Line #28 YMMV/REM - TV Tropes


1	* AlternateCharacterInterpretation: In "The One I Love", does the guy actually love the girl he's singing to or not? He claims that she was just "a simple prop to occupy [his] time", but his screaming "FIRE!" repeatedly in the chorus could be taken to imply that there was some passion to their relationship which he doesn't want to admit.
2	* AmericansHateTingle: Although the band is huge in England now, as the GermansLoveDavidHasselhoff example below attests, the band initially was not very successful there. Their first UK Top 40 hit was "Orange Crush" in 1989, long after they had established themselves as the top alternative group in the United States. There are several reasons for this: First, Creator/IRSRecords had [[ScrewedByTheNetwork crappy distribution]] outside the U.S., and their similarly successful labelmates Music/TheGoGos also experienced difficulty with scoring hits in Europe. Secondly the U.K. indie scene was obsessed with [[Music/TheSmiths their own native jangly guitar band]] (who themselves struggled to break the U.S. market).
3	* {{Anvilicious}}: Michael Stipe intentionally made "Everybody Hurts" this so the message would be unmistakable to listeners, mainly the teen market he was trying to reach. This is arguably a case of Administrivia/TropesAreTools, however.
4	* AudienceAlienatingEra: Though opinions on Music/{{REM}}'s Creator/WarnerBrosRecords output repeatedly shifted with time, the period after Bill Berry's departure is still regarded as a step down compared to earlier material. As the band were a democratic unit who had everyone contribute to the songwriting, losing a member was, in their own words, like cutting off a dog's leg. While the first "trio" album, ''Music/{{Up\|REMAlbum}}'', got VindicatedByHistory, ''Music/{{Reveal}}'' remains somewhat divisive and ''Music/AroundTheSun'' is widely seen as R.E.M.'s nadir by fans, critics, and the band themselves. This decline corresponded with a substantial drop in sales and publicity, with their commercial success and fan reception not recovering until ''Music/{{Accelerate}}'' and ''Music/CollapseIntoNow'', the band's last two albums.
5	* SugarWiki/AwesomeMusic: Too many to list. Even their weaker albums feature some absolutely amazing tracks.
6	* BrokenBase:
7	** Had this something awful while they were active, though the rift has largely been sealed in recent years, with their breakup leading many fans to return to and re-evaluate material they had previously disliked. At the time, though, there were those who only liked the albums before or after Stipe stopped burying his vocals (''Lifes Rich Pageant'' being the dividing line), those who only liked the albums before or after they adopted a poppier sound (''Green'' being the dividing line), those who only liked the pre-''Out of Time'' material, and those who only liked the material with Bill Berry. It's pretty strange looking back on just how divisive so many now-beloved albums were. If you thought Music/{{Weezer}}'s fanbase was fractured, their situation is arguably much tamer compared to what R.E.M. used to face.
8	** Whilst as a general rule, ''Up'' is considered a good record (albeit noticeably rough compared to its predecessors) and ''Around the Sun'' mediocre, fans and critics are very divided on the album in between: ''Reveal'', an LP that is more about soundscapes than catchy songs. It suffered from HypeBacklash at the time and certainly in the UK alienated a lot of fans, who only returned to the band after the critical and commercial success of the single "Bad Day" (released to promote the GreatestHitsAlbum ''In Time'').
9	* ChorusOnlySong: "It's TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt (And I Feel Fine)", mainly due to the fact that it's pretty hard to understand what Stipe's saying in the verses since it's so fast.
10	** "Low" arguably fits this trope as well.
11	** "The One I Love" is an [[InvertedTrope inversion]]: more people know the verses ("This one goes out to [[TitleDrop the one I love]]...") instead of the chorus (Michael Stipe [[IncrediblyLongNote holding the word "fire" for a whole bar]] while Mike Mills sings "Comin' down on her own now" repeatedly in the background).
12	* CoveredUp:
13	** Their version of "Superman" has become better known than the Clique's original, so much so that when the song [[RepurposedPopSong appeared, re-recorded, in a 1999 commercial]], some parts of their fandom were shocked that the band had supposedly sold themselves out in such a manner. The group responded by pointing out that it wasn't their song to begin with, so they had no control over what was done with it.
14	** Also, "Strange" is often thought of as a song they originally performed. You'd think the fact that it's credited to a different set of writers would tip off people that it was originally performed by [[Music/{{Wire}} another band]]. This has actually caused R.E.M. to earn a lot of ire from Wire fans and HardcorePunk fans in general, who accused R.E.M. of missing the point of the song by "softening it up," to the point where many of said fans outright refuse to listen to R.E.M. out of spite.
