R.E.M., Automatic for the People (1992)

Not feeling it, man. This is the album that features "Everybody Hurts" and "Man on the Moon" but plenty of stinkers. It sounds a lot like Irish folk music appropriated for alternative and probably is. Michael Stipe's voice is morose and mostly plodding, the guitar riffs are 90s cheese, and the lyrics? Nothing to write home about.

I like Stipe's voice and deep down I hope that there will be one album that turns up by R.E.M. that I actually will like overall.

The kind of music on this album is the kind of music that would interfere with my digestion if I heard it in the background while eating a meal, the kind of music that would make me carsick too.

Not an endorsement.