"The ocean machine is set to nine": IT'S THE INEVITABLE REM HIT SINGLES OF THE 1990s POLL

Let's not do one for their singles of the 00s, huh?

maybe 'crush with eyeliner' altho i hate the bit where he sings "she's ah reeeal womanchiiild"

Utter dross the lot of 'em

Drive is good.

At My Most Beautiful

^^^used to go to a support group for troubled teenagers when this dropped, this was the jam for the self-harm kids

Oh man. It's like choosing between flavors of ass. I'll have to go with "Lotus."

I'm going with Strange Currencies. I'd vote for Everybody Hurts but I hate that part where he sings and they play instruments.

words like 'dropped' and 'jam' feel strangely out of place on an REM thread.

I think it's E-Bow The Letter. It's gotta be something off that album, which is the only 90s one that's really worth a damn.

I can't vote for any of these, they're all pretty bad. Pretty uniformly bad as well.

Would have voted for Furry Happy Monsters, just for the bit where they all get sad.

lol Brits

I voted for "Bang and Blame" today (I know, wtf), but I could have voted for any of these except "Strange Currencies" or "E-Bow the Letter".

I always thought Texarkana was a single(?) and 5 singles off Monster? Damn.

this is a pretty sad list.

It's all be swiftly downhill since "Losing My Religion".

E-Bow, followed by Man On The Moon.

Man on the Moon fucking rules so that's first, followed by Sidewinder, Kenneth and Drive.

yeah I think it was around the 114th time I saw the LMR video in the course of a day and a half that I was kind of "these dudes need to take a break."

Strange Currencies, because it's the best song on the album that pissed off their fans. Hurrah!

Yeah, Lotus.

Should've released Hope though, that's the best song on that album.

It's shocking to see all the hatred these guys inspire now. Their stock has really fallen since the early 90s.

Drive.

REM hatred has been a popular hipster move for decades.

top 10:
Man On The Moon
Strange Currencies
Radio Song
Nightswimming
What's The Frequency Kenneth
Bittersweet Me
Lotus
The Sidewinder Sleeps Tonite
Near Wild Heaven
Drive

going to have to revist E-Bow cause i thought that sucked, but several people have gone for it.

no, it does suck.

E-Bow is like Everybody Hurts or Radio Song, seems to polarize opinion. I find the stream of consciousness lyric annoying, and Patti Smith's moaning or whatever too. But lots of folks think this is great, I guess. I love "Radio Song" though for the reasons others hate it, so I'm cool with this.

New Adventures In Hi-Fi is actually quite a strong record. Though I wouldn't select E-Bow as its strongest song, it was an odd choice for the first single.

I think the New Adventures singles debacle was what had Warners going 'right then boys, we pick the singles from now on' from about 98 onward.

I'm pretty sure 'Suspicion' was a single as well, mostly because I remember thinking 'what the fuck are they doing?'

Was "Nightswimming" really a single? I don't remember that, but it is still my favorite of their songs, pretty much ever.

I haven't even thought of "Bang and Blame" for a very long time. It was like two songs, the verse (which I loved) and the chorus (which was terrible).

Can we ban anyone who votes for "Shiny Happy People"?

I'd vote for Everybody Hurts but I hate that part where he sings and they play instruments.

hahahahahaha

It's all be swiftly downhill since "Losing My Religion" Stipe started enunciating.

I like most of these, and I'm tempted to vote for Kenneth just because listening to the new live CD, the "withdrawal in disgust is not the same as apathy" line finally grabbed me. But, Drive.

"losing my religion". (out of time is unfairly maligned these days, it's a good record. also i think "shiny happy people" gets misunderstood a lot, but whatever. song has has one of buck's best riffs.)

It gets misunderstood for sounding like cats dying.

No, but "E-Bow the Letter" actually features a cat dying.

"Strange Currencies" or "Man on the Moon". Probly the former, today.

It was briefly quite cool to be into REM in my school when I was 16 or so. Very odd to consider now.

For me it's close between the bizarrely unappreciated "Shiny Happy People" and "What's the Frequency, Kenneth?" At the time these records came out I liked "Sidewinder," "Man on the Moon," and "Strange Currencies" just as much, but they haven't aged as well, especially "Man on the Moon" which once seemed fun to me but now reads as forced whimsy.

So if I don't like forced whimsy, why do I rate "Shiny Happy People" the best track on this list?

1. Kate Pierson. Her voice works with Stipe's for the same reason Mike Mills' does -- she's high where he's low, and clear and sweet where he's raspy and shouty. I wish there were more of her in R.E.M.'s catalog than SHP and the even better "Me in Honey."

2. The song, like its twin, the almost-as-underrated "Stand," serves to remind that R.E.M. is at bottom an Athens party band and can play party songs when appropriate.

3. Main guitar riff is unimpeachable.

4. There's a weird general sense around this song that it's some kind of "Up with People" ditty where in fact it's about a guy who has to go bury his love in the ground. Yeah, pretty flowers grow out of the ground, but it's still where you put dead things. Love shines; but so does money. Are you sure you know the difference? Et cetera.

It was briefly quite cool to be into REM in my school when I was 16 or so. Very odd to consider now.

I'm actually very interested in how old you'd have to be for this to be true. I mean, it's odd to be a big REM fan now, but that's because REM's current output isn't very good, not because their old output seems weak in retrospect, right?

For a long time, i.e. 1983-1990, disliking REM was a possible but usually self-consciously contrarian stance, like disliking the Velvet Underground or the Clash. And I was under the impression that disliking R.E.M.'s '80s records was still like that. No?

"near wild heaven" is probably the only one i could listen to all the way through...

This is a pretty awesome list, guys. Seriously, the closest it gets to dud is the hokeyness of Radio Song, but the pretty part is really great and hell, the hokey part's not that bad either. Everything else here is a really damn good song.

