Editorial Reviews Music Review:
Music Review
Casey Kasem Presents: America's Top Ten - The 70's Rock's Greatest Hits
Lebendige Vergangenheit: August Seider
Mendelssohn: Violin Concerto, Op.64, Vol.1
Musique Traditionelle D'Algerie [Import]
Pavarotti's Opera Made Easy-My Favorite Heroines
Mr. Funk [Original recording remastered] [Import]
Playin 4 Real [Explicit Lyrics]
Amazon.com essential recording
Continuing to specialize in the art of curve-throwing, R.E.M. followed up its 1991 smash, Out of Time, with this fragile album of soft melodies and string arrangements. The sympathetic ballad "Everybody Hurts" must have prevented countless suicide attempts, while the Andy Kaufman tribute "Man on the Moon" (with Michael Stipe affecting an Elvis Presley imitation) and the rock-into-oblivion "Drive" are among the quartet's strongest hits. (The opening line, "Hey, kids, rock and roll," isn't so much a rallying cry as an expression of anxiety.) It takes a few listens for its charms to unfold, but Automatic is the gem between bigger hits Out of Time and Monster. --Steve Knopper