An R.E.M. opinion others might not agree with. I’ll start.
Pageant - which is my favorite album by far - would have been much better if they had subbed Mystery to Me, All the Right Friends or Ages of You for What if We Give It Away.
Ages of you I’ll agree with
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I have always maintained that What If We Give It Away is the blandest R.E.M. song. There’s no real hook or substance to it. I don’t hate it, but I don’t like it.
Of those three, I’d take All The Right Friends please
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New Adventures could have been a much bigger album. As much as I love EBow, it was the wrong first single.
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I’ve heard others say that about E-bow. Hi Fi could go on for ever. 
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Ignoreland should have been given a rougher mix and put on Monster. Right, @essei7point0?
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Accelerate was their most meh album
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I’m learning as fast as I can!
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Green is their second worst album.
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R.E.M. did whatever they wanted which is one of many reasons I love them. Releasing E-Bow as a single was a brave move which fits the bands enlightening thinking. But I respect your opinion
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I’d agree it’s not remotely as good as some fans make it to be, and likely their fourth worst in my list.
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I often listen to Hi-Fi without Binky and Zither (So Fast So Numb comes right after Be Mine). The tracks fit sonically and Binky is a good song, but I feel like as a whole the album flows better without them.
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I wish they had made Around the Sun more like the live versions. The rawness of the live performances added something, I think they lost in the production.
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Lightnin’ Hopkins, King of Comedy, Beachball, I’m Gonna DJ and the Toys In The Attic cover are all songs I’ll never understand the bad reputations of.
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Pageant: replace Underneath The Bunker and Superman with Ages Of You and All The Right Friends, you get a perfect album. At least Begin The Begin and I Believe should have been singles besides Fall On Me.
Document: replace Strange and Local Oddfellows with Bad Day and Mystery To Me.
Out Of Time: change SHP to Fretless. Texarkana and Me In Honey should have been singles.
NAIHF: Electrolite should have been released as the first single.
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The drop in album sales and fan base from the late 90s was less about decline and more about never having meant to have reached “biggest band in the world” status in the first place.
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I have to say that some of you are 100 percent wrong (not gonna say who 
) but I am glad we have this space to share without judgment.
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Completely agreed. They never declined to begin with, even as a three-piece band. Always soldiered on fiercely making original, solid music. And they never ever set out to be big at any time at all; that just happened all of a sudden due to their usual competence. Fads come and go. From 1991-1995, R.E.M. fell into the mainstream public consciouness like other bands did on other occasions. That speaks much more of that volatile public consciousness (pathetic, if you ask me) than of the band’s production, quality of any other merits.
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Totally agree with your first and last sentence
Even tho it’s my favorite album, I’ll agree with that