| Out of Time | |
| Type: | studio |
| Artist: | R.E.M. |
| Cover: | R.E.M. - Out of Time.jpg |
| Caption: | Cover to the standard release of Out of Time |
| Recorded: | Mid-1990 |
| Studio: |
|
| Genre: | |
| Label: | Warner Bros. |
| Prev Title: | Green |
| Prev Year: | 1988 |
| Next Title: | This Film Is On |
| Next Year: | 1991 |
Out of Time is the seventh studio album by American alternative rock band R.E.M., released on March 12, 1991,[3]
Out of Time combines elements of pop, folk and classical music heard on the band's previous album, Green, with a new concentration on country elements that would continue on 1992's Automatic for the People. It features guest appearances by KRS-One and Kate Pierson from The B-52's.[5]
Preceded by the release of "Losing My Religion," which became R.E.M.'s biggest U.S. hit, Out of Time gave them their first U.S. and UK No. 1 album. The band did not tour to support the release, although they did make occasional appearances on television or at festivals. In Germany, it is the band's best-selling album, selling more than 1,250,000 copies, reaching 5× gold.[6] Out of Time was the first R.E.M. album to have an alternative expanded release on CD, including expanded liner notes and postcards. In Spain, a contest was held to have a limited-edition cover, with the winner being an abstract oil painting.
For the 25th anniversary the album was remastered. The standard version of the reissue comes with a second disc of demos, the deluxe version adds a third disc featuring live acoustic tracks.[7] It was released through Concord Records on November 18, 2016.
Warner Bros. Records executive Jeff Gold, alongside Rock the Vote campaign co-founder and Virgin Records executive Jeff Ayeroff, approached R.E.M. in regards to printing a petition on the back of Out of Times CD longbox packaging in the United States, where buyers were encouraged to sign their name in support for Rock the Vote, who were in support of the Motor Voter Act to ease voter registration, and would allow voters "to register through their local DMV."[8] Gold reasoned, considering many of the album's buyers would be young, that this could "vote out" the controversial Parents Music Resource Center music censorship bill, who "put pressure on the creators and distributors of 'objectionable' music,"[9] as well as make good use of the popular longbox packaging format of the day, which many artists and customers considered unnecessary and wasteful. Michael Stipe also appeared in a public service announcement for the campaign.
In July 2014, radio show 99% Invisible said that because of this packaging, Out of Time is "the most politically significant album in the history of the United States." They said that three weeks after the album's release, "they had received 10,000 petitions, 100 per senator, and they just kept coming in droves," and a month following its release, the campaign's political director and members of KMD "wheeled a shopping cart full of the first 10,000 petitions into a senate hearing." The bill was eventually passed in 1993 by Bill Clinton and was in effect January 1, 1995; one commentary later said this happened "in no small part because of R.E.M.’s lobbying."
The album received mostly positive reviews from critics. Mark Cooper of Q contrasted Out of Time with its predecessor Green, highlighting Stipe's vocals and the harmony singing while describing the album as a "brooding departure [that] offers them at their most reflective, challenging and intriguing".
Terry Staunton in his review for NME praised the album for its refreshing sound, calling it "easily their most eclectic and wildly inspired album yet, although it is still very identifiably REM". At the same time, Entertainment Weeklys David Browne was left unimpressed with the record, criticizing the album for sounding boring, and describing it as "the least satisfying, most forced album they've ever made."
Stephen Thomas Erlewine of AllMusic gave a low scoring review of two and a half out of five stars, observing, "The scope of R.E.M.'s ambitions is impressive, and the record sounds impeccable, its sunny array of pop and folk songs as refreshing as Michael Stipe's decision to abandon explicitly political lyrics for the personal." concluding "Most of the songs are slight but pleasant, or are awkward experiments like "Radio Song"'s stab at funk, and while this sounds fine as the record is playing, there's not much substantive material to make the record worth returning to."
Out of Time was one of R.E.M.'s more successful albums in terms of awards and nominations. It was their only album to win a Grammy Award, for Best Alternative Music Album. It also won the Q Award for Best Album of 1991.
