188 replies to this topic

[MurmursAdministrator]

The band will cap its 31-year recording career with its first-ever definitive greatest hits album, due out from Warner Bros. Records on November 15th. The 40-song retrospective-- R.E.M., PART LIES, PART HEART, PART TRUTH, PART GARBAGE, 1982 - 2011--includes tracks from both the IRS and Warner years plus three brand-new songs.

One of the new tracks, We All Go Back to Where We Belong, goes to radio and on sale on October 18th.

Read the Warner Bros. press release which includes Track-listing for the Greatest Hits below:

After R.E.M. ignited the blogosphere on September 21st with the news that they had decided to “call it a day as a band” via a statement on their website, the beloved band have announced that they will release their final album, R.E.M., Part Lies, Part Heart, Part Truth, Part Garbage, 1982 – 2011, on Warner Bros. Records on November 15th, 2011. The album is a 40-song career-spanning retrospective that collects, for the first time ever, songs from R.E.M.’s entire back catalog, including the pioneering American band’s years on both the IRS label (1982 to 1987) and Warner Bros. Records (1988 to 2011). The album is currently available for pre-order on Amazon here. A brand-new song, “We All Go Back To Where We Belong,” goes to radio and will be available for sale on October 18th.

R.E.M. formed in 1980 when singer Michael Stipe met guitarist Peter Buck in an Athens, GA, record store where Buck worked. After recruiting bassist Mike Mills and drummer Bill Berry, R.E.M. released its first single, “Radio Free Europe,” in 1981, followed by 1982’s Chronic Town EP, capturing the imagination of a new generation of music lovers and bringing “guitar pop back into the underground lexicon,” as All-Music put it. Widely credited with inventing the college-rock genre, R.E.M. became the most influential American alternative rock band in history — inspiring such artists as Sonic Youth, Pavement, Nirvana, and Radiohead — for achieving multi-platinum mainstream success while maintaining their distinct identity.

Over the course of its career, the band has released 15 studio albums: Murmur (1983), Reckoning (1984), Fables of the Reconstruction (1985), Lifes Rich Pageant (1986), Document (1987), Green (1988), Out of Time (1991), Automatic For The People (1992), Monster (1994), New Adventures in Hi-Fi (1996), Up (1998), Reveal (2001), Around the Sun (2004), Accelerate (2008), and Collapse Into Now (2011). They have sold more than 85 million albums worldwide.

“Working through our music and memories from over three decades was a hell of a journey,” says Mike Mills of choosing the songs that appear on R.E.M., PART LIES, PART HEART, PART TRUTH, PART GARBAGE, 1982 - 2011. “We realized that these songs seemed to draw a natural line under the last 31 years of our working together.”

In addition to liner notes written by band members Berry, Buck, Mills, and Stipe, the album also features three new songs that R.E.M. finished after they completed their last album, Collapse Into Now: “A Month of Saturdays,” “We All Go Back To Where We Belong,” and “Hallelujah,” which were recorded over the summer in Athens with Accelerate and Collapse Into Now producer, the estimable Jacknife Lee. The band came roaring back with those two albums in the last two years, achieving some of the best reviews of their career and enabling them to go out at the top of their game.

The track-listing for R.E.M., PART LIES, PART HEART, PART TRUTH, PART GARBAGE, 1982 - 2011 is as follows:

Disc 1:
Gardening At Night
Radio Free Europe
Talk About The Passion
Sitting Still
So. Central Rain
(Don’t Go Back To) Rockville
Driver 8
Life And How To Live It
Begin The Begin
Fall On Me
Finest Worksong
It’s The End Of The World As We Know It (And I Feel Fine)
The One I Love
Stand
Pop Song 89
Get Up
Orange Crush
Losing My Religion
Country Feedback
Shiny Happy People

Disc 2:
The Sidewinder Sleeps Tonite
Everybody Hurts
Man On The Moon
Nightswimming
What’s The Frequency, Kenneth?
New Test Leper
Electrolite
At My Most Beautiful
The Great Beyond
Imitation Of Life
Bad Day
Leaving New York
Living Well Is The Best Revenge
Supernatural Superserious
ÜBerlin
Oh My Heart
Alligator_Aviator_Autopilot_Antimatter
A Month of Saturdays
We All Go Back To Where We Belong
Hallelujah

[MurmursAdministrator]

pelagius42, on 26 September 2011 - 08:25 AM, said:

Ethan, do you know if Mr. Berry plays on the new songs?  If you knew, would you be able to say (given that you no longer work for Warners)?

Don't think he does. I'm supposed to hear them soon.

[mattlpfoster]

I'd have dropped Alligator for something more from Up or Reveal. Really don't think they should skirt over those two, especially with 4 from AFTP. 24 tracks from the first decade and only 16 from the last two seems unfair on the late period stuff.

Also, seeing Shiny Happy People on here, I do wonder whether they've reconciled themselves to this track or whether the label had a hand?

Will be lovely to get three new tracks, though.