There's a weird general sense around this song that it's some kind of "Up with People" ditty where in fact it's about a guy who has to go bury his love in the ground.

yeah at the time it seemed like aids song (of course everything was tinted by aids then, like everything's tinted by iraq/terror now). so it seems off to me when people write it off as some kind of sugar pop. not that i don't like sugar pop, but its bittersweetness is really what it's about.

For a long time, i.e. 1983-1990, disliking REM was a possible but usually self-consciously contrarian stance

i dunno during my high school years (83-87) there weren't even that many people who knew who they were. just us college-radio fans. "fall on me" is the first time i remember any broader awareness. and it really wasn't til document that they started seeming like a mainstream rock band, in terms of being able to say "r.e.m." and have a reasonable number of teen-to-20s people know who you were talking about.

Sorry, I should have said "a possible but usually self-consciously contrarian stance among people in the '80s analogous to people who read ILM today," and the truth is, I wasn't one of those people until at least 1988 so I'm kind of blowing smoke here. Maybe I should just say that when Document came out, it was considered cool in my high school to like it, and in retrospect, that judgment still seems pretty sound, not odd.

near wild heaven by far

I have always liked most of these songs except for Shiny Happy People and Everybody Hurts.

After loving this band so much in the 80s, I'm amazed at how indifferent I became toward them in the 90s. Near Wild Heaven, Strange Currencies, and Electrolite are all good songs, I admit.

"near wild heaven" is probably the only one i could listen to all the way through...
OTM

"Losing My Religion" by a mile.

Now, the 80s singles poll, on the other hand, would be hard as fuck!

I think REM are the band ILM is most confused by -- there's always a lot of soul-searching whenever their name comes up. For what it's worth, me? I loved almost everything they did up until NAIHF. And at least half of Up was also great. Even Reveal had a moment or two.

Anyway, I think I'm going to go with "E-Bow..." in this.

"Dreaming of Maria Callas... whoever she is." I mean, it's so awkward, but it's nice too, empathic or something.

Up could not sound more like a relic of the late-90s. Wow.

Going with "Crush With Eyeliner." Big Loud Fun REM is awesome.

at least half of Up was also great.

i thought more like, half of up was ok. the best melody on the album is from leonard cohen. after that i just heard assorted singles, haven't bothered with the albums. but i think it's true that r.e.m. elicits an interesting ambivalence. i've been a fan for 25 years (i can't believe i've been a fan of anyone for 25 years, jesus) and i'm still ambivalent about them. there's tons of r.e.m. stuff i love and god knows i've spent plenty of time listening to them, but they never spring to mind when someone asks me my favorite bands. they were always a band i liked having around, appreciated their general presence, but they were never the most interesting or exciting thing going on.

of course anyone who's grown up largely with the 1990-and-later r.e.m. might see them as a totally different thing too. i can understand why some people can't stand them. still don't get the out of time hate though. that's a really good album. and maybe more than anything else they ever did really emblematic of its era. "radio song" is easy to make fun of, but it has to be understood in a landscape of all kinds of interesting hybridization that was going on in the late 80s/early 90s. (against the backdrop of aids, the collapsing eastern bloc, a recession, etc.) (not that all the hybridization made great stuff. radio song's not as good as kool thing. but r.e.m. at least gave krs-one gets a lot more room than chuck d got.) but a lot of it is really elegiac -- "losing my religion," "low," "country feedback," it's really kinda somber --including or despite "shiny happy people" depending on how you hear it. but good tunes too.

(should have said against a backdrop of "aids, crack," etc., because crack had really complicated and fucked-up ramifications for a lot of things, but combined with all the other stuff it helped create some political solidarities.)

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

"Was "Nightswimming" really a single? I don't remember that, but it is still my favorite of their songs, pretty much ever.

-- nickalicious"

i didnt realise it was a single. same with "the sidewinder sleeps tonight". "automatic for the people" is quite obviously the best REM record, i wish they hadnt beaten "everybody hurts" to death since it was the weakest track on there anyway, but now i just skip it. if you take that track off, that is a perfect album. my vote goes to "drive" though i like other songs better (such as the two mentioned) im not sure they really worked very well as singles.

wb

Between "Drive", "Man On The Moon" and "Losing My Religion" for me. "The Great Beyond" might have been a contender (a very underrated late masterpiece IMO), but of course it isn't a 90s single.

Voted "Drive", but "Man On The Moon" is probably closer now that it was in the past.

"Daysleeper" and "Near Wild Heaven" are also great. And wasn't "Find The River" a single?

Why isn't "The Great Beyond" on here?--released Nov. 1999.

Not my favorite, which might actually be "Strange Currencies," but I think this has to go to "Losing My Religion," which all by itself was like their Joshua Tree - it made them deservedly huge and deservedly over all at once. Still a beautiful song though. REM haters give herpes to kittens.

The one I thought was missing wasn't a 90s single: "Imitation of Life".

Where's the one with Miss Piggy?

"Near Wild Heaven"

Losing My Religion, mostly for the memories

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

Bang And Blame 3

^^^Why?

nothing for 'bittersweet me'? that's a pretty nice song

i would have voted for 'losing my religion' though. despite having heard it about two million times too many

SOMEONE VOTED SHINY HAPPY PEOPLE (PROBABLY AN IRONIC INDIE FUCKER)

I would voted "Sidewinder" if I voted.

Tongue 0

this makes me so so sad ^

:-(

great song

i would have voted for it, had i seen the poll.

SOMEONE VOTED SHINY HAPPY PEOPLE (PROBABLY AN IRONIC INDIE FUCKER)

That would be me, unironically. See explanation earlier in thread.