album as sounding 'jaded', when several of the tracks wouldn't have looked out of place on Automatic For The People.

Forget the music press! Since when were a bunch of freeloaders who receive free cds from record companies ever credible?!
I would recommend Around The Sun as a fine album, based solely on the 13 songs presented, not by how credible they may be in 2005.

For anyone who has seen R.E.M. in concert during the current world tour, several of the tracks from Around The Sun come to the fore and sound great live, particularly The Outsiders, I Wanted To Be Wrong and Leaving New York.

As of July 2005, this album is only seven quid on Amazon.co.uk! Chump change for such a great album. Patient listening rewards even the most casual R.E.M. fan with an enjoyable experience.

I give this album four stars - that's four stars for competence, not for 'attitude', which is seemingly how the music press grade things.

REM - Around The Sun
I find the reviews of this album very revealing about the sort of people that listen to REM. Most people seem to have very two-dimensional, linear expectations of this band. And so they miss the point completely.

People seem compelled to make comparisons "It`s not as good as Automatic for the People!" or even "It`s their best since Automatic for the People!". If I want to hear Automatic for the People, I go put it on. People complain that REM have lost the punky, college-radio, folksy, alt.rock edge of the IRS years. If I want to hear that - I go put on Lifes Rich Pageant or Document.

REM down the years have provided us with an embarrassment of riches, and the widest variety of sounds of any major band I can think of. The point that a lot of people seem to miss is that REM have been on a journey since day one, since Chronic Town, since that gig in that church in Athens. Each new album is a further step along their way - but each album follows on logically from the one before.

They have never tried to forcibly change themselves (Apart from maybe with Monster), yet they have never allowed themselves to stand still. If you listen to the albums consecutively - each album actually sounds a lot like the one before (Again, apart from Monster. Monster was a deliberate attempt to sound different to Automatic.. That album was a reaction to what had gone before rather than an evolution.), and yet despite each other album being sonically similar to the one before - they have somehow got from the startled lo-fi of Murmur to to the celestial glimmer of Around the Sun. It`s been a true journey of evolution.

Each album has been a unique and distinct snapshot of where the band were at the time. Around The Sun is a great album, and an essential addition to the REM canon. Michael Stipe`s voice - one of the most haunting and beautiful sounds we`re lucky enough to have in popular music today - has never sounded richer or more assured, the musicianship is consummate - as we would expect. The song-writing is some of the most personal and emotional they have ever released.

REM have done precisely as they always have - they`ve provided us with the REM album we need today. Not the albums we needed ten or fifteen years ago - they already made them.

The most striking thing I recall about every REM album I`ve ever heard is that they are definitively "growers". The tunes, lyrics and moods of the songs cunningly sneak into your subconscious and then, after a while - and quite out of the blue - you realize you`re utterly smitten.

I really like this album today, in a year I`m gonna love it.

Play it more than once!
The first time I heard this record was via a link from the REM website and after doing a quick flick through the tracks, I thought it was the worst thing they had ever recorded. However, as with a number of their more recent recordings this is one that grows. It continues where Reveal left off in many ways - none of the tracks are really up-tempo, but on each hearing they reveal layers and subtleties that weren't there before. Leaving New York, for once, is a good choice for a single. Boy in the Well and I wanted to be Wrong are other stand out tracks and Electron Blue has a flavour of 'The Lifting' about it. Wanderlust is probably the weakest track - more upbeat but gives the impression it was written in twenty minutes. The Outsiders would have been excellent but for the Q-Tip rap - it just seems like an add-on at the end of the song. Overall, there is a slight move towards a more acoustic and country sound to the album. Its an album to listen to on a Sunday while you're cooking dinner rather than on a motorway drive - but its well worth getting! I would probably give it 7/10 so I guess that's 4 stars.