Feeling Gravity's POLL: REM's "Fables of the Reconstruction"

Can't imagine "Driver 8" won't win, though "Gravity's Pull" is a strong dark horse.

Peter Buck hates "Wendell Gee." He's so wrong.

But I voted "Gravitys."

Their worst album before Green. Not much I remember other than "Wendell Gee," "Driver 8," and the execrable "Can't Get There From Here." Voted for "Wendell Gee."

this is a good record to separate the old school fans from the fans of the multi-platinum years. i think this is way more interesting than anything that came after, but it is murky and hard to penetrate. can't get there from here doesn't fit on this album or anywhere else, it's just a jokey throwaway that somehow became a (semi)hit.

kohoutek is their greatest song ever.

i like "can't get there." but yeah, i have a lot of affection for this record. "feeling gravity's pull" is probably my favorite, but "driver 8," "kohoutek," "life and how to live it." "green grow the rushes" is really pretty. good album.

Poll title was a toss-up between this, "KoPOULLtek," and "POLLed Man Kensey" which I kind of regret not going with.

"Kohoutek" is the real slow-burner of this record, I like it more and more with every single listen. "Driver 8" just kicks ass, so does "Can't Get There From Here" which also has Stipe going "Yeep!" at the beginning. Are the really big horns on this or only on Eponymous?

And then there's "Life And How To Live It," maybe the last of their great skittery jittery rockers where it feels like the wheels are going to come off at any moment - the descendent of Chronic Town and "9-9." After this record they still did plenty of great rock tunes but they were more locked down somehow - don't quite know how to articulate this but there's a nervous energy that gradually gets concentrated into something more focused, not necessarily better or worse but different.

I voted for "Driver 8" in homage to the startling proportion of my sophomore year of college I spent playing it on my crappy acoustic guitar. "Can't Get There From Here" is a strong runner-up -- not a joke track at all, I'd have thought. And indeed, "Life and how to live it." Which is more closely related to "Pretty Persuasion" than "9-9" I think, and not really the last of its kind -- that is "Just a Touch."

Here we're in the middle of a long stretch where REM were incapable of making a bad record.

God, "Driver 8" is so good... there's this perfect note struck of sympathetic comfort, and some great railroad travel imagery to boot.

"power lines have floaters so the airplanes don't get snagged"

that line is almost exactly how my parents explained those power line balls to me when i was 7 or 8. that whole song is kind of childlike, stipe doing his naive impressionist thing.

http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1173/1267344528_02d8a69b26.jpg?v=0

Also reminds me a lot of Wendell Gee building the missing middle of a tree out of chicken wire - the same kind of dream logic.

can't decide between Green Grow the Rushes and Good Advices.

I totaled a car to "Driver 8"

Haven't decided what to vote for, but this is the only REM album I listen to now.

Voted for this. Spazzy dance and all

Agreed about this being one of their finest moments. My first job after leaving school was in a drug company laboratory, and one of my jobs was to inspect ampoules for specks of dust, which had to be done in the chemical store cupboard with a lamp. I would sit there and play this album completely enraptured. The jar of amphetamine sulphate that was kept in there helped too.
Gravity always sends shivers down my spine.

Wendell Gee but there are at least four other tracks here vying for second place.

Brilliant album and another vote for Driver 8.

kohoutek is their greatest song ever.

OTM

"Wendell Gee" by a landslide. The only thing in this album that holds up to the general quality of their first two.

maybe my third favourite REM album at rough count. half the songs in contention but Driver 8 is as special as it is obvious.

Was gonna vote Wendell Gee but's Geir's "by a landside" has put me off somehow. No winner is going to be by a landslide - there really isn't a bad track on this and, as Matt DC says, there are so many close run second bests they may even be first bests.

Feeling Gravity's Pull has swung it, I think - "Time and distance are out of place here" sort of sums up the track. It's unsettling and fantastic.

I want to vote for "Driver 8," but it's like the mid-80s suburban "Layla" -- EVERY fucking high-school-age band was playing it. So I'm goin' with "Kohoutek" -- the last great mysterious R.E.M. song.

I want to vote for "Driver 8," but it's like the mid-80s suburban "Layla" -- EVERY fucking high-school-age ban

Really? What was the band's college radio exposure at this point? The next two records really raised their mainstream profile.

they utterly unfuckingavoidable on college radio at the time. this is probably their worst '80s record.

oh, and i went with "Green Grow the Rushes" just for the hell of it.

oops *they were

xp

Life and How To Live It, one of their greatest songs.

I returned to vote for "Maps and Legends," a beautiful slice of beauty. This is a great album and was FURIOUS live.

Voted "Kohoutek" last night before I had a chance to be influenced by any other opinions, but it could have been any of 3 or 4 songs. This album is the end of that stretch of theirs that I love, "Chronic Town" and the first 3 albums. After that they got boring to me.

geez, maybe I'll have time to listen to this before I vote; probly haven't played it in 15 years. In '85 I thought it was a disappointment.

Alfred so wrong about "Can't Get There From Here."

