R.E.M.
Collapse Into Now
Craft Recordings
Released 07/14/23
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In March 2011, six months before R.E.M. officially called it a day as a band following a prolific three-decades-strong career, they released their swan song Collapse Into Now. “That's the record where we put ourselves on the cover for the first time and I'm waving goodbye, and nobody got it,” Michael Stipe explained during a 2019 interview. "We were saying, 'This is it, sayonara, we're out of here.’”
Reissued on 180-gram vinyl alongside the group’s thirteenth studio album Around The Sun (2004) and featuring guest contributions by Patti Smith, Pearl Jam’s Eddie Vedder, The Hidden Cameras’ Joel Gibb and Peaches, the reemergence of their fifteenth and final LP offers fans a new chance to celebrate the culmination of their storied recording career.
“The thing that makes a band a band is the chemistry that occurs between the three or four people when they're standing on stage,” Mike Mills told NPR in 2011. “The one thing I really will miss is that energy that happens when Peter (Buck) and Michael and I start to make noise together. You can't replace that. You can only be grateful that you had it, and move on and find something else that makes you happy and excited.”
Featuring the singles “It Happened Today,” “Mine Smell Like Honey,” “Überlin” and “Oh My Heart,” Collapse Into Now peaked at #5 on both the US and UK album charts.
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