[jerad]

Of course, we'll all have some complaints about what's on there or what's been left off, but I'm pretty happy with what I see here. It's obvious that the band worked to choose what would show up here; this tracklist almost reads like a setlist from some of the recent tours. All of the albums are represented, it's not just the singles (a true "best of"), only two (Green & AFTP) have as many as 4 songs included, it's in chronological order, we get three new ones, and liner notes by Berry, Buck, Mills, and Stipe. I'm sure that Peter's notes alone will be worth the price of the compilation.

[jstecker22]

I find it funny Sidewinder has ended up on both Greatest Hits packages and they've never played it live (that I'm aware of).

[thomas08]

any news if there will be a special edition with rarities and/or a dvd of some sort?

[The Wrong Child]

Great tracklisting, and it's good to see "Shiny Happy People" show up on a greatest hits compilation.  "Drive" I think is more anthemic than "Sidewinder," but no complaints as I like "Sidewinder" anyway.  Regardless, legacy and evolution (being chronological) are reflected in the tracklisting.

[ebowtheloser]

Pretty amazing when you look at all of those great songs and there are STILL worthy cuts that had to be left off! Just an astounding career!

[Eidnes]

Four songs from Green, and no World Leader Pretend? Strange. And I find it very odd that they leave out E-bow. New Test Leper is a pleasant surprise, though.

Other songs I miss: Drive, Find the River, Let Me In. EDIT: And Be Mine.

[falls to climb]

I miss Drive, Find the River, World Leader Pretend, E-bow the letter, bang and blame, daysleeper, it happened today & Perfect Circle

[wahlers]

I second the hope that there will be a special editon version with an extra CD or DVD.

Also, any word on if this will be issued as a vinyl box set?

Would also be nice if Warner took this opportunity to reissue Accelerate and Collapse Into Now as CD+DVD releases to match the set and put out a follow-up DVD set to compliment In View to include all videos since then.

On a related note, does anybody know if we will be getting anniversary reissues of Document and Dead Letter Office to complete the set?

[cjr67]

wahlers, on 26 September 2011 - 09:48 AM, said:

I second the hope that there will be a special editon version with an extra CD or DVD.

Also, any word on if this will be issued as a vinyl box set?

Would also be nice if Warner took this opportunity to reissue Accelerate and Collapse Into Now as CD+DVD releases to match the set and put out a follow-up DVD set to compliment In View to include all videos since then.

On a related note, does anybody know if we will be getting anniversary reissues of Document and Dead Letter Office to complete the set?

In a recent interview, Mills stated that DLO was not part of the reissue campaign.  I forget if he spefically mentioned Document (probably) but I can't imagine that it wouldn't get the 25th Anniversary re-release treatment.

[wahlers]

cjr67, on 26 September 2011 - 09:54 AM, said:

In a recent interview, Mills stated that DLO was not part of the reissue campaign.  I forget if he spefically mentioned Document (probably) but I can't imagine that it wouldn't get the 25th Anniversary re-release treatment.

That's a shame.  I was really hoping for the reissue of Dead Letter Office to have a 2nd disc of the b-sides from Document that were not included along with any other live or rare non-studio b-sides from that era.  I know that the bonus disc on "And I Feel Fine" had some nice tracks, but it was not complete.  I have most if not all of the officially released tracks from that era, but to have them all in one place remastered and at a consistant volume would have been nice.

Well, if they don't reissue Dead Letter Office, I'd hope they'd give Chronic Town a standalone CD release then with a 2nd CD of live or demo tracks.

[Coop]

I agree that everyone would tweak it to suit their own tastes, but I think this looks like an excellent compilation.  It's maybe telling of the richer pickings in the earlier part of the band's catalogue that the first CD covers Chronic Town plus the first 7 albums, and the second CD has only 15 tracks from the remaining 8 albums plus FIVE non-album tracks (TGB, BD plus the 3 new ones).

So pleased to see that the band have acknowledged Shiny Happy People as being part of their journey - not my favourite song, but it has always seemed churlish to pretend it never happened.  And, given that most of the rest of the band's "pop experiment" (Stand, Pop Song 89) is represented here, it's only fair.

On the subject of a DLO reissue, I wouldn't think there's a chance until IRS/EMI have scraped the bottom of the barrel with everything else that they could possibly milk from the R.E.M. canon.

[beyond]

Surprised that "Country Feedback" is not on there, being Michael's favorite song.  Also surprised about "New Test Leper" but as NAIHF is my favorite record, pleased.  Not my choice of tracklist for a best of (a common thread, of course), but I see where they're going with this.  Might as well been called "Singles Collected."

Keen on hearing the new songs.  Is "Hallelujah" a cover?  I should hope not.

[REMCHICAGOBOY]

beyond, on 26 September 2011 - 10:36 AM, said:

Surprised that "Country Feedback" is not on there, being Michael's favorite song.  Also surprised about "New Test Leper" but as NAIHF is my favorite record, pleased.  Not my choice of tracklist for a best of (a common thread, of course), but I see where they're going with this.  Might as well been called "Singles Collected."

Keen on hearing the new songs.  Is "Hallelujah" a cover?  I should hope not.

Um..."Country Feedback" is right after "Losing My Religion" and right before "Shiny Happy People".