Dreams, they comPOLLcate my life: REM's "Green"

My shortlist - Pop Song, You Are The Everything, Orange Crush, and....that's about it. Everything else is either kind of yelpy (Get Up), too convinced of its seriousness (World Leader Pretend, Wrong Child) or so loopy it gives me a headache (the mandolin chatter in Hairshirt for example).

"Orange Crush" is pretty interesting. The thinking man's "19".

It's still "Stand," the single that introduced me to mumbles and kudzu. The first REM album I owned and, until the recent Suck Trilogy, the one I like least. But the first side is very good: "Pop Song '89"'s title represents truth in advertising, "Get Up" has the instructive line "Dreams they complicate my life," and the second season of '90210' scored a Dylan McKay Introspective Moment with "You Are the Everything."

"Turn You Inside Out" was the only one I liked on this one, and I liked it a lot. Haven't heard that in ages.

Good groove, that one; but this sonic cousin of "Finest Worksong" is totally unconvincing: the only thing Stipe can turn inside out is his mattress in looking for his glasses.

Yeah, frankly I'm not sure what he's trying to say in that song. He could turn me inside out, but he chooses not to - what does he want, a standing ovation? Maybe if the turning-inside-out were a little more spelled out...but then he'd be doing it! D'oh!

"World Leader Pretend".

is Green really worse than Document and Out of Time? cuz I did not like those albums very much... (hmmm...I might not be an R.E.M. fan after all)

I thought this album was disappointing at the time, but in retrospect the first four tracks here are among the best album sides R.E.M. recorded. "Orange Crush" and "Turn You Inside Out" reveal themselves as great live, but lie a bit flat on the record. "World Leader Pretend" and "The Wrong Child" make for a slightly gooey center. But the untitled closer is unimpeachable.

Part of me wants to vote for "Stand," which jolted me out of my seat the first time I heard it, which made me understand what leaving the E open on your barre chords is FOR, and which (along with "Shiny Happy People") attracts tons of unjust hate from fans. And the guitar lick on "Pop Song '89" does its job in a way unequalled except on "Begin the Begin."

But it's "You Are The Everything" for me -- the song where R.E.M. proves they can do a slow, two-chord, featureless, completely sincere ballad and make it majestic and great. Sort of a lonely monument against all the slow, two-chord, featureless, completely sincere, and kind of terrible ballads that came later.

During the first year after it came out, I would have been hard-pressed to pick a favorite out of about 4 songs, but then "World Leader Pretend" kicked in for me on seeing the Tourfilm video and has been my favorite ever since.

I acquired this on cassette, along with Document and Reckoning, at a yard sale in maybe '97 or '98 - so I never really had the experience of it arriving as a distinct thing, just part of this big mash of songs that I VERY slowly digested over the next few years.

from Wiki:

"Pop Song 89" was the third single released from R.E.M.'s sixth studio album Green. It peaked at #86 on the Hot 100, and in the UK Stand was re-released instead.

In the music video, MTV asked Stipe, who directed it himself, to censor the three topless women with whom he was dancing in the video. Instead, Stipe superimposed black bars on the chests of all four dancers, himself included, and stated, "a nipple is a nipple."

like i said on the warner bros. album poll, i think this one's underrated and underappreciated. voted "get up," but i love "orange crush," "pop song," "you are the everything," "world leader pretend," and the unnamed closer. and "stand." it's a good record.

"World Leader Pretend" was an outstanding moment from a pretty lukewarm gig last time I saw them, so that gets it. ("Orange Crush", which I think was the only other 'Green' track they played, left me surprisingly unmoved).

You Are The Everything, narrowly over Orange Crush. This record isn't as bad as I thought it was when it came out, but still in the lower reaches of their canon.

You Are the Everything. Like Pop Song '89 too. I even like "The Wrong Child"
but am not brave enough to vote for it.

Another vote for "You are the everything". Reminds me of a certain night in '89 I got very drunk and someone played it for me for the first time and I cried like a baby. Still gets to me now.

It' a good record, kinda bogged down by the black hole of sadfaceness that is "The Wrong Child". But "Orange Crush" is still a gem.

Listening to it now, it's interesting how some parts seem admirably of-a-piece with Document (no sense of changing their sound for the major label) while others are such clear forerunners to Out of Time (the untitled song especially). The bummer is that it leaves the remainder as distinctly Green songs and they're all among my least favorite REM songs. "I Remember California" musters a certain atmosphere, but it really outstays its welcome. I'll give you the riff on "Pop Song 89" but it has a kind of observational-humor quality, like, look at the funny ways we use small talk to mince through our early moments with people.... but Stipe turns out to not have much to say about the topic. They were a much more precise and articulate band a couple of records earlier and then immediately after - what happened?

I think what happened is that they decided they wanted to keep trying to be a mainstream pop band, but did it with a fair bit of detachment and irony (e.g. "Pop Song 89", "Stand"). My favorite moments on this record are the ones when they go pop but drop the shield ("Get Up", which I voted for, the untitled song, and to a lesser extent, "You Are The Everything"). Well, that can't be all of it. "I Remember California", "World Leader Pretend", and "Orange Crush" carry over the political aspect of their art from the previous couple of albums. These latter songs are ok but not great by REM standards. But the album came around right around the 1988 election and hell, the name of the album was a political statement, I won't hold that against them.

I loved this when it was released, but it's not one I come back to very often now. For me, it's probably inextricably linked to the time they became a big arena band but, at least live, hadn't quite learned how to sell their music to a larger audience.

You Are The Evrything stands out now. That wonderfully personal and touching opening line still gets to me: "Sometimes I feel like I can't even sing..."

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

The last REM album I would toss if I had to pare down my record collection. I can see why those who were fans from the get-go diss Green but it was perfect for me at the time (and remains so), both the pop and, ehr, "emo" sides of it - Nowadays when I listen to it I think it needs to lose either "Hairshirt" or "The Wrong Child" to be really perfect, but I can't decide which, because I love them both inordinately and completely sentimentally. Must be what some folks who were 14 when Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme came out feel about thatalbum.

Yeah, I can't detach my love for these songs, which is grounded in experience, and try to evaluate these albums objectively.

tough pick but "i remember california." the whole second side (except for "turn you inside out" ("finest worksong" lite)) rules ("hairshirt"'s the first (?) and still my favorite buck mandolin jam) and "california" bridging "hairshirt" and the last song climaxes one of the best close-out dirge sets for a band that had quite a string of them, murmur - new adventures

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

Never did I dream YatE could pull it off so it would be churlish to complain about "Stand" getting another undeserved boot.

One of the most interesting results overall - clearly these are votes from people who know this album! Thanks, everybody. Next poll up shortly.

Yes. This one came out just about right, particularly the 0 votes for The Wrong Child.

woulda gone WLP

I also don't care if this album is shit

"The Wrong Child" is killing me this morning. I put on Green because "You Are The Everything" is kind of a perfect summer song, but wow @ the pathos of "I'm not supposed to be like this". If I'm being coldly analytical I'll sneer at it as just "politically correct college rock" and goodness knows there used to be lots of that (kinda wish there still was? like caring for the unprivileged is really not lame, and I mean when *you're* not the unprivileged one you're singing about) but it is hitting hard.

Been on a bit of an REM kick the last couple of days. Green is still one of my personal Top 3 favourite REM records.

MEMPHIS TRAIN BLUES