15	** Wet Wet Wet famously covered The Troggs' "Love Is All Around" in 1994... but it was R.E.M.'s 1991 B-side recording of it that inspired them to do so. As Wet Wet Wet's version was so successful, it's weird for some to hear either The Troggs or R.E.M. versions without thinking of it.
16	* EnsembleDarkhorse: Some of their less commercially successful albums have developed passionate followings nonetheless, most notably ''New Adventures in Hi-Fi'' and ''Fables of the Reconstruction''. ''Monster'' is a different example in that while it was a commercial success, it was initially highly controversial among fans for its {{grunge}}-oriented sound, only to later acquire a cult following of its own for its effective satire of mainstream celebrity culture.
17	* EpicRiff: Many. "Losing My Religion", "Shiny Happy People", "Man on the Moon", "Drive", "The One I Love", "What's the Frequency, Kenneth?", "Supernatural Superserious", and "Discoverer", among others.
18	* FandomRivalry: With fans of Music/TheSmiths, on account of the fact that both bands were pioneering jangle-pop artists from the 80s, yet at the same time the two of them had radically different sounds from one another (R.E.M. specializing in arpeggio-based guitars and tangy, reedy vocals, and the Smiths specializing in riff-based guitars and ethereal, crooning vocals).
19	* FanonDiscontinuity: Changes from person to person. For some fans, it's after ''Fables of the Reconstruction'', when the band cleaned up their sound; for others, after they signed on Creator/WarnerBros For most, it's after Bill Berry left.
20	** While their appeal varies, the first three albums without Berry (''Up'', ''Reveal'', ''Around the Sun'') are often considered an AudienceAlienatingEra that was ended by ''Accelerate''; consequently, any number of fans will try to pretend that any one, two, or even all three of those albums don't exist (though much less commonly with ''Up'' after it got VindicatedByHistory).
21	* FirstInstallmentWins: A subset of fans maintain that ''Music/{{Murmur}}'' is the band's best album.
22	* FriendlyFandoms:
23	** With Music/TenThousandManiacs, due to both bands having a similar style, as well as Michael Stipe and Natalie Merchant being romantically linked for a while. Both lead singers made contributions to the other bands' albums.
24	** Also with Music/TheB52s, due to both bands hailing from Athens, Georgia, and Kate Pierson's guest appearances on ''Music/OutOfTime''.
25	* FridgeBrilliance: "It's TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt (And I Feel Fine)" is well known for its WordSaladLyrics sung really quickly. (So much, not even Michael Stipe is sure of the correct lyrics.) But isn't that representative of the chaos and confusion that would accompany the end of the world as we know it?
26	* GeniusBonus:
27	** "Welcome to the Occupation" is deliberately written in such a manner that it can either be about an "occupation" as in a job, or it can be about an "occupation" as in a country in war. Both meanings imply that the people involved had hoped for better things but have no real choice in the matter. Being screwed over by the government is the main theme of ''Document''.
28	** The political subtext of "The Flowers of Guatemala" is more obvious to anyone who knows that ''Amanita'' is actually the name of a genus of very poisonous fungi.
29	* GermansLoveDavidHasselhoff:
30	** When their popularity dropped off in America, they remained popular in the UK and Ireland, mostly because the [[AlternativeRock genre of music the band performs]] remains extremely popular in those countries. Indeed, ''Around the Sun'' (their only studio album never to have had a song place even on the Bubbling Under chart in the U.S.) produced a #5 hit in the UK.
31	** For that matter, [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Great_Beyond "The Great Beyond" hit #3 in the U.K.]], and it wasn't even an album track, but written for the movie ''Man on the Moon'' -- which didn't make a peep at their box office.
32	** Also [[AmericansHateTingle inverted]]: their first album, ''Murmur'', was a hit in the US but did not chart anywhere else (except New Zealand, where it was only a minor hit). They did not even hit the top 10 in any other country besides the US until they signed with Warner Bros.
33	* HarsherInHindsight:
34	** "Houston" after the titular city was hit by Hurricane Harvey. The song's opening lines are "If the storm doesn't kill me, the government will./Got to get that out of my head."
35	** In "Star 69", Michael sings, "I know all about the warehouse fire." In 2008, [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_Universal_Studios_fire a fire at Universal Studios]] destroyed a number of artists' masters, including some by R.E.M. In 2019, a New York Times article revealed the extent of the destruction, and [[https://twitter.com/remhq/status/1138532624006295556 a spokesperson for REM stated that they were not aware of the destruction of said master tapes]].
