R.E.M. — Around The Sun

After a couple years skulking around Vancouver, R.E.M. have finally completed their new album and the good news is, while it isn’t exactly a return to form, it carries far more weight than their last two efforts, Up and Reveal.

Around The Sun has already been labeled by some as a "political album," but thankfully, it’s only political in the same way that Bruce Springsteen’s post-9/11 album, The Rising, is in that R.E.M. prefer to frame their politics in a personal context. Around The Sun is lengthy and gentle, filled with an unspecified sadness that's woven through nearly every song. The lead track, "Leaving New York," is one of the most seemingly personal songs that Michael Stipe has ever written but, like most of the album, it lacks the lyrical crypticness of R.E.M.’s early work and the universal warmth of their early ‘90s hits.

Around The Sun is better than most of R.E.M.’s work from the last half decade, but in these times of conflict, a band of this intellectual calibre should have been able to come up with something a little less boring.

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