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NAIHF reviews.

9/10/96

Its Out. Go buy it and see for yourself... :)

9/2/96

Check out the new cover story at ATN's Music News of the World featuring Peter Buck.

8/17/96

Release dates of the new single, courtesy of Gary Huested.

Billboard spells out the release schedule of the new single:

14 Aug. goes to all rock radio formats

19 Aug. commercial single released in UK w/non-album track Tricycle (A
UK dealer called me this mroning to say that he was sending me the
E-Bow promo CD. Go figure!)

20 Aug. commercial single released in US  w/non-album track Tricycle

26 Aug (the following week)  CD5 released w/Tricyle, Departure
(alternate version), & Wall of Death.

8/7/96

New press releases and pictures from the new album are surfacing.
Here are the releases...

R.E.M. Set's Rundown
The Act's Buck And Mills Discuss Cuts
Billboard Newspaper
August 10, 1996

R.E.M.'s Peter Buck and Mike Mills provided Billboard with a track-by-track
rundown of "New Adventures In Hi-Fi." The band's songs are published by Night
Garden Music, administered by Warner-Tamerlane Publishing Corp. (BMI).

"How The West Was Won And Where It Got Us." Features Buck on bass, guitar,
mandolin, and bozouki (a Greek stringed instrument). Says Buck, "I doubled it
with the guitars. It's supposed to sound Ennio Morricone-ish."

"The Wake-Up Bomb." Buck says, "It was kind of about the glam rock scene.
Michael [Stipe] was kind of looking at the whole 'Dress like we do' [scene]
when we were teenagers. All that said, it is kind of a joyous pop song, too."
Mills calls it "a big, loud, stupid rock song."

"New Test Leper." "It's about a person on a talk show," says Buck. "It's kind
of a weird folk-rock thing with surf guitar."

"Undertow." Features touring musicians Scott McCaughey on ARP Odyssey and
Nathan December on guitar. Says Buck, "Whether it is literally or
metaphorically, it's about someone drowning... Being on tour seems like a
drowning situation sometimes."

"E-Bow The Letter." "Patti Smith singing on something that I helped write was
just amazing," says Buck. "She changed my life in a real literal way in 1976
when I saw her play live. She changed my perception of what music was." As
the title suggests, Buck uses an E-bow on the track.

"Leave." Features McCaughey again on ARP. The seven-minute-plus song begins
with a quiet acoustic passage before exploding into a rocker with a persistent
siren-like sound. "Scott's holding down a key and moving the octave switch
back and forth through the whole song," says Buck. "We could only play it once
every other sound check, because Scott's wrist would be numb by the end of it."

"Departure." "It's literary a road song," says Buck. "Michael wrote the Iyrics
on a plane flight from Singapore to San Sebastian, Spain," he says.

"Bittersweet Me." Says Buck,'For me, it's all snapshots. I remember coming up
with the initial riff at the Shoreline Amphitheatre in San Francisco. It was
the first show when Bill [Berry] came back from his aneurysm."

"Be Mine." Mills says, "We had one version that I recorded by myself on the bus
that will probably turn up somewhere as a B-side."

"Binky The Doormat." "The title comes from the Bobcat Goldthwait movie 'Shakes
The Clown,'" says Buck. "For some reason, Michael got really obsessed with
that movie when we were making this record."

"Zither." Says Mills, "It was recorded in a dressing room. I think Scott was
actually in the bathroom with the autoharp. We like to do instrumentals."

"So Fast, So Young." Says Buck, "Someone said, 'Is that a drug song?' and I
never have thought about that. That is something that doesn't occur around us
a whole lot, but it seems like it is a warning to someone for behavior, maybe
just emotional behavior."

"Low Desert." Says Buck, "Definitely a road song... It was called 'Swamp,' and
toward the end of the tour, Michael said, 'It wasn't a swamp song, I wrote the
words and said it was a desert song'"

"Electrolite." Mills says, "It was written on piano, so it has a different
feel." Adds Buck, "It's hard to drive over Mulholland [Drive in L.A.] and not
feel like a movie star, but I don't know what you feel like when you hit
bottom and go down the bottom of the hill."	CRAIG ROSEN

8/6/96

Older news, but still interesting...

>>>   R.E.M.'s album -- which clocks in at over an hour -- was fashioned
in a far more off-the-cuff manner than any of the band's previous efforts,
with the bulk of the material being written and recorded during last
year's Monster tour. In fact, most of New Adventures in Hi-Fi's 14 tracks
were taped live during soundchecks and concert performances in various
cities, and therefore feature guest musicians Scott McCaughey and Nathan
December, who accompanied R.E.M. on tour.

The track list for New Adventures in Hi-Fi:
1) "How the West Was Won and Where It Got Us," a studio recording from
Seattle, with Peter Buck on mandolin and bouzouki.
2) "The Wake-Up Bomb," recorded live in Charleston, South Carolina.
3) "New Test Leper," a studio recording from Seattle.
4) "Undertow," recorded live in Boston.
5) "E-bow the Letter," a studio recording from Seattle, on which Patti
Smith guests.
6) "Leave," a soundcheck recording from Atlanta.
7) "Departure," recorded live in Detroit, with Mike Mills on fuzz bass and
Farfisa organ.
8) "Bittersweet Me," a soundcheck recording from Memphis.
9) "Be Mine," a studio recording from Seattle.
10) "Binky the Doormat," recorded live in Phoenix.
11) "Zither," an instrumental recorded in a dressing-room bathroom in
Philadelphia.
12) "So Fast, So Numb," a soundcheck recording from Orlando, Florida.
13) "Low Desert," a soundcheck recording from Atlanta.
14) "Electrolite," a soundcheck recording from Phoenix.