36	** "Ignoreland" from ''Automatic For The People'' was written in response to the UsefulNotes/RonaldReagan and UsefulNotes/GeorgeHWBush's presidencies and their neoconservative policies. The line "marched into the capital" used to compare the rise of the Reagan-led Neoconservative Revolution to a coup, became frighteningly more prescient after ''an actual coup attempt'' in January 2021 that featured mobs of right-wing populist UsefulNotes/DonaldTrump supporters quite literally marching into the Capitol Building in Washington, D.C. (the capital of the United States) to try and overturn the results of the 2020 election.
37	* SugarWiki/HeartwarmingMoments: During "Let Me In" live performances, the band members form a closed circle and perform an acoustic version of the song as a tribute to Kurt Cobain, to whom the song is dedicated.
38	** "Everybody Hurts" performed [[https://youtu.be/UzNPGvKn9WM?si=8GUZSp0M0zD9hJxr live in Lima]].
39	*** Heck, "Everybody Hurts" performed ''anywhere''. The 1993 MTV Video Music Awards is another notable example.
40	*** Glastonbury 1999 had a sweet moment before the encore. The band left the stage to a rapturous applause... And the crowd spontaneously burst into a rousing serenade of "It's the End of The World as We Know It".
41	* HilariousInHindsight: The opening lyrics of "It's the End of the World as We Know It (And I Feel Fine)": "That's great, it starts with an earthquake, birds and [[Film/SnakesOnAPlane snakes, an aeroplane]]..." Made even funnier by the mishearing where people hear it as "snakes in airplanes".
42	* MemeticMutation:
43	** The chorus from "It's The End Of The World" has shown up many times in various parts of pop culture, usually where people try to sing along to it but always end up forgetting the words. Hell, it even named [[SomethingSomethingLeonardBernstein a trope]]!
44	** "STAND IN THE PLACE WHERE YOU L-" [[note]]The infamously hilarious cutoff during ''Series/ParksAndRecreation'', where Ben's 3 weeks of claymation filming produces a clip so short it doesn't even get through the first line of the song.[[/note]]
45	** [=#EverybodySpurts=][[labelnote:Explanation]]A Website/{{Vine}} trend where people would post videos of themselves donning a saddened facial expression before drooling dark liquid from their mouths in time to the chorus of "Everybody Hurts".[[/labelnote]]
46	* {{Misblamed}}: Fans, critics, and analysts tend to erroneously point fingers at Bill Berry's departure as being the reason for the band's much-contested incorporation of electronic elements in the late 90s and early 2000s. However, the band themselves stated that the shift was already planned before Berry left, and indeed "Leave" on ''Music/NewAdventuresInHiFi'' was an early hint at that.
47	* NarmCharm:
48	** "Shiny Happy People", especially [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YYOKMUTTDdA the video]]. The blend of oddness and sincerity is most likely why there's such a big enthusiasm gulf between the band and their fans over both. It helps a lot that the song and video receive an assist from Kate Pierson of the Music/TheB52s, whose own band worked with NarmCharm the way Michelangelo worked with marble.
49	** "Stand" from the album prior also garners this type of appeal, being based on cheesy bubblegum pop songs from the 1960s. The fact that Music/WeirdAlYankovic parodied it (as "[[Music/UHFOriginalMotionPictureSoundtrackAndOtherStuff Spam]]") certainly helps.
50	* NightmareFuel: The album cover for ''Monster'' is an out-of-focus photo of a balloon featuring a bobcat-cougar-lynx...thing's disembodied head. Worse is that there's a drawing of a headless bear on the back of the CD, implying that what you're looking at is the monster's ''decapitated head.''
51	* RefrainFromAssuming:
52	** Those hearing "Oddfellows Local 151" without knowing its title would think it was called "Firehouse" due to that being the entire chorus -- in fact, that was its WorkingTitle.
53	** Many people thought that "The Great Beyond" was called "I'm Pushing an Elephant Up the Stairs" when released.
54	** "So. Central Rain" is not called "Sorry". This got to the point where the single release and some reissues of ''Music/{{Reckoning}}'' add the parenthetical subtitle "I'm Sorry".
55	** Early bootlegs sometimes title the then-unreleased "All The Right Friends" and "Romance" as "I Don't Want You Anymore" and "Easy Come Easy Go" respectively. Though both songs feature the titles in their lyrics, the given phrases are used more prominently.
56	* RetroactiveRecognition: The cinematographer for the music video to "The One I Love" was Alton Brown, who later went on to make the groundbreaking cooking show ''Series/GoodEats''.
