looking back on 'reveal' - it's rubbish isn't it ?

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and the thing is i still can't understand why
it got such great reviews. esp in the uk. crazy ! it's no 'up'.
it's not even 'new adventures'. there are genuinely *dreadful*
moments on it (summer turns, she just wants to be ...)
still in love with 'i've been high' and 'beachball' mind, and
really upbeat about the next one, but honestly !
shape up lads. can't remember what everyone made of it on here
18 months ago in relation to the greats
(automatic, green, pagaent, reckoning, add yr own)
but...i bet any yay sayers have kinda changed their minds.

― piscesboy, Tuesday, 19 November 2002 17:50 (twenty-three years ago)

"Reveal" fuckin sux. And the very fine "Imitation Of Life" was put there just to let you know the obscenely high shit factor was intentional.

It gives me new respect for warhorses like the Rolling Stones. Post-punk behemoths get just as bloated & tired, but their self-loathing is much higher and they sound like they don't enjoy their fame anymore than we do.

Of course, there's always the theory that they were replaced by robots starting with Monster. That's why Bill's head exploded, Peter can't take the damn sunglasses, Mike went Nudie suitie, and Michael is the frightening nosferatu he is today.

― Anthony Miccio (Anthony Miccio), Tuesday, 19 November 2002 17:57 (twenty-three years ago)

Listen to the first miniute of "I've been High" and tell me it's not a Chris De Burgh record. Even when the vocals come in.

― Lynskey (Lynskey), Tuesday, 19 November 2002 19:50 (twenty-three years ago)

from the beginning, i liked "The Lifting" a lot and everything else was just blah. went back to it recently, and it's overall a little more pleasant, but the standouts lost their lustre and it's just pretty worthless. i liked Up quite a bit though and still manage to get something out of it from time to time

― Al (sitcom), Tuesday, 19 November 2002 20:04 (twenty-three years ago)

"and the thing is i still can't understand why
it got such great reviews. esp in the uk. crazy ! it's no 'up'.
it's not even 'new adventures'"

This is so true. Reveal is washy and saccharine. Most critics hailed it as a 'return to form'. But when were they off form, exactly? Ok, Monster was average, but "New Adventures..." and "Up" are fucking fantastic records. Great warm winter listening. They need to return to form on the next album, if you ask me.

― weasel diesel (K1l14n), Tuesday, 19 November 2002 21:35 (twenty-three years ago)

I wasn't aware that there was a controversy.

― Spencer Chow (spencermfi), Tuesday, 19 November 2002 21:54 (twenty-three years ago)

But doesn't every review of an REM album say "Their best work sicne Automatic/Murmur", whilst every REM fan goes "This is rubbish, the last album was so mucb better"?

― Dom Passantino (Dom Passantino), Tuesday, 19 November 2002 22:42 (twenty-three years ago)

Inconsistent but enjoyable. Better than Up, but what isn't?

― Daniel_Rf (Daniel_Rf), Tuesday, 19 November 2002 23:43 (twenty-three years ago)

"whilst every REM fan goes "This is rubbish, the last album was so mucb better"?"

I didn't say any such thing when Up and New Adventures... came out. I raved!

― weasel diesel (K1l14n), Wednesday, 20 November 2002 10:08 (twenty-three years ago)

I never understood what is so great about Murmur. It's not a bad album but it's nothing special. I'd take Dream Syndicate's Days of Wine & Roses a million times above Murmur. And I could never stand the embarrassing folk-country-rock of Reckoning.

Monster was crap and Up was a futile essay of REM to use electronics in their music. I think Reveal was a very sound album. Probably not as good as New Adventures but better than the album that made them big: Out of Time.

― alex in mainhattan (alex63), Wednesday, 20 November 2002 10:22 (twenty-three years ago)

very sound as a beer coaster... whats good about it?

― Kiwi, Wednesday, 20 November 2002 10:42 (twenty-three years ago)

I wrote on it last year in my old blog here. Not sure if I would still write the same.

But it definitely is a beautifully light album. And it somehow feels mature. I recently listened to it by chance at a party and it has become already one of those classic nostalgic albums of which I can't say immediately if it is one, five, ten or twenty years old.

