REM - 'Around The Sun' (Warner Bros)
3/5
By: Matt Tomiak
Twenty-one years on from the release of debut LP 'Murmur', and the most consistent rock act of their generation return after a three year hiatus.
'Around The Sun' finds Michael Stipe, Mick Mills and Peter Buck at a career crossroads - a curious, frustrating place for three middle-aged, anti-rock stars who have spent the best part of two decades shaping the landscape of that crevice deemed 'alternative'. For all the relative disappointment of their last two records - 1998's experimental, sometimes confounding 'Up' and 2001's unfairly lambasted 'Reveal' - the Athens, Georgia trio have achieved one of rock's most daunting tasks: counter-balancing massive commercial success whilst retaining indie credibility and - until recently - universal critical acclaim.
Thirteen tracks long, 'Around The Sun' could do with some trimming. A high proportion of these tracks merely feel like facsimiles of past REM material, mainly from their last two albums: not bad per se, but lacking in genuine spark. There are too many 'OK' songs on an exasperatingly 'OK' album. It starts brightly: 'Leaving New York' - reflective, regretful, enigmatic - is classic REM, with a chorus in the vein of 'Man On The Moon', while there's 'The Outsiders', featuring rapper Q-Tip in a moody, understated cameo which exorcises the ghost of 'Radio Song'; the cringe-inducing opener from 1989's 'Out of Time' upon which KRS-One guested.
Yet for all the supposed 'political' content, Stipe's lyrics remain as cryptic as ever. But, for what we can make out, the overriding themes seem to be those of upheaval ('High Speed Train'), identity ('Boy In The Well'), and a need for direction in uncertain times ('The Ascent of Man'); all indications of precisely where the band find themselves in late 2004.
So, in over two decades of record releases, the REM canon doesn't contain a single really weak album. 'Around The Sun' doesn't affect that statistic. But in completing a hat-trick of LPs deemed simply middling by the masses, the future looks uncertain.
Artists in this article: REM, Remi Nicole
Your Feedback
Login to post your comment