Four different producers appear as lines on my R.E.M. map, and every one of them earned it the hard way. Don Dixon played bass. Mitch Easter played a guitar part backwards. Scott Litt played harmonica. Jacknife Lee played keyboards and guitar. That is the only reason they are on there.
Plenty of other people produced R.E.M. records and are nowhere to be seen. This is the map where my rule for that shows up most clearly.
The short version. My R.E.M. map plots 15 studio albums from Murmur (1983) to Collapse into Now (2011), a span of 28 years. Michael Stipe, Peter Buck and Mike Mills appear on all 15. Bill Berry appears on 10 and his line stops at New Adventures in Hi-Fi in 1996. Out of Time is the widest station with 22 credits. Four producers appear as musician lines and the rest do not. Available as a Giclée art print in A2 and A1, unframed or framed, from £42.00.
The Rule That Shapes This Gift for R.E.M. Fans
My rule across every map in the range is that a producer only becomes a line if the sleeve also credits them playing something. Produce a record and you are not on the map. Produce it and play tambourine on one track and you are.
R.E.M. is the catalogue where that rule does the most visible work. On Murmur in 1983, Don Dixon is credited as co-producer and for additional acoustic guitars and bass guitar on "Perfect Circle". Mitch Easter is credited as co-producer, additional acoustic guitars and backwards guitar on the same track. Both play, so both get lines, and both lines stop after one station.
Scott Litt produced a run of the band's biggest records. He appears on the map twice: an echo-loop feed on "Radio Song" on Out of Time in 1991, and harmonica and clavinet on Automatic for the People in 1992. Jacknife Lee is credited on Collapse into Now in 2011 for production, mixing, keyboards and guitar, so he qualifies too.
It keeps the map honest. What you are looking at is people who made sounds on the records, not everyone whose name is on the back.
R.E.M. Discography Map
Fifteen albums across 28 years, four members and every credited player, drawn as a single transit network.
Explore This Art PrintBill Berry's Line Stops in 1996 and the Other Three Carry On
Stipe, Buck and Mills are credited on all fifteen albums. Three unbroken lines from 1983 to 2011.
Bill Berry reaches ten. His last station is New Adventures in Hi-Fi in 1996, and he is absent from Up in 1998 onwards. Five albums where a four-line band becomes a three-line band, and the map shows it as exactly that: one line stopping while three continue.
What his credits show along the way is how little he stuck to drums. On Out of Time he is credited with drums, percussion, congas on "Low", bass guitar on "Half a World Away" and "Country Feedback", piano on "Near Wild Heaven" and backing vocals on three tracks. On Fables of the Reconstruction in 1985 the whole band appear under invented job titles, with Berry credited as "WT Berry, Best Boy" and Buck as "PL Buck, Ministry of Music". I mapped them under their own names, but that sleeve is a favourite.
Twenty-Two People Played on Out of Time
Out of Time in 1991 is the busiest station on the print, and most of the traffic is strings. Nine string players are credited across seven tracks, with Mark Bingham writing the arrangements and Jay Weigel credited as orchestral liaison, which is the only time that job title appears anywhere in my catalogue.
Kidd Jordan brings baritone, tenor and alto saxophone plus bass clarinet. John Keane plays pedal steel on "Texarkana" and "Country Feedback". Peter Holsapple, who had been on the road with the band since Green, plays bass, acoustic and electric guitar across five tracks.
And then Kate Pierson of the B-52's, whose credit is the one detail on this record I would not have found without reading the booklet properly. She sings on "Near Wild Heaven" and duets on "Shiny Happy People" and "Me in Honey", but the printed booklet attributes one of those backing vocals to "Country Feedback" instead. It is a mistake on the sleeve, and mapping it correctly rather than copying the error is the sort of thing that takes an afternoon and shows up as one short line.
Two Rappers, Seventeen Years Apart
KRS-One raps on "Radio Song", the opening track of Out of Time, in 1991. Q-Tip raps on "The Outsiders" on Accelerate in 2008. Two hip hop lines on an Athens jangle-pop map, seventeen years between them, neither appearing anywhere else.
