In college I pretty much relied on BMG to provide me with my music. I must have joined and rejoined and joined under myself at least 15 times during my four years. Due to my limited financial resources, this was a great way to build up my collection. While nothing beats the short-term thrill of getting CD's in the mail, there's something special to be had by paying full price for a CD at a normal store once in a while. This was one of those times.

I owned the previous two REM CD's, but I wasn't really a die-hard fan at all. I was kind of curious to see what they would do after being launched into superstardom from the numerous hits from their last album. Would the continue the march toward more commercialistic sound and poppiness that had brought them their recent success? Would they return to their Rock roots or would they continue to experiment with different instrumentation?

I bought this album based on seeing the video for "Drive." The song itself was stark and depressing, with a very nice mix of strings with the harsh guitar in the background. The video was quite disturbing, and I liked where the band started the album. Needless to say I wanted to see where they went with this sound. So there I was, on a unique first date with an intriguing girl. What better way to impress her than buying the new REM CD? We enjoyed the first few songs on the way to the Fargo Theater (my first experience with that building) and the album continued to grow on me for a long time after that.

For a long time I used this album as a crutch during my first tough breakup. I listened to "Everybody Hurts" so often that I now consider it one of the weaker songs on the album. "Nightswimming" reminded me of many parts of the relationship -- I can easily relate the simplicity and sadness and beauty of the song to the same aspects of that relationship. I've never really sat down and tried to listen to the lyrics of this entire album -- many of the words don't make too much of a theme (typical Michael Stipe), but they sound nice together and they just work.

A lot of REM fans do not particularly think this album is the best indicator of the band, but to me it's the culmination of many of the things going on in their immediate previous albums. I appreciated the experimentation with new instrumentation and I really appreciated their stand against continuing their mainstream pop sound.

I'm not as familiar with REM's early music as I should be. I do have the greatest hits album from their early years (Eponymous) and I can say that I thoroughly enjoy every song on it. "Fall on Me" has a great 15-second section that always gives me some chills. I still listen to Green and Out of Time on a fairly regular basis, but neither seems to have the lasting power that Automatic does.

After Automatic REM stopped short the direction they were going with their sound and made a direct 180 with their last two albums Monster and New Adventures in Hi-Fi. There are some things going on in each of these two albums that are worth listening to, but the sounds are pretty much a hodge-podge; the albums become more of a collection of songs rather than cohesive albums.

I had the chance to see REM in concert in 1995 while they supporting their Monster album. I can honestly say that I really didn't give them a chance. I didn't particularly care for the album (they were returning to their aforementioned Rock Roots); I had seen a number of good concerts in the previous 6 months; I had a bad experience getting tickets for the show; my concert companion was less than ideal; we had bad seats; we did a down and back to Minneapolis in one day; the opening band wasn't that great (I like Sonic Youth, but not as an arena band); etc. etc.

I spent the entire show wanting to punch Michael Stipe in the stomach. I really like Stipey's music and I think he's a great poet, but I really don't like to listen to him talk. If I were forced to hang out with him for any length of time, I think I would have to resort to random acts of violence. Like U2, REM were on their "we're big rock stars" kick around this point in time and that didn't set to well with me. Unfortunately, they were not on tour for Automatic for the People so they didn't play too many songs from that album (which wouldn't have worked too well in a venue the size of which they were playing) and I really couldn't get into the show that much.