57	* RewatchBonus: The music video for "Imitation of Life" is this trope, as there are dozens of different happenings going on that become more obvious when seen again.
58	* SignatureSong: "Losing My Religion" is their best known hit overall. "It's the End of the World as We Know It (And I Feel Fine)" and especially "Everybody Hurts" are not far behind, although the latter is kind of a BlackSheepHit.
59	** "Shiny Happy People" may be a CreatorBacklash, and they played it live only twice. That said, it still remains one of their most popular songs.
60	** To be fair, there are other iconic and well-remembered songs by them, such as their BreakthroughHit "The One I Love", "Man on the Moon" and "Nightswimming". Going by album, though...
61	** ''Murmur'': "Radio Free Europe" (and "Talk About the Passion to a lesser extent).
62	** ''Reckoning'': "So. Central Rain" and not far behind "(Don't Go Back to) Rockville".
63	** ''Fables of the Reconstruction'': "Driver 8".
64	** ''Lifes Rich Pageant'': "Fall on Me" (though also their CoveredUp verion of "Superman" is well-known).
65	** ''Document'': "It's the End of the World as We Know It" and "The One I Love".
66	** ''Green'': "Orange Crush" and "Stand".
67	** ''Out of Time'': "Losing My Religion" [[SignatureSong of course]] (and, if you want to go by pure popularity and put aside the association with the band, also "Shiny Happy People").
68	** ''Automatic for the People'': "Everybody Hurts" and "Man on the Moon", but the notable songs are several ("Nightswimming", "Drive", "The Sidewinder Sleeps Tonite").
69	** ''Monster'': "What's the Frequency, Kenneth?", with "Bang and Blame" and "Strange Currencies" also being notable.
70	** ''New Adventures in Hi-Fi'': "E-Bow the Letter" and "Electrolite".
71	** ''Up'': "At My Most Beautiful" and "Daysleeper".
72	** ''Man on the Moon'' soundtrack: "The Great Beyond".
73	** ''Reveal'': "Imitation of Life".
74	** ''In Time'': "Bad Day".
75	** ''Around the Sun'': "Leaving New York".
76	** ''Accelerate'': "Supernatural Superserious".
77	** ''Collapse into Now'': "Uberlin" and "Oh My Heart".
78	* SongAssociation: If you browse the [=YouTube=] video for "Stand", expect a few of the top comments to mention [[Series/ParksAndRecreation the scene of Ben Wyatt's]] ''[[OneSceneWonder Requiem For a Tuesday]]''.
79	* SophomoreSlump: The band's second major-label album ''Out of Time'', despite featuring "Losing My Religion" and subsequently selling more than ''Green'', is often considered a step down from its predecessor.
80	* TheyChangedItNowItSucks: While R.E.M. were often considered by the abrasive side of the 80s alternative movement to be rather not abrasive enough, the band's various shifts in sound have all saw backlash from some of its fans, most notoriously the shift to a more polished sound on ''Music/{{Green}}'', the one-off {{grunge}} experiment on ''Music/{{Monster\|REMAlbum}}'', and the electronic soundscapes on ''Music/{{Up\|REMAlbum}}''.
81	* ValuesResonance: Originally written in reaction to the UsefulNotes/RonaldReagan and UsefulNotes/GeorgeHWBush administrations, "Ignoreland" from 1992's ''Automatic For The People'' still remains relevant all the way into TheNewTens and TheNewTwenties.
82	* ViewerPronunciationConfusion: A number of people in the band's native US mispronounce their name as rɛ́m (reflecting the US pronunciation of "REM," as in the band's namesake, [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rapid_eye_movement_sleep REM sleep]]) rather than the intended pronunciation, ɑ́ːrɪjɛ́m (i.e. "R-E-M," reflecting the UK pronunciation of "REM").
83	* VindicatedByHistory: ''Monster'' and ''Up'' are probably the band's most dramatic examples of this, but this applies to some extent to almost all of the band's post-''Automatic'' output, which was often downgraded until the band broke up, at which point people went back and began reconsidering. ''Monster'' in particular was aided by people becoming more aware of the actual intent behind it (a critique of mainstream celebrity culture), while ''Up'' was in part aided by electronic music becoming more widely accepted again in the 2010s, allowing people to see that the songwriting on the album was still pretty good at that point.
84	* SugarWiki/VisualEffectsOfAwesome: The music video for "Imitation of Life" is a beautifully done collage of mini-vignettes all occurring at once on a loop, with some ''very'' effective use of PanAndScan to highlight individual moments while also leaving them open for the viewer to detect in advance during re-watches.

Context YMMV / REM