R.E.M. Albums in Order: 15 Studio Albums, 1983 to 2011
The R.E.M. albums in order start with Murmur in 1983 and end with Collapse into Now in 2011: fifteen studio albums across 28 years. I drew all fifteen as stations on my R.E.M. discography art print, with each credited musician running as a named line through the records they played on.
Four producers appear as lines on it, and each earned the line by playing something. Plenty of others produced R.E.M. records and are nowhere on the print.
The R.E.M. Albums in Order, Listed with Release Years
Fifteen studio albums, transcribed from my research sheet in the order its album columns run. Live albums, compilations and the B-sides collections are left off by editorial rule, so this is the studio run only.
- Murmur (1983)
- Reckoning (1984)
- Fables of the Reconstruction (1985)
- Lifes Rich Pageant (1986)
- Document (1987)
- Green (1988)
- Out of Time (1991), the busiest station on the print with 22 credits
- Automatic for the People (1992)
- Monster (1994)
- New Adventures in Hi-Fi (1996), Bill Berry's last station
- Up (1998)
- Reveal (2001)
- Around the Sun (2004)
- Accelerate (2008)
- Collapse into Now (2011)
One oddity is worth naming. My sheet carries a sixteenth column, headed Man on the Moon (1993), sitting between Automatic for the People and Monster, and it is completely empty. It is a song, not an album, and it is not a station on the print.
The Rule That Decides Who Gets a Line
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 twice: an echo-loop feed on "Radio Song" on Out of Time in 1991, then 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.
R.E.M. Discography Map
Fifteen studio albums across 28 years, four members and every player credited on the sleeves, drawn as a single transit network.
See This Art PrintBill Berry's Line Stops in 1996 and the Other Three Carry On
Michael Stipe, Peter Buck and Mike 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.
His credits show how little he stuck to drums: on Out of Time he is down for drums, percussion, congas, bass guitar, piano and backing vocals. 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 the same seven tracks, with Mark Bingham writing the arrangements and Jay Weigel credited as orchestral liaison, a job title I have not come across on another sleeve while researching these maps.
That 22 is counted by hand rather than read off the top of the sheet. My R.E.M. spreadsheet has a tally row that says 7 for Out of Time, and the column itself holds 22 names. The tally row is wrong on every album I checked it against, so I counted the grid instead. Where the two disagree, the grid is what the artwork was drawn from.
Kidd Jordan brings baritone, tenor and alto saxophone plus bass clarinet. John Keane plays pedal steel on "Texarkana" and "Country Feedback". Peter Holsapple, on the road with the band since Green, plays bass and guitar across six tracks.
And then Kate Pierson of the B-52's. She sings on "Near Wild Heaven" and duets on "Shiny Happy People" and "Me in Honey", but the printed booklet attributes that backing vocal to "Country Feedback" instead. My sheet records it as a miscredit, 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, Thirteen Years Apart
KRS-One raps on "Radio Song", the opening track of Out of Time, in 1991. Q-Tip raps on "The Outsiders" on Around the Sun in 2004. Two hip hop lines on an Athens jangle-pop map, thirteen 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, both credited, both therefore on the map.
The Guests Who Turn Up Once
| Contributor | Album | Credited for |
|---|---|---|
| Steve Berlin | Document (1987) | Horns on "Fireplace" |
| Bucky Baxter | Green (1988) | Pedal steel on "World Leader Pretend" |
| Keith LeBlanc | Green (1988) | Percussion on "Turn You Inside-Out" |
| 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" |
| Lynda Stipe | Monster (1994) | Backing vocals on "Bang and Blame", and Michael's sister |
| Lenny Kaye | Collapse into Now (2011) | Guitar solos on "Alligator_Aviator_Autopilot_Antimatter" and "Blue" |
| Eddie Vedder | Collapse into Now (2011) | Vocals on "It Happened Today" |
| Joel Gibb | 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. The quiet long-server is Scott McCaughey, who first appears on that same 1996 record and is still there on the final album, six stations in all. Bill Rieflin covers the last three. Between them they are why the post-Berry records still sound like a band rather than three people.
Sizes and Paper
It is a landscape print, so the shape of it rewards width. A3, 420 x 297 mm, gives you the overall pattern: three lines running the full span, one stopping two thirds of the way along, and the roster thickening sharply around 1991. A3 comes unframed or in a black wood frame, as do A2, 594 x 420 mm, and A1, 841 x 594 mm, and at A1 the nine string players on Out of Time separate out rather than reading as a block.
Three inch formats are sold alongside the A sizes rather than as conversions of them: 16 x 12 in, 24 x 18 in unframed or framed, and 36 x 24 in unframed or framed. Current prices are on the product page.
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
How many studio albums did R.E.M. make?
Fifteen, from Murmur in 1983 to Collapse into Now in 2011. All fifteen are stations on the map.
How many musicians played on Out of Time?
Twenty-two credited names, the busiest station on the print. Nine are string players, and most of the rest appear there and nowhere else.
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 on the sleeve: 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.
What is not on the map?
Live albums, compilations and the B-sides collections. The map plots the studio albums only, which is why Dead Letter Office and Eponymous do not appear as stations, and neither does anything released after the artwork was drawn.
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
For lineage rather than shared credits, the Byrds discography art print is the one I would hang next to it, since Peter Buck's jangle came from somewhere, and my guide to The Byrds albums in order walks through twelve years of line-up churn. For the same mid-eighties years on the other side of the Atlantic, The Smiths albums in order covers a band that made four records while R.E.M. made six.
The 1980s collection gathers that decade, and the discography music maps collection holds the full range. If it is a present you came for, the R.E.M. discography art print comes in A3, A2 and A1, and there is a gift card for music fans if you would rather let them choose.
