In all the years I've been listening to this CD (and I listened to it a lot today as well), I find that my favorite song of this album keeps changing. Rockville. Harborcoat. Time after Time (I'm naming my first daughter AnnElise). Today, though, it's Letter Never Sent.

Dammit, each song on this CD is totally different than the next, and just about every one of them deserves to be a hit.

Ranked against my favorite REM albums, it's hard to not put this one at the top. Fables, Murmur, Life's Rich Pageant...they are all great. I don't know if it's my favorite REM album, but I know that I wouldn't want to live the rest of my life without this masterpiece. I guess the main point is, if you enjoy Life's Rich or Murmur or any other REM album, you will definitely LOVE Reckoning.

Now if you'll excuse me, vacation in Athens is calling me. Buy Reckoning today. Don't waste another year.

R.E.M. broke onto the scene with "Chronic Town" when I was a sophomore in high school in 1982. Prior to this time, I was "into" the mainstream hard rock of the day (Van Halen, Aldo Nova, Huey Lewis, Rush, Men at Work, etc.). R.E.M gave me an individualistic retreat amidst the pressure of adolescent conformity. In this period prior to adulthood, I was able to invest R.E.M.'s music with my own innocence, naivete, and sense of mystery. The band's initial EP ("Chronic Town") and first two LPs ("Murmur" & "Reckoning") seemed to beg the listener down this path. The music suggested a growing youth movement that embraced kindness, creativity, and commeraderie.

Side One (pardon this out-moded expression) was one of the best LP sides ever. The sound of "Reckoning" was more driving and slightly more electric than it's folk-tinged predecessor, "Murmur". The vocals were rarely decipherable, but one could extract occassional nuggets ("Your handshake is worthy, it's all that you've got"..."The wiseman builds his house upon the rock, but I'm not bound to follow suit"..."Goddamn your confusion"..."pull your dress on, and stay real close"). These little chestnuts somehow seemed and felt important at the time. Never enough to hang one's hat on, but enough to conjure intrigue.

Side Two yielded "Letter Never Sent", which is still at the top of my favorite R.E.M. songlist. Other highlights included "Second Guessing" and "(Don't Go Back To) Rockville".

While R.E.M. continued to create occassional moments of brilliance ("Maps & Legends", "Flowers of Guatemala", "Me in Honey", and "Man on the Moon"), their music yielded diminishing returns from this point forward. Peter Buck abandoned the gorgeous sweep of the clean arpeggio jangle of his Rickenbacker for power chords and distortion. At the time I grieved and lamented this loss, but after 20 years I realize that the sound I loved HAD to change. It was the product of its time and the age of its creators. And somehow the fact that R.E.M. and I went down different paths after 1984 lends a bittersweet pathos to "Reckoning".

"Reckoning" is one for the ages. And the embarrassment of Michael Stipe circa 2003 does not diminish its beauty. Highly recommended.

"Reckoning" is a continuation of the first album. Same janglily, hooky songs with the vocals very low in the mix although much brighter and more beautiful than "Murmur". Many of these songs are just goregous, beautiful in the extreme with many breathtaking moments and very solid material from beginning to end.

If you are to have only one R.E.M. album, I'd say get this. "Murmur" may be one of the all time greatest debuts in rock history, but this actually improves upon it and demonstrates why R.E.M. was one of the greatest underground acts of the early to mid 80's.

I don't give out 5 star ratings to just anything, this more than deserves it..I'd give it a 6 if I could..it's just that beautiful of a rock record.

I seldom go on the record for ANYTHING. But the song, "Time After Time" really did change my appreciation for music. I can't say "for life" because I didn't change that much. I had smoked some world-class pot, I had listened to "Time After Time", and I had UNDERSTOOD. The richness of Michael Stipe's voice and the melody really did hit home with me. It ranks as one of the top musical experiences of my life (Sonny and Cher on "Letterman" and REM on "Letterman" also qualify, so be warned...) and, dare I say it, it is THE most musically transportative moment of my life. Timing is everything and the song and my mindset were "just so" (thank you, Rudyard Kipling) on that fateful day (eh, Pincus, poor little ERIC Pincus) so that it resonated with me-and still does to this day. It moved me then, it moves me now, and it will move me til the day I die.

While many listeners of R.E.M. argue passionately that "Murmur" is their best work, I respectfully disagree. "Reckoning" ranks as the best and most fully realized album R.E.M. ever produced and in my opinion is the best album to come out of a decade littered with the likes of Madonna and Michael Jackson, not to mention various glam rockers, hair bands, and pretentious English beat groups. The jangly 12 string playing of Peter Buck on songs such as "South Central Rain" and "Seven Chinese Brothers" are simple yet complex at the same time. Michael Stipe bares his soul on plaintive, muddy vocals with a beauty yet to be surpassed by any other vocalist. Simply put, this is an album of straight forward, unassuming and beautiful tunes crafted by one of the best rock bands of the last 20 years. If someone ever asks me to name only one album I could take to a desert island with me, "Reckoning" would definitely be that album.