   "The difference between this and the last album," a source at Warner
Bros. tells ICE, "is that for all of Monster's noise, dissonance and
electric stuff, it was really precisely sculpted. This is a lot less
constructed at certain parts. It's not lo-fi, but it resembles a Crazy
Horse record in its organic approach -- though the music doesn't sound
like Crazy Horse.
   "A lot of the songs have longer running times than R.E.M. fans may be
used to. 'Leave' is the longest -- and weirdest -- track on the album at
around seven minutes. It starts out with a very quiet acoustic guitar
passage, which sets you up for something you don't get in the rest of the
song. Sonically, it's quite different."
   As for the album's overall impression, one source who's heard it tells
ICE, "It's definitely not Monster II. It's one of those records that will
clearly take more than one listen too make a real impression. It's diverse
-- and has a lot of color to it, too."  <<<

Thanks to Chris Bray...

This came from Intergalactic Garage:

REM E-BOW THE LETTER CD-5 (UK) 8/16 [$10] $8.99
        Featuring PATTI SMITH on backing vocals. This is the limited
collector's CD and comes with a booklet. c/w live version of DEPARTURE,
WALL OF DEATH - written by Richard Thompson & TRICYCLE - a new instrumental
track.
REM E-BOW THE LETTER #2 CD-5 (UK) 8/16 [$10] $8.99
        Exactly the same tracks but in a slimline case.

Thanks to Gary Huested for the following info...

Apparently, the first UK CD from the album will be issued with some
type of box for the other CDs that will follow. Sure hope it's not as
lame as the Out of Time box. 

I received this from a dealer:  Due 08/23, REM - E-Bow the Letter (w/
Patti Smith) / Triangle (unreleased). (As was also noted by the
Singapore poster to RMR). Good news having an unreleased track as the
1st b-side--I was hoping we would not get live Monster tour tracks as
b-sides. 

7/22/96

There is a new article with detailed info on the new album at ATN's Music News of the World.

7/14/96

Howdy. New information about the track listing of the new album is now
floating around the net. I have no idea about the validity of this info.

To see the list, check out:

http://www.murmurs.com/sections/rem/news.htm

Rumor has it that the first song, "How the West was Won and Where it Got Us"
will be the first single.

A note from the one... the only... Kipp Teague on 7/2/96.

I phoned the r.e.m. office, and while I didn't get to speak with Bertis Downs
about another (non-r.e.m.) matter, I did get confirmation on the new album
title.  It *really* is "New Adventures in Hi-Fi".

Kipp



There is yet another bit of info on the new album from ATN's Music News Of The World

This story mentions a release date of September 10, and a bit about the band's

plans after the album is released.





[From a source close to the band on 5/14/96 (wishing to remain anonymous)]
..[A] big piece of news is that the same source has ... heard the
new album, in the sequence it will most likely be released in (it hasn't
been mastered yet), and is, well, ambivalent at best.  Oddly enough,
"Revolution" isn't on there, although "Binky", "Departure", and 
"Wakeup Bomb" all are.  Stylistically, the album veers all over the place--
one song (one of the first, if not the first one up) is terribly grating, 
with a repeating crashing/clanging/screeching noise repeating throughout
("R.E.M. goes industrial?" I asked; "That sounds about right," said the
source).  Other songs are sweet, silly, and syrupy pop songs about
lovey-dovey subjects; some are *very* reminiscent of _Document_
(the source had a brain fart & asked "Which album was "King of Birds"
on?", so that might be a clue); and some are just plain *weird* as hell.
Also, the lyrics are apparently rather juvenille and self-centered--lots of
"me, me, me", and boasting about being the best, etc. (hey, Michael,
lay off the gangsta rap, will ya?).  "But does it sound like _Monster_--
you know, kinda punky/grungy?"  "Not at *all*!"   (There goes *that*
idea, eh?)  Don't know what the title is going to be, but I'll ask the next
time we talk and report back as soon as I hear.


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Latest new Album Info from ATN's Music News Of The World updated 4/10/96.

Also, this earlier story...

This courtesy of the ATN's Music News of the World:

Producer Scott Litt and R.E.M. are heading to
Seattle to continue work on the group's next album, according to one of 
our sources. The group
wrote material for the album throughout their 1995 world tour, and 
already logged some studio
time. "We spent a couple of weeks in Georgia doing stuff," producer Scott 
Litt told us. "It's
coming along great. It's going to be a really great record. We're going 
to be working on it all next
month and some of April as well." Litt couldn't tell us if the plan was 
to get the album out by
summer, but we won't be surprised if that's what happens. 

ATN also made a big deal today of the fact that Scott Litt's new label 
managed to sign "hot" new Canadian folk-rock singer Hayden.  Apparently, 
it helped that Litt flew Hayden down to Athens (presumably to hang with 
the boyz).

--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Thanks to Jesse Sage for the above reference...






Also, check out Kipp Teague's page for even more info...



zim@svs.com