R.E.M have enlisted the talents of Pearl Jam frontman Eddie Vedder and Patti Smith on their forthcoming new album, according to band member Mike Mills.
Mills broke the news in an interview with Spin, revealing Vedder is to appear on a new track named ‘It Happened Today’, while Patti Smith will feature on a song called ‘Blue’.
Later, Mills also discussed R.E.M’s approach to recording their fifteenth studio album, saying the group were striving for a more ambitious sound than that featured on 2008’s ‘Accelerate‘. “With ‘Accelerate‘ we were trying to make a point by making the songs as short and as fast as possible,” he said. “So we wanted this new one to be more expansive.
We wanted to put more variety into it and not limit ourselves to any one type of song. There are some really slow, beautiful songs; there are some nice, mid-tempo ones; and then there are three or four rockers.”
High expectations for the new record, which has been produced by Jacknife Lee, were fuelled this summer when Ken Stringfellow, singer and guitarist of cult American alternative band The Posies, told NME he believes the new material marks a ‘return to form’. “It’s sounding really great, very old school,” he said. “The first track had vocals which were mixed super low which I couldn’t understand and I was like, ‘Yes a return to form’. Mike was on about pushing the vocals up and I was like, ‘No, don’t do it’.”
The new LP is entitled ‘Collapse Into Now‘ and is due for release early next year.