In 2000, Out of Time was voted number 49 in Colin Larkin's All Time Top 1000 Albums.[10] It was featured in Time magazine's 2006 list of the "All-Time 100 Albums".[11]
According to the review aggregator Metacritic, the 25th anniversary re-release of Out of Time received "generally favorable reviews" based on a weighted average score of 80 out of 100 from nine critic reviews.
All tracks written by Bill Berry, Peter Buck, Mike Mills and Michael Stipe.
Time Side
Memory Side
Personnel adapted from Out of Time liner notes,[12] except where indicated.
R.E.M.
Additional musicians
Production
| Peak position | |
| Belgian Albums (SABAM/IFPI)[14] | 6 |
|---|---|
| Danish Albums (IFPI)[15] | 8 |
| European Albums (Music & Media)[16] | 1 |
| Finnish Albums (The Official Finnish Charts)[17] | 5 |
| French Albums (SNEP)[18] | 1 |
| Greek Albums (IFPI Greece)[19] | 1 |
| Irish Albums (IRMA)[20] | 1 |
| Italian Albums (Musica e dischi)[21] | 1 |
| Portuguese Albums (AFP)[22] | 1 |
| Spanish Albums (AFYVE)[23] | 4 |
| Position | ||
| Australian Albums (ARIA)[24] | 12 | |
|---|---|---|
| Austrian Albums (Ö3 Austria)[25] | 3 | |
| Canada Top Albums/CDs (RPM)[26] | 1 | |
| Dutch Albums (Album Top 100)[27] | 2 | |
| European Albums (Music & Media)[28] | 1 | |
| French Albums (Europe 1)[29] | 14 | |
| Swiss Albums (Schweizer Hitparade)[30] | 3 | |
| UK Albums (OCC)[31] | 6 | |
| US Billboard 200[32] | 11 |
| Position | ||
| UK Albums (OCC) | 47 | |
|---|---|---|
| US Billboard 200[33] | 50 |
| Position | ||
| UK Albums (OCC)[34] | 73 |
|---|
In 2005, Warner Bros. Records issued an expanded two-disc edition of Out of Time which includes a CD, a DVD-Audio disc containing a 5.1-channel surround sound mix of the album done by Elliot Scheiner, lyrics, a photo album, and the original CD booklet with expanded liner notes. In 2011 Warner Bros. released a 96 kHz, 24-bit and 192 kHz, 24 bit stereo release (the same High-Resolution stereo mix as featured on the DVD-Audio and later, the Blu-Ray editions) of the album at HDtracks.
Out of Time
| Region | Date | Label | Format | Catalog | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Germany | Warner Bros. | Compact Disc | 7599-26496-2 | ||
| United Kingdom | Warner Bros. | LP | 7599-26496-1 | ||
| Compact Disc | 7599-26496-2 | ||||
| United States | Warner Bros. | LP | 1-26496 | ||
| Compact Disc | 2-26527 | ||||
| Cassette | 4-26496 | ||||
| Canada | Warner Bros. | Compact Disc | CD 26496 | ||
| France | Warner Bros. | Compact Disc | WE 833 | ||
| Germany | Warner Bros. | Digital Compact Cassette | 7599-26496-5 | ||
| Argentina | Warner Bros. | Cassette | 4-26496 | ||
| Bolivia | Warner Bros. | LP | WEA WL-1152 | ||
| Brazil | Warner Bros. | LP | 6709323 | ||
| Germany | Warner Bros. | LP | 7599-26496-1† | ||
| Israel | Hed Arzi | Compact Disc | 9 26496-2 | ||
| Japan | Warner Bros. | Compact Disc | WPCP 4195 | ||
| Mexico | Warner Bros. | LP | LPNB-7069 | ||
| Russia | Warner Bros. | LP | 1092MD/RGM 7028-1A/2 | ||
| South Africa | Warner Bros./Tusk | Compact Disc | WBCD 1701 | ||
| South Korea | Warner Bros. | LP | 7599-26496-1 | ||
| Zimbabwe | Tusk | LP | WBC 1701 | ||
| Australia | Warner Bros. | Compact Disc | 7599264962 | ||
| United States | Warner Bros. | Compact Disc/DVD-Audio DualDisc | 73951 | ||
| Internet | 2011 | Warner Bros. | LPCM FLAC 96 kHz/24bit, LPCM FLAC 192 kHz/24bit |
Note
Box sets
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