# Do you think REM's 'Monster' is a terrible album? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [October 18, 2013, 6:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-think-rems-monster-is-a-terrible-album/671557 "2013-10-18T06:12:59Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2013, 4:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-think-rems-monster-is-a-terrible-album/671557/41 "2013-10-19T04:55:55Z")
I really like Texarkana, too. I agree there are a couple of clunkers on Out of Time, but if I had to pick one early R.E.M. album to get rid of I’d join the anti-Green horde. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2013, 5:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-think-rems-monster-is-a-terrible-album/671557/42 "2013-10-19T05:00:12Z")
> [@Ponch8](#): > > Not the greatest album ever, but it did give rise to [this moment](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Huyn9itzIw) where Dan Rather sang “What’s the Frequency Kenneth” with the band during a sound check. The song title refers to an incident where some lunatic attacked Dan Rather. [Some lunatic who later murdered an NBC stagehand.](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dan_Rather#.22Kenneth.2C_what_is_the_frequency.3F.22) It entered pop culture as a great random moment, but it’s much creepier in hindsight. ---
**Author:** ![Accidental\_Martyr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ce7236/32.png) [@Accidental\_Martyr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Accidental_Martyr)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2013, 5:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-think-rems-monster-is-a-terrible-album/671557/43 "2013-10-19T05:31:43Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > Honestly, I don’t get the hate for Monster. It’s a terrific album. I’ll say the same about “New Adventures in Hi-Fi,” too. I agree. Honestly, _Out of Time_ is the album I don’t really care for. It has some good stuff, “Low” is probably my favorite, but it really never did a lot for me. As for _Green_, I don’t know how anyone can dislike that record. “Stand” got incredibly overplayed at the time and I usually skip it but the rest of that album is fantastic. I became a fan when I heard “Radio Free Europe” in 1983 when I was 14 and they were always one of my favorite bands although I didn’t keep up with them much in the later years. The last R.E.M. albums I bought were _New Adventures in Hi-Fi_ and _In Time: The Best of R.E.M. 1988-2003_. ---
**Author:** ![Le\_Ministre\_de\_l\_au-dela](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/le_ministre_de_l_au-dela/32/12181_2.png) [@Le\_Ministre\_de\_l\_au-dela](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Le_Ministre_de_l_au-dela)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2013, 12:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-think-rems-monster-is-a-terrible-album/671557/44 "2013-10-19T12:59:56Z")
I thoroughly enjoyed ‘Monster’ when it first came out, and still enjoy it some 15+ years after. I totally don’t get the hate. I guess I am smitten… And **WordMan** , I’m surprised - I would have thought you would have savoured that incredible guitar tone to no end! Not to mention the solos where he sounds like he’s on the verge of dropping the instrument altogether. ---
**Author:** ![WordMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e8c25b/32.png) [@WordMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WordMan)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2013, 1:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-think-rems-monster-is-a-terrible-album/671557/45 "2013-10-19T13:50:04Z")
> [@Le\_Ministre\_de\_l\_au-dela](#): > > I thoroughly enjoyed ‘Monster’ when it first came out, and still enjoy it some 15+ years after. I totally don’t get the hate. I guess I am smitten… > > And **WordMan** , I’m surprised - I would have thought you would have savoured that incredible guitar tone to no end! Not to mention the solos where he sounds like he’s on the verge of dropping the instrument altogether. Oh yeah, it sounds good - and I like Monster more than most other REM albums from that era. But tone isn’t everything (:eek:) and the songs haven’t really stuck with me. But, as we’ve seen in this thread, I’m a bit clueless about REM once the lyrics got intelligible, so I will humbly step back ;). Again, Peter Buck is a great guitarist and typically plays and sounds great; the question is more about the songs… ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2013, 3:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-think-rems-monster-is-a-terrible-album/671557/46 "2013-10-19T15:01:23Z")
For me, “Reveal” is the R.E.M. album that should never have been released. It has exactly ONE good song (“Imitation of Life”; JMS has never been in finer vocal form, either) and the rest is just…there. ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2013, 4:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-think-rems-monster-is-a-terrible-album/671557/47 "2013-10-19T16:28:21Z")
> [@astorian](#): > > But there’s no doubt that each album represented a major change in style from what older fans had been used to. The Black Album didn’t sound like thrash- it sounded like mainstream hard rock/heavy metal. And _ **Monster** _ didn’t sound anything like the college band that people got into in the 80s. > > I think it’s absurd to call either a “terrible” album, but easy to see why many older fans didn’t appreciate either album the way millions of newer fans did. Bingo. I was a pretty serious Metallica fan from roughly Master of Puppets forward, and the Black Album was kind of like a derailment. Good songs, and I liked it, but it wasn’t really what I thought of as _Metallica_. More like Metallica trying to do ballads or something. I wasn’t so much disappointed with the Black Album itself as I was with the album after, when they lost a lot of the harder sound I liked, and concentrated more on the melodic stuff. That was the point I quit listening to Metallica, actually. I imagine for a lot of REM fans, it was similar- Monster was a change- well done, but a change, and then after that with the loss of Bill Berry and a change in sound, they were done with the next album. ---
**Author:** ![John\_DiFool](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_difool/32/19543_2.png) [@John\_DiFool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_DiFool)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2013, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-think-rems-monster-is-a-terrible-album/671557/48 "2013-10-19T21:11:01Z")
> [@nearwildheaven](#): > > For me, “Reveal” is the R.E.M. album that should never have been released. It has exactly ONE good song (“Imitation of Life”; JMS has never been in finer vocal form, either) and the rest is just…there. I vehemently disagree-I think “All the Way to Reno”, “She Just Wants to Be”, “Disappear”, and “Saturn Return” all are the equal of anything else that they have ever done. ---
**Author:** ![Airman\_Doors\_USAF](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e36b37/32.png) [@Airman\_Doors\_USAF](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Airman_Doors_USAF)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2013, 9:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-think-rems-monster-is-a-terrible-album/671557/49 "2013-10-19T21:26:13Z")
Not only do I NOT think _Monster_ is a bad album, I would put it behind only _Automatic For The People_ and _Murmur_ as their best. I can’t quite put my finger on why, though. ---
**Author:** ![elfkin477](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a9a28c/32.png) [@elfkin477](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfkin477)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2013, 12:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-think-rems-monster-is-a-terrible-album/671557/50 "2013-10-20T00:15:31Z")
> [@astorian](#): > > I may be the wrong person to ask, because I’m NOT a huge REM fan (I like enough of their songs to put together one good Greatest Hits CD), but I liked _ **Monster** _ a lot. Ditto. Most of the REM songs I like are on _Monster_ and it’s the only REM album I own. ---
**Author:** ![Carmady](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f04885/32.png) [@Carmady](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Carmady)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2013, 12:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-think-rems-monster-is-a-terrible-album/671557/51 "2013-10-20T00:20:15Z")
No, it’s one of their better albums 1. Reckoning 2. Murmur 3. Automatic for the People 4. Lifes Rich Pageant 5. Monster [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-think-rems-monster-is-a-terrible-album/671557.md?page=2)