This one still sounds good all the way through. All that survives for me of the next one is Fall on Me

Alfred so wrong about "Can't Get There From Here."

But you don't dance!

dancing to rock only makes sense if it's, like, the Monks.

I don't know how 'Wendell Gee' goes so I don't understand the praise for it here.

I do like 'Good Advices' quite a bit - it has sweetness and at least a veneer of wisdom.

'Maps & Legends' I am very fond of. I like the intuitive, reflex jangling of all this.

But there is no contest: with that shimmering riff, that shuddering tipsy feeling of love, loss and time as the track stops on a cliff's edge, that title even - LIFE AND HOW TO LIVE IT

I never quite understood all the love for that one - I saw them play it around 1999 and the guy standing in front of me went absolutely mental in this total "now I can die happy!" way. Sounds a bit of a mess to me.

I'm a big fan of this album - way underrated!

I'm going with the obvious choice of "Driver 8" because that riff is one of their very best.

I want to vote for "Driver 8," but it's like the mid-80s suburban "Layla" -- EVERY fucking high-school-age ban

So OTM

live and how to live it

Driver 8 and how to drive it.

admittedly, i haven't heard the fucking thing in its entirety for some 23(?) years. but it just seemed like such a huge letdown coming after their first two albums that i could never really go back to it.

meanwhile, Matt's back!!!

haven't listened to this in a lonnnnnnng time, but it's probably not as bad as Green.

Green may not be as consistent an album overall, but it sure as hell had greater highs than this one did.

This is a great album and was FURIOUS live.

OTM. I was shocked at how loud they were (spring '85 "Preconstruction" tour). They're neck-and-neck with AC/DC. Or at least they were then.

Green

I don't see any highs here, really.

"Pop Song 89" – ehhh, whatever.
"Get Up" – 2:39 not too bad
"You Are the Everything" – 3:41 pretty good
"Stand" – 3:10 I KILL YOU NOW
"World Leader Pretend" – 4:17 overwrought bologna
"The Wrong Child" – 3:36 --- ibid
"Orange Crush" – 3:51 --not too bad
"Turn You Inside-Out" – 4:16 -- ok
"Hairshirt" – 3:55 -- i don't even remember this
"I Remember California" – 4:59--crap. like side 2 of document but somehow worse.
11th untitled song – 3:10 --kinda cute

I like all the Green singles ("Stand" was the first REM song I ever heard), but this is the wrong thread. The second side's awful.

i dunno. a couple of those tracks are real standouts.

document is a bit better than green, but none of them really compare with the first 3 albums

Re: "Life and How To Live It": it's all about Mike Mills's bass part rolling up to the chorus. Incredible sense of excitement and arrival, and Stipe's lyrics are so animated! "My pockets are out and running about" somehow summarizes this entire area of their catalog.

You guys are doing a damn good job of making me listen to this after work.

yeah, "life and how to live it" is the underrated gem here. as great as anything on the surrounding couple of albums (which, as noted, i prefer)

i suppose it's not really "underrated" when it's received several effusive mentions ITT. still! amazing song.

Best. Wish that when they decided they needed to "rock" later in their career they listened to this song.

Remaster sounds best in headphones, I think. That's where I'm really hearing the separation I'd never heard before. (Was amazed to hear the harmonica in "Driver 8," which I don't think I ever even noticed?)

this album is all about the bass

OTM! Especially on 'Driver 8', that's a great bassline. I'm a huge fan of Mike Mills' playing on those early albums, although Murmur and Reckoning are so trebly that it's easy to overlook his playing sometimes. 'Radio Free Europe' is a great bassline.

It punches through really clearly on the Murmur remaster

'Belong' on Out Of Time too, the bass makes that song in my humble opinion. As a piece of music there's very little there, but the bass gives the track melody and is the glue that holds the whole thing together!

Adore the "Belong" bassline - secret key to the chorus working as well as it does.

I haven't checked out the recent reissues with demos on the bonus discs. Are they anything more than curiosities?

demo of Hyena makes it sound like a Reckoning track; it's.. weird. also some pretty interesting other demo bits on Fables' 2nd disc. they're all on Spotify (in the UK at least).

Just learned that Stipe's first choice to produce Fables was Van Dyke Parks, and when that didn't pan out, Elliot Mazer. Either of those could have been very interesting.... (but I love Joe Boyd's production here and elsewhere nonetheless)

I spent a lot of time playing "Driver 8" on my acoustic guitar as a teenager. Pre-internet, Stipe's mumble of the "power lines" line made it impossible to transcribe. I rewound the cassette *so* many times, only found it out from a piece of sheet music several years later.

I want to vote for "Driver 8," but it's like the mid-80s suburban "Layla" -- EVERY fucking high-school-age band was playing it.

This can't possibly have been true, can it?

I loved this album when I was a teenager. I think I voted for "Feeling Gravity's Pull"?

Hyena was a Reckoning-era track. It shows up frequently on bootlegs of the era.

Yeah, there's quite a few songs from Life Rich Pageant that came from the Reckoning era and even earlier. Pageant was a bit of a backlog-clearing exercise in a way.

