7. Fables of the Reconstruction (of the) (1985)

Oddities: Owning to the alternate titles, the LP spine featured “Fables of the” one way and “Reconstruction of the” upside down on the opposite end. Liner notes featured word puzzles to match personnel to duties. Sides A and B are listed as “A Side ” and “Another Side” respectively.

Younger readers who grew up on “Everybody Hurts” (or later even) may not realize it, but at one time R.E.M. was weird. Odd, angular, arty, fussy, and completely unwilling to contort themselves to fit pop music conventions. Hell, their first video compilation was titled Succumbs, with tongue firmly in cheek. Between gauzy music videos of abstract Super 8 footage of freight trains pulling into and leaving stations, Stipe constantly toying with his public image (this tour would see him shaving a bald monk’s spot on his head) and delivering odd folk soliloquies between songs, and artsy, cryptic visuals hidden in their album and even their 7″ single covers, R.E.M. in the mid-80s were a strange creature, on purpose. Perhaps nowhere more so then on 1985’s Fables. Not only does the album feature a cyclical title (readable as Fables of the Reconstruction or Reconstruction of the Fables with an extra “of the” to bring you back round again) but it also essentially features two covers to suit this concept. Sprawled over front and back 9or back and front) are weird sculptures, sponge-dab paintings of prosceniums, individual band photos projected over with ocean life…its all very psychedelic without falling into any of the tired tropes often associated with psychedelic design. There was a (to employ an oft-used cliche about this record) southern gothic flavor to this folk-psychedelia. And it only got weirder inside, with woodcuts of fractured architecture and stacks of a variety of antiquarian typefaces spelling out mysterious liner notes and song titles, some of which were for songs that wouldn’t even appear on the album.

A weird design for a weird record of a weird band in a weird period. Excellent.