They are not the strangest thing on it. On Reckoning in 1984, "Wind Out" carries a credit marked "With Friends" that turns out to be the band's manager Jefferson Holt on lead vocals and their lawyer Bertis Downs on backing vocals. Two people who ran the business singing on the record, both credited, both therefore on the map.
The Guests Who Turn Up Once
Branch lines are for one-off contributors, and the later albums are full of them.
| Contributor | Album | Credited for |
|---|---|---|
| Steve Berlin | Document (1987) | Horns on "Fireplace" |
| Bucky Baxter | Green (1988) | Pedal steel on "World Leader Pretend" |
| Jane Scarpantoni | Green (1988) | Cello on "World Leader Pretend" |
| John Paul Jones | Automatic for the People (1992) | Orchestral arrangements on four tracks including "Everybody Hurts" |
| Thurston Moore | Monster (1994) | Vocals and guitar on "Crush with Eyeliner" |
| Rain Phoenix | Monster (1994) | Backing vocals on "Bang and Blame" |
| Lynda Stipe | Monster (1994) | Backing vocals on "Bang and Blame", and Michael's sister |
| Lenny Kaye | Collapse into Now (2011) | Two guitar solos |
| Eddie Vedder | Collapse into Now (2011) | Vocals on "It Happened Today" |
| Peaches | Collapse into Now (2011) | Vocals on "Alligator_Aviator_Autopilot_Antimatter" |
Patti Smith is the exception to the one-off pattern, singing on New Adventures in Hi-Fi in 1996 and returning fifteen years later for "Blue" on Collapse into Now, with Lenny Kaye from her own band alongside her on that second visit.
The quiet long-server is Scott McCaughey, who first appears on Monster and is still there on the final album, six stations later. Bill Rieflin covers the last three. Between them they are why the post-Berry records still sound like a band rather than three people.
A2 or A1 for Somebody Who Owns the Whole Run
The A2 at 420 x 594mm (23 x 16 in) reads the shape of it clearly: three lines running the full width, one stopping two thirds of the way along, and the roster thickening sharply around 1991. It starts at £42.00.
The A1 at 594 x 841mm (33 x 23 in) is the size for a fan who will want to find KRS-One and John Paul Jones on the same print. Twenty-two credits converge on Out of Time, and at A1 the nine string players separate out rather than reading as a block.
Both sizes come unframed or framed and ready to hang. Every print is a Giclée on 230gsm premium fine art paper, textured matte, archival and acid-free, with the detail on the print and frame specification page.
What Buyers Check Before Ordering This One
Does the map cover the albums after Bill Berry left?
Yes, all of them, through to Collapse into Now in 2011. Berry's line ending at New Adventures in Hi-Fi is one of the clearest things on the print.
Are the session and guest players included, or only the four members?
Everyone credited. The string sections, the horn players, the guest vocalists and the four producers who also played.
Why are some producers on it and others not?
Because a producer only earns a line if the sleeve credits them playing something. Don Dixon, Mitch Easter, Scott Litt and Jacknife Lee all do. Producers with no playing credit are not on the map.
Does it include the IRS years or start at the Warner albums?
It starts at Murmur in 1983, so the whole IRS run through to Document is on there before the catalogue moves on.
Does it show who played what on each track?
No. Track-level roles appear only on my Rolling Stones Goats Head Soup album map. Here each line tells you which albums that person appears on.
Where This One Leads Next
Two of the links here come off the credits rather than the genre shelf. Eddie Vedder sang on Collapse into Now, and he also sang on The Who's Royal Albert Hall album, so the Who discography map shares a name with this one. Joey Waronker, who drums on Up and Reveal, turns up on The Who's 2019 record too.
For lineage rather than credits, the Byrds map is the one I would put next to it, since Peter Buck's jangle came from somewhere. The Smiths map covers the same years on the other side of the Atlantic.
The 1980s collection gathers that decade, and the music art print collection holds the full range. If the gift is what you came for, the R.E.M. discography map is in A2 or A1, unframed or framed, from £42.00.
