Up (R.E.M. album)

Up
Studio album by R.E.M.
Released	October 26, 1998
Recorded	January–July 1998
Genre	Alternative rock jangle pop electronic
Length	64:31
Label	Warner Bros.
Producer	Pat McCarthy and R.E.M.
R.E.M. chronology
R.E.M.: In the Attic – Alternative Recordings 1985–1989 (1997) Up (1998) Man on the Moon (1999)
Singles from Up
"Daysleeper" Released: October 12, 1998 "Lotus" Released: December 7, 1998 "At My Most Beautiful" Released: March 8, 1999 "Suspicion" Released: June 28, 1999

Up is the eleventh studio album by the American alternative rock band R.E.M. It was the band's first album without original drummer Bill Berry, who left the group amicably in October 1997 to pursue his own interests. In his place, R.E.M. used session drummers and drum machines.

Details

Up 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?'"^[1]

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."^[1]

R.E.M. subsequently admitted that they came close to breaking up while recording the album.

Sales and critical reception

Professional ratings
Review scores
Source	Rating
AllMusic	[2]
Entertainment Weekly	A–[3]
Houston Chronicle	[4]
Los Angeles Times	[5]
NME	7/10[6]
Pitchfork Media	6.1/10[7]
Q	[8]
Rolling Stone	[9]
Select	[10]
Spin	8/10[11]

Up reached #3 in the U.S. (with 16 weeks on the Billboard 200) and #2 in the UK, but didn't have the staying power of the band's more-recent albums, and thus the band's lowest sales in years. "The things that we have to do creatively for the band may not be the most commercial things," Mike Mills observed. "That isn't the point. The point is to keep it fresh and interesting and alive."^[1]

"It will certainly sound strange to those who only own Automatic for the People and repeat-play the hits," wrote Danny Eccleston in a 4-star review for Q.^[8] "Conversely, anyone who has a healthy number of R.E.M. records – let's say four – and plays them regularly, should manage to listen to Up without his head exploding or tossing herself off a tall building or any of the weird things people are meant to do when faced with music they don't quite understand. This is R.E.M. after all. We couldn't even hear the lyrics until album five."^[8]

Although R.E.M. initially intended not to tour for the album, after many successful promotional concerts upon the album's release, the band quickly arranged a four-month arena tour of Europe and America during the summer of 1999. As of March 2007, Up has sold 664,000 units in the U.S.^[12]

In 2005, Warner Bros. Records issued an expanded two-disc edition of Up which includes a CD, a DVD-Audio disc containing a 5.1-channel surround sound mix of the album done by Elliot Scheiner, and the original CD booklet with expanded liner notes.

Track listing

All songs by Peter Buck, Mike Mills and Michael Stipe unless otherwise stated.

Up Side

1. "Airportman" – 4:12
2. "Lotus" – 4:30
3. "Suspicion" – 5:36
4. "Hope" (Leonard Cohen, Buck, Mills, Stipe)¹ – 5:02
5. "At My Most Beautiful" – 3:35
6. "The Apologist" – 4:30
7. "Sad Professor" – 4:01
8. "You're in the Air" – 5:22

Down Side

9. "Walk Unafraid" – 4:31
10. "Why Not Smile" – 4:03
11. "Daysleeper" – 3:40
12. "Diminished" – 6:01
    • Includes an hidden track entitled "I'm Not Over You" starting at 5:00, with Stipe soloing on acoustic guitar, after the song's conclusion.
13. "Parakeet" – 4:09
14. "Falls to Climb" – 5:06

Notes

¹ Cohen was not directly involved in the writing of "Hope" but was given a writing credit by the band due to similarities in melody and lyrical pattern to his "Suzanne".

Studio B-sides

Two non-album tracks from the Up sessions appeared as single-only releases, as well as alternate versions of four album tracks.

• "Emphysema"
• "Surfing the Ganges" – 2:25
• "Why Not Smile" (Oxford-American version)
• "Sad Professor" (Live in the Studio)
• "Suspicion" (live in the studio) (Toast Studios, San Francisco, 1998 – "Lotus"single)
• "Suspicion" (live in the studio) (Ealing Studios, 29-10-1998 – Suspicion single)
• "Lotus" (Weird Mix)

Personnel

R.E.M.

