According to Wikipedia, the July 2011 sessions were originally supposed to be for a new album. According to REM Timeline, the known songs recorded included:
A Month of Saturdays
Hallelujah
We All Go Back to Where We Belong
Elephants
I recollect reading that Buck was not involved in these sessions due to a back injury/surgery, though REM Timeline shows him performing live in the middle of the month. Was he on all of these recordings (I recollect he may have demoed Hallelujah)?
Were they really thinking about recording a new album, particularly when after-the-fact accounts suggest they had written Collapse Into Now as their swan song? Did they record other songs? Will they ever release Elephants?
There were rumours back than claming that they intended to record 4 new songs for the compilation - a goofy-pop one, some other 2 genres, donât remember which , and the fourth one was supposed to be a rocker - at first they thought about finishing BadAss, and then they tried Elephants but Michael got tired of that one as well⌠so âalligator aviator autopilot antimatterâ got the slot instead of a new song (sadly).
Peter wasnât there, Scott brought in the hallelujah-acoustic-guitar-home-demo from Peterâs house⌠thatâs all I remember. the new album thingy sounds like nonsense to meâŚ
Didnât know there was a 4th song! Only 14 years til the reissue, hopefully itâll be on thatâŚ
I remember something from Michael Stipe - dunno if it was a social media post, or something on REMHQ - after the session for these songs. This was pre-break up. Something along the lines of being happy after a good studio session with R.E.M. Got me excited for a new album, which obviously never happened.
In hindsight, it wouldâve been weird for them to be back in the studio so soon. I was one of the people who didnât see any of the signsâŚ
Me too! Adam Scott was one of the people putting the âgoodbyeâ theory out there back then, though I didnât clock who he was at the time. I thought people were reading too much into it. I was wrong!
Looks like, according to REM Timeline, We All Go Back to Where We Belong was recorded in 2009 and had vocals recorded in 2010, before they even went to Germany to record Collapse Into Now.
All I know about Badass and Elephants is that theyâre supposed to be rockers, and that Michael probably was unsatisfied with his lyrics for themâŚ
As for We All Go Back to Where We Belong - when they recorded it in 09/10 it was very different - guitar based, and with different & unfinished lyrics (the vocal melody was probably different as well but who knowsâŚ)
Didnât they pretty much know they were retiring the band during the Accelerate tour? Sure I remember Michael talking about it hitting him playing Man in the Moon at their final gig. Unless I misremembered?
I believe it first came up during that tour but if memory serves, the final decision wasnât made until just before the sessions for Collapse into Now got underway.
I found that a while back and posted it in one of the R.E.M. groups on FB. @ethank weighed in and set the record straight. Perhaps heâll do the same here.
I canât tell whether twitter in 2011 was already a mature network (or an incipient) but I do recall that the Matthew Perpetua article quickly went âviralâ (as they say these days) with people from all walks of life (R.E.M. fans or not) replicating the story that the band would release the sixteenth album independently of the labels and very closely following the In Rainbows model.
We have the benefit of retrospective that time allows, so we can´t blame Mr. Perpetua, who is a genuine R.E.M. fan, for reaching a precipitated conclusion. After more than ten years I canât remember how many days (or weeks) elapsed between the publication of the article and the announcement of the compilation, but I seem to recall that the compilation was announced in the same day (or even simultaneously) as the disbandment.
While the bandâs breakup was terribly sad, the compilation at least offered a glimmer of hope and something to look forward to with excitement, but it definitely eliminated any chances of a 16th studio album.
I remember back in the day, of the many comments posted here, one in particular: that of the mythical â5 album cycleâ implying that if a 16th album was indeed inminent, then consequently that would mean that a new 5-album run was guaranteed, at least into the 20th R.E.M. studio album.
Iâd actually like to see a video release of the Collapse into now sessions that were filmed indoors in Berlin. Since the band would not tour, these represented the closest to a âliveâ rendition of the songs. We had no pandemic back then, but the band performing indoors with zero audience is pretty much what most artists kept doing these recent years.
I think the key nuance to understand here is they didnât break up, they retired REM and made a conscious decision to do so definitively. To this end, once the decision was announced, there was no chance that anything new was to happen from that point (archive releases etc donât count).
I do recall hearing in one interview that when they were deciding their future, they did consider the indie route and all options but decided the passion ultimately wasnât there anymore. To this end, I think that if they had anything compelling to them post CiN, they might have reconsidered and gone this route even for just one last album, but they obviously didnât. If the new tracks on Part Lies, Part Heart were anything to go by, they made the right decision tbh.
I expect the article was just written on hearing that they had considered the indie route plus wishful thinking.
Would you consider âall the bestâ as one of the best R.E.M. songs of all time or where would you place it in that ranking? Would you say that although âThat someone is youâ is short and feels unfinished, is however a step in the right direction, musically?
I, myself, wouldnât put anything on Collapse above 99% of what came before 1998. The two songs you mention, âAll the bestâ and âThat someone is youâ, are good to my ears, because I like the rockier part of the album. But they still lack originality and hooks and something to grab you. They just rock and kinda⌠thatâs it.
I like âAviator_alligatorâ better than those two because it sounds more distinctive to me.
But the mellower side of Collapse, to me, is even hard to describe. I barely consider it âmy R.E.M.â, because⌠I kinda hate it with a passion. âBlueâ and âOh my heartâ have got to be the two worst R.E.M. songs ever recorded. The rockier songs are not all that great, but, to me, they are the only things that could partially redeem that album.
Same. In fact I really like most of the album haveing only liked a couple of tracks from each of ATS and Accelerate. If Iâm to be overly critical, I think CiN only just manages to pull off being a worthwhile homage to themselves and they couldâve taken much more interesting routes to their goodbye album. Itâs a decent end though for me.
What I do always like to point out though is that although their final three albums donât consistently hit their previous heights, this is only in the context of their own high standards. ATS, Accelerate and CiN were stll all objectively amongst the best rock albums of their respective years of release and generally rated as such in the music press. Always worth remembering.
, and the fourth one was supposed to be a rocker - at first they thought about finishing BadAss, and then they tried Elephants but Michael got tired of that one as well⌠so âalligator aviator autopilot antimatterâ got the slot instead of a new song (sadly).