What If We Give It Away goes right back to the beginning of the band iirc

"Just a Touch" as well

Yeah, definitely 'Hyena', 'Just A Touch' and 'What If We Give It Away?' had been around for a few years. I think 'I Believe' was a leftover from Fables although it's possible they may have had it earlier in some form or another.

Wow, I love how sloppy and fucked-up that "Hyena" is. I mean, I love it on the record for the tightness of the riff wiring its way around the beat, but between the two versions you can really triangulate the drunk party band on the bootlegs, the hypnotic post-punk band on Chronic Town band, and the sunny propulsive rock band on Reckoning through Life's Rich Pageant. All the same dudes playing songs that really weren't that different, just a few minor adjustments. It's like the Cavern Club vs. Revolver.

one of the songs (Throw These Trolls Away) seems to have some of the I Believe lyrics in it.

After all this time, what I remember was it was a very pretty record but I had a roommate at the time who was poisoned with inexplicable hatred for R.E.M. For making a pretty record. Or something.

If I remember, Fables Of The Reconstruction was the last of the IRS-era records I heard, and I never could fathom why the band themselves were so down on it or why it was treated as if it was some kind of "crisis" album. I mean, sure, the band sound like they had a terrible time making it, but why I listen to 'Driver 8', 'Maps and Legends', 'Life and How To Live It', 'Green Grow The Rushes', it's just as good as any stuff they'd done up to then. I think the band have changed their mind about the record in recent years and I'm glad about that.

Yeah, I was disappointed to read that. It has such a strong sense of nature and geography, whereas other R.E.M. records address that stuff more directly. With this one, the sense of place is in the music.

It's got that Americana vibe, like Wichita Lineman.

Pulled out the album again on Friday to absorb to and from work. For the love of god I don't hear what you guys do: retreads, murk, bleh.

Relistening to Life and How to Live It, I'm struck by how much it sounds like Makoto Kawabata nicked the opening for Pink Lady Lemonade

Love this record. Their last really great record IMO (he writes, ducking).

And EveningStar, it is totally true that Driver 8 was covered by everyone, even by bands for whom it was their one "indie" song (also Radio Free Europe). But the Buck lick is the one song everyone with an acoustic guitar knew. (Even though Boxcar was a little cooler.)

read just about every paragraph

the sky is open armed
when the light is mine

Surprising poll results; these are some of the best songs on there:

"Maps and Legends" – 3:10 3
"Good Advices" – 3:30 2
"Old Man Kensey" – 4:08 0

look at his shoes

ew

at the end of the day
when there are no friends
when there are no lovers

what do you have to saaaaaaayyyy

Locomotive 8, Southern Crescent, hear the bells ring again

"Life and How to Live It" – 4:06 5

my actual favorite rem song

No album sounds like this album

So there's a dude named Pablo Hidalgo who is a longtime employee of Lucasfilm in their Story Group and (until recently) interacted a lot with fans on Twitter. His wife Kristen is also on there and her handle is @ManRaySky, which is awesome.

"Life and How to Live It" – 4:06 5

my actual favorite rem song

way up there for me, too

I've given this album more chances than most and it'll always be meh, but I do appreciate how the arrangements strive (and achieve) for a half-awake stumbling feel.

This may be their most criminally underrated album.

Embrace the murk, Soto!

At this point every R.E.M. gets called their most criminally underrated album.

Except in this case it's true

r.e.m. didn't put out a "meh" record until reveal

I feel like Maps and Legends should be higher than Green Grow the Rushes.

For me it probably would be Driver / Maps / Can't Get.

It is a pretty good record

I usually skip "Maps and Legends", too much of a drone. It's the song where I understand why someone wouldn't like this album, or even this band.

But those last three songs, or even the last four: building up to a final relief. maybe today I would rate "Auctioneer" the highest. they're songs of a band exhausted by the road that already an album earlier was at best viewed ambiguously ("another Greenville, another Magic Mart"). but rather than write about I dunno, Bob Segar style, they characteristically code their images. But they build and build, from frenzy to anxiety to a final passing.

counterpoint: not a drone

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7-2QlXO1SYY

And then there's "Life And How To Live It," maybe the last of their great skittery jittery rockers where it feels like the wheels are going to come off at any moment - the descendent of Chronic Town and "9-9." After this record they still did plenty of great rock tunes but they were more locked down somehow - don't quite know how to articulate this but there's a nervous energy that gradually gets concentrated into something more focused, not necessarily better or worse but different.

― Doctor Casino, Monday, October 27, 2008 11:23 PM (eleven years ago)

OTM on "Life and How to Live It". When Bill "Blue"Berry plays that disco-esque beat at such frenetic tempo (a la "Hyena", "Harborcoat", et al) it feels like a dangerously-fast downhill ride on an unfamiliar road. I also love the backup vox in the chorus, and those walk-up bass notes that precede it. "my CARPENTERS OUT AND RUNNING ABOUT!!!!..."

What's the deal with the liner notes and its listing of trakcs that aren't actually on the album ("When We Were Young")? Or did I hallucinate that like a "Wendell Gee" fever dream?