I might be inclined to stick up for Messrs. Buck, Mills and Stipe in this instance though, as I doubt they would personally object. Don’t forget they insisted that the album was available for free on Facebook (via iLike) for some time before its general release.

Which brings us back to the album itself.

Isn’t it fucking ace?!

Okay, so it is REM doing REM, but what’s wrong with that?

It beats the band’s approach to the last few albums which – while they each had occasional wonderful moments (Even Around The Sun had the wide-eyed and gorgeous Electron Blue) – have really been REM doing music from airline adverts.

C&B: bollocks to Web Sherriff, go get the album. You won’t be disappointed.

It features the band’s best album-opener since Begin The Begin in <Living Well’s The Best Revenge. Peter Buck attacks the rusty strings of his oldest guitar with shards of corrugated iron, Mike Mills has had extra octaves fitted to his bass (No-one else owns a bass that goes that high – and that means no-one else could play that thrilling bass guitar passage at the beginning of each verse.) and Michael Stipe wails his way through a vocal that leaves you in palpatations, feeling a bit like when your alarm clock goes off in the middle of a deep dream. REM haven’t sounded this alive since they signed to Warner’s.

Next up, Man SIzed Wreath is more of the same in terms of dynamics, but whereas Living Well… runs at you and delivers a flying headbut to the bridge of your nose, the second track swaggers up all cocky-like, flipping the finger and spitting at old ladies. That is, until the sweetener of the chorus, four or five Mike Millses providing ethereal backing vocal harmonies.

Regrettably, the next track, the lead-off single, is shit. It’s just lazy, dull and boring. It’s a mid-paced pop song from the Man On The Moon, Imitation Of Life mould. It doesn’t go anywhere. The lyrics have no meter, the music is no more than the old three-chord trick, everyone sounds half-asleep. It’s the only time on the album I reach for the track-skip button.

Fortunately we’re back on track for Hollow Man, which opens with some worrying piano chords, worrying because they’re reminiscent of Snowplay or Cold Patrol. Luckily Peter Buck is on hand to nip this in the bud before it goes too far, and gives the song a good kick up the backside with some big crunchy guitar chords as the chorus launches, and everything from there drops into place nicely.

The album then turns into Automatic For The People for a little while. I’m told Houston is Michael Stipe forgiving the state of Texas for producing the Bush family of presidents and their hangers-on; a noble sentiment. The song is made up of layers of tinkling mandolins, acoustic guitars and wheezing pump organs. It’s REM by numbers, to be honest, but it’s comfortable and sounds good. However it is enhanced by a thrilling deep drone sound that pops up now and again, which I think is an e-bow on a bass guitar. Whatever it is, it sounds like a foghorn and gives the song a clear identity.

The title track rattles along on a breathless sixteen-beat, underpinned with pile-driving bass, chainsaw guitar and, later in the song, a string section which, forgive the cliché, sweeps. This song hasn’t fared well in many reviews, but I love it.

We’re back on Automatic For The People for more minor-key mandolins and acoustic guitars on Until The Day Is Done. There’s even a waltz-beat in case you’d been missing it. Perhaps it’s depressing that Stipe’s lyric – at odds with the government and the general state of things – could have come from 1992 or 2008. An instantly familiar song, but not without its charms.

Mr. Richards is what Monster should have sounded like. It’s all overdriven guitars and hip-swinging swagger, but the melody has a chilled-out, late-60s, west-coast, almost hippy vibe. You can even imagine a sitar making an appearance on some parts. It’s a good little song which perhaps would have benefited from more care and imagination in the arrangement, but it works nonetheless.

Song For The Submarine is another that has divided opinions, this time for its prog leanings. Perhaps Genesis could have done something like this around their The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway period. All I’ll say is that if they had, it would have been more than four-and-a-half minutes long.

Phew, we’re back to crotch-thrusting, eye-bulging, gobbing punk rock for Horse To Water. I’m sure there’s a bit in there where’s he’s singing “mother-fuck-cunt” about something. Which is cool.

The album goes out on I’m Gonna DJ. “Death is pretty final, I’m collecting vinyl” asserts Stipe, letting us know that, while he intends to DJ at the end-of –the-world party, he’s not quite ready to go just yet. It’s a bit of a throwaway novelty song, but it’s better than Agadoo, and there are some delicious rhyming couplets in there, so I’m happy with it.

So yeah, that’s barely half-an hour of your listening life in a nutshell. Did I mention that hardly any songs break the three minute barrier? It’s certainly an efficient record with little flab or filler (Other than the abominable third track).

The recurring theme of revisiting the band’s history with both lyrical and musical motifs from their back-catalogue may be a sly dig at the nay-sayers who slagged off their last few ‘experimental’ albums, or it may turn out to be a great band bidding us adieu. Either way it’s not by accident, and it’s the subtle glue that holds a simply brilliant album together.

No one does REM like REM. It’s good to have them back.

Tossers!

Ed

Well done, web sheriff. You suck whole fat yummy elephant dicks.

*I’m guessing it’s a ‘he’ because, like forensic accountancy, this kind of self-satisfying, fantasy Private Investigator employment only ever really attracts pathetically sad, living with mum at age 45, route to & from work goes past the junior school, dyed in the wool cunts.