― alex in mainhattan (alex63), Wednesday, 20 November 2002 10:51 (twenty-three years ago)

classic nostalgic albums

yes thats what they were aiming for I think! Theyve gone for "easy listening"!

I agree with the lite bit just not the beautiful. the album sounds beautiful but is just lite. There are 3 or 4 songs that stand up, the rest well theyre completley forgettable either pissy generic melodies or vacuous background tunes. Fantastic stunning production saves this album and manages to give it the "feel" it longs for. 80 million creates pressure obv ;) Hardly a drop of inspiration or innovation or dare I say it originality to my ears. Going through the motions... REM =Eagles? IMHO of course.

― Kiwi, Wednesday, 20 November 2002 11:33 (twenty-three years ago)

It's a bit of a joke now. Every new album, Q magazine does an REM cover with the strapline - 'their best yet?' I kind of expected Reveal to be shit 'cos I'd seen it all before with New Adventures which also enjoyed over the top reviews. New Adventures is ok but nothing like Murmur, Reckoning, Green, Life's Rich Pageant.

― Paul Cunningham, Wednesday, 20 November 2002 11:48 (twenty-three years ago)

New Adventures is ok but nothing like Murmur, Reckoning,
Yawn. I thought I was the boring old fart...

Reveal is a very clever ironic title actually. It doesn't reveal itself immediately to everyone. Give it another three spins and judge it afterwards.

― alex in mainhattan (alex63), Wednesday, 20 November 2002 12:29 (twenty-three years ago)

Actually Green as well is highly overrated. That does not leave much in REM's golden 80s. Why does everybody hate the 90s and 0s REM and loves the 80s ones? I don't get it. I do understand people who prefer the early 80s U2 to today's. I am one of them. But REM got better during their career. More subtle if you want. Whereas U2 got more pompous.

― alex in mainhattan (alex63), Wednesday, 20 November 2002 12:40 (twenty-three years ago)

I like both 80's and 90's REM, actually. Can I be boring and suggest that "Automatic for the People" is still their best rec? "Reveal" is their only album that i have zero time for. Even "Monster" had a few good ones on it. 0's REM has some catching up to do...

― weasel diesel (K1l14n), Wednesday, 20 November 2002 13:09 (twenty-three years ago)

Automatic could have been close to perfect if there hadn't been one of the most embarrassing songs in the history of popular music on it: Everybody Hurts.

― alex in mainhattan (alex63), Wednesday, 20 November 2002 13:51 (twenty-three years ago)

I'd rank REM's three best albums as Automatic, Murmur, and Reveal, to be honest. The problem (or joy) of REM post Automatic is that they signed to what (at the time) was the biggest record deal ever. Thus, they don't have to make music that the public want to hear, they're just making music that they themselves want.

That's a really dumb sentence. Sorry.

― Dom Passantino (Dom Passantino), Wednesday, 20 November 2002 13:58 (twenty-three years ago)

I'll give it more of a go, but it's underwhelmed me so far.

'New adventures in hi-fi' is great. Not heard 'Up' so much but I like what I've heard so far.

― James Ball (James Ball), Wednesday, 20 November 2002 14:08 (twenty-three years ago)

I still like The Lifting, Beat A Drum, Saturn Return and even I've Been High once it fills out and you get past the dreadful drum machine at the beginning. The brass section on Beachball is atrocious, mind.

The lyrics to most of it are fucking awful too - especially I'll Take The Rain.

― Matt DC (Matt DC), Wednesday, 20 November 2002 16:04 (twenty-three years ago)

I listened to Up not so long ago, and it still struck me as quite a graceful assimilation of electronic influences for a band that's been doing the rounds for as long as REM have - You're In The Air in particular. And thankfully it wasn't an attempt to 'go dance'.

― Matt DC (Matt DC), Wednesday, 20 November 2002 16:06 (twenty-three years ago)

Wait, R.E.M. got more "subtle" when the singer started enuniciating?

― Anthony Miccio (Anthony Miccio), Wednesday, 20 November 2002 16:16 (twenty-three years ago)

Mr. Stipe certainly didn't get more subtle when he finally came out and the world yawned. Worst PR move ever.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Wednesday, 20 November 2002 16:19 (twenty-three years ago)

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