Lunar Boulevard

Last week I wrote an article about Weezer and how I felt it was unfair for fans and critics to constantly criticize the band for changing and evolving in their sound and lyrics. However, Weezer is far from the only band to deal with this. One of my all-time favorite bands, R.E.M., has come up against similar criticisms and complaints as well. R.E.M. Much like Weezer, R.E.M. began their career at such a profound and stellar level of creativity that they've been judged against it ever since. When Murmur was released in 1983 it immediately set the bar high. In fact, the album's title is somewhat ironic because it started the band's run off with a bang. This began their stint on the IRS record label, commonly referred to as the "IRS Years" by fans. This lasted from 1983-1987 and included Murmur , Reckoning , Fables of the Reconstruction , Lifes Rich Pageant , and Document . Few fans or critics will argue against this era and many claim the band was at their artistic ...

"If you hate this, I can't blame you" sings frontman Rivers Cuomo in the opener "American Gigolo". What he's referring to may be unclear but the album itself could very well be the topic of conversation. After reemerging after a five year hiatus with The Green Album in 2001, it didn't take the band long to release the follow-up a mere thirteen months later. Originally conceived as an experiment, the band posted demos and song ideas on their website and asked fans to give them feedback. How much this helped is debatable, especially since fans and Rivers had major disagreements over the creative aspects of the album. This didn't make it a totally failed experiment though: the album's title and cover were both chosen from fan-submitted ideas and the song "Slob" was added to the album by fan request, with Cuomo even stating that he would never have thought of adding the song to the record if fans hadn't suggested it. It wasn't all s...

There seem to be two types of music lovers that I run into. There's the first camp, who we'll simply label as the "Stuck in the Past" group. These people fear musical change. Anytime an artist they love does anything even minutely different from the norm they freak out and talk about how the artist sold out or lost their way. Then you have the "It Must Be Different Every Time" category. These people want every new song or album to be a complete departure from what came before and if it isn't then they accuse the artist of playing it safe and not progressing. Lately I've had several of my favorite artists take on these criticisms and I want to cut through the muck and get to the heart of how I feel about music and whether these claims are authentic. To begin with, I fall somewhere in the middle. I enjoy artists who try new things and who do the unexpected. It's one reason why artists like U2, Beck, Radiohead, and Elvis Costello are some of my all-...