Agreed. Lyrical poetry can be great and impactful, but if the cadence of the lyrics doesn't fit in with the music, the music as a whole suffers. And on the other side of the coin, some great songs can have largely meaningless lyrics but they still fit with the style or theme of the song.
Back to the subject of REM, I'm a bit sick of their hits (I could go without ever hearing Shiny Happy People ever again quite frankly) but their whole career has a lot of great songs. Life's Rich Pageant, Green and Murmur are probably my favorite three albums.
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