• Peter Buck – guitar, bass guitar, keyboards, percussion
• Mike Mills – bass, keyboards, guitar, backing vocals
• Michael Stipe – lead vocals, guitar

Additional musicians

• Barrett Martin – percussion
• Scott McCaughey – keyboards, percussion
• Joey Waronker – drums, percussion

Technical staff

• Nigel Godrich – engineering
• Pat McCarthy – production

Charts

Chart positions Chart (1998) Peak position Australian ARIA Albums Chart[13] 5 Austrian Albums Chart[14] 1 Belgian Albums Chart (Flanders) [15] 4 Belgian Albums Chart (Wallonia)[16] 25 Canadian RPM Albums Chart[17] 2 Dutch Albums Chart[18] 7 Finnish Albums Chart[19] 10 French SNEP Albums Chart[20] 9 German Media Control Albums Chart[21] 1 Italian Albums Chart[22] 2 Japanese Oricon Albums Chart[23] 47 New Zealand Albums Chart[24] 8 Norwegian VG-lista Albums Chart[25] 1 Swedish Albums Chart[26] 2 Swiss Albums Chart[27] 7 UK Albums Chart[28] 2 U.S. Billboard 200[17] 3

Year-end charts Chart (1998) Position Austrian Albums Chart[29] 45 Belgian Albums Chart (Flanders)[30] 38 Dutch Albums Chart[31] 99 Italian Albums Chart[22] 26 UK Albums Chart[32] 59

Certifications

Region	Certification	Sales/shipments
Australia (ARIA)[33]	Gold	35,000^^
Austria (IFPI Austria)[34]	Gold	25,000^x
France (SNEP)[35]	Gold	103,300[36]
Netherlands (NVPI)[37]	Gold	50,000^^
New Zealand (RMNZ)[38]	Gold	7,500^^
Norway (IFPI Norway)[39]	Platinum	50,000^*
Spain (PROMUSICAE)[40]	Gold	50,000^^
Sweden (GLF)[41]	Gold	40,000^^
Switzerland (IFPI Switzerland)[42]	Gold	25,000^x
United Kingdom (BPI)[43]	Platinum	300,000^^
United States (RIAA)[44]	Gold	664,000[12]
Summaries
Europe (IFPI)[45]	Platinum	1,000,000^*
^*sales figures based on certification alone ^^shipments figures based on certification alone ^xunspecified figures based on certification alone

References

1. Cavanagh, David: 'Come On, He Was Only The Drummer', Q #146, November 1998, pp96–104
2. Erlewine, Stephen Thomas. "Up – R.E.M.". AllMusic. Retrieved August 13, 2011.
3. Browne, David (October 30, 1998). "Up". Entertainment Weekly. Retrieved August 13, 2011.
4. Racine, Marty (October 25, 1998). "Directionally impaired / R.E.M. weighs in with sullen 'Up'". Houston Chronicle. Retrieved November 1, 2011.
5. Boehm, Mike (October 25, 1998). "Album Review". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved September 18, 2011.
6. Segal, Victoria (October 21, 1998). "REM – Up". NME. Archived from the original on August 17, 2000. Retrieved August 31, 2015.
7. Ambroz, Duane. "R.E.M.: Up". Pitchfork Media. Archived from the original on October 5, 2000. Retrieved August 31, 2015.
8. Eccleston, Danny (December 1998). "R.E.M.: Up". Q (147): 112.
9. Powers, Ann (November 12, 1998). "Up". Rolling Stone. Retrieved August 31, 2015.
10. Wilkinson, Roy (December 1998). "R.E.M.: Up". Select (102): 107.
11. Jacob, Sally (December 1998). "R.E.M.: Up". Spin 14 (12): 176. Retrieved May 17, 2015.
12. Gundersen, Edna. "R.E.M.: A 25-year rockin' role". USA Today. March 11, 2007.
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