The Best of R.E.M.

The Best of R.E.M.
Greatest hits album by R.E.M.
Released	September 30, 1991
Genre	Alternative rock
Length	59:17
Language	English, French ("Talk About the Passion")
Label	I.R.S.
Producer	Mitch Easter, Don Dixon, Joe Boyd, Don Gehman, Scott Litt, R.E.M.
R.E.M. chronology
This Film Is On (1991) The Best of R.E.M. (1991) Automatic for the People (1992)
R.E.M. compilations chronology
Eponymous (1988) The Best of R.E.M. (1991) The Automatic Box (1993)

The Best of R.E.M. is a greatest hits album by R.E.M. released in 1991, shortly after the success of the band's seventh studio album, Out of Time, released by Warner Bros. The Best of R.E.M., however, was released by the band's previous record label, I.R.S. Records, and only includes tracks from their first five albums while the group was with that label.

The Best of R.E.M. was only issued in the United Kingdom, New Zealand, Australia and Brazil, complete with liner notes from Remarks: The Story of R.E.M. by Tony Fletcher (a domestic American greatest hits album had been released prior with a very similar tracklist titled Eponymous). It has no alternate mixes (unlike Eponymous); all the songs are the album versions.

Three songs were taken from each of the first five studio albums and one song was taken from Chronic Town, the band's first EP, making a total of sixteen songs on the album.

Track listing

All tracks written by Bill Berry, Peter Buck, Mike Mills, Michael Stipe.

1. "Carnival of Sorts (Box Cars)" – 3:51
2. "Radio Free Europe" – 4:03
3. "Perfect Circle" – 3:23
4. "Talk About the Passion" – 3:22
5. "So. Central Rain (I'm Sorry)" – 3:11
6. "(Don't Go Back To) Rockville" – 4:34
7. "Pretty Persuasion" – 3:53
8. "Green Grow the Rushes" – 3:42
9. "Cant Get There from Here" – 4:10
10. "Driver 8" – 3:18
11. "Fall On Me" – 2:49
12. "I Believe" – 3:32
13. "Cuyahoga" – 4:17
14. "The One I Love" – 3:17
15. "Finest Worksong" – 3:48
16. "It's the End of the World as We Know It (And I Feel Fine)" – 4:07

Reception

"A considerable improvement on the useful but haphazard Eponymous collection," wrote Dan Maier in a 5/5 review for Select. "It'll be a few years before Warners release their own 'Best Of'. In the meantime, this'll do very nicely indeed."^[1]

Sales certifications

Country	Certification (sales thresholds)
Germany	Gold
BPI - UK	Gold[2]

References

1. Select, issue 17, November 1991
2. "Certified Awards". BPI. Retrieved 19 June 2014.