Just when did it become so cool to hate the newest R.E.M. record?

Ever since 1995's volume fest Monster, it seems the release of every subsequent disc by the godfathers of college rock have been met with more and more disdain.

New Adventures in Hi-Fi was too syrupy (untrue, it's a classic), Up was too weird and direction-less (it's both those things, but not too much of either) and Reveal, just plain uninspired But R.E.M. is too great a band to write off, so we continue to listen and hope for another Murmur.

The earth will not shake for R.E.M.'s brand new one, Around the Sun, but the complaints you're likely to hear from all the rabid R.E.M. fans are made in haste. Around the Sun is a sleepy, downbeat affair, but it has an engaging chamber-music quality that's hard to deny, and anyone who's ever considered Michael Stipe one of rock's great abstract songsmiths would be well-advised to listen up to this set.

"I Wanted To Be Wrong" and "High Speed Train" are stately and stunning, and slightly-more-uptempo fare like "Wander Lust" and "The Outsiders" breaks things up a bit.

True, it's no Document or Automatic For The People, or any number of other R.E.M. records. But for a band that's been around for practically a quarter century -- a band you should really want to succeed -- it's a pretty cool little record.

Buy Around the Sun, and on the coldest day of the fall, put it on headphones and walk around for an hour. Then tell me you don't like it.

-- Reviewed by Paul Thompson