R.E.M. – Up (New Vinyl) (25th Anniversary)

NEW DOUBLE LP

New sealed copy. 2023 25th anniversary remastered reissue. Pressed for the first time on vinyl since its initial release in 1998.

Up is the eleventh studio album by American rock band R.E.M., released on October 26, 1998, by Warner Bros. Records. The album saw R.E.M. move into electronic music-influenced territory after delivering New Adventures in Hi-Fi in 1996. Ending a 10-year relationship with co-producer Scott Litt, the band engaged the production assistance of Pat McCarthy, who was assisted on most tracks by engineer Nigel Godrich, Radiohead's producer. The single "Daysleeper" became a Top 10 UK hit, and "Lotus", The Beach Boys-influenced "At My Most Beautiful" and "Suspicion" were also released as singles.

"There are certain things I set out to do," Michael Stipe noted. "Rough ideas that I wanted to play around with. One of them was the religious-spiritual versus science-technology-modern-age. There are several songs on the record that, to me, address that. I don't know how other people are going to take them. It's taking off a little bit from 'Undertow' and 'New Test Leper', with the freedom of 'E-Bow the Letter' and 'Country Feedback' – songs that just come out. What I really wanted was more of that automatic, unconscious stuff… greatly inspired by Patti Smith and various others… Bert Downs said the record's about people falling down and getting back up again. He said there's a lot of that imagery. I'm like, 'Really?'"

Breaking with a tradition that stretched back to the band's 1983 debut, Murmur, Stipe elected to have his complete lyrics included in Up's CD booklet, a practice he would maintain on all subsequent R.E.M. studio albums. "[Mike Mills] was reading the lyrics," he explained, "and he said, 'These are really great – we should print them on the record sleeve.' It was a really good night and there were eight or nine songs on the wall. I said, 'Yeah, we will'… I thought it was a nice way of saying that we are a different band now."

A 25th anniversary edition is slated for release in November 2023.

TRACKLIST:

A1 Airportman
A2 Lotus
A3 Suspicion
B1 Hope
B2 At My Most Beautiful
B3 The Apologist
B4 Sad Professor
C1 You're In The Air
C2 Walk Unafraid
C3 Why Not Smile
C4 Daysleeper
D1 Diminished
D2 Parakeet
D3 Falls To Climb