A Band Walking Unafraid

Ever since R.E.M. came out of Georgia in the early ‘80s, there have been three things that could be counted on in the band’s music: intelligence, integrity and craft.

As the group kicked off its first U.S. tour in four years (and its first without original drummer Bill Berry) on Monday at the Greek Theatre, those elements were still very much in evidence in the band’s two-hour set.

This wasn’t the most consistent or jubilant R.E.M. appearance ever here, partly because of sluggish pacing and a song sequencing that seemed arbitrary at times--both factors possibly due to rustiness from a two-week break between a two-month European tour and this one, which included a second night Tuesday at the Greek and a stop tonight at Irvine Meadows Amphitheatre.

Despite the lulls, R.E.M. demonstrated the intelligence and craft in its music as it played some two dozen songs with precision and passion.

The material ranged from the signature hits, including “Losing My Religion” and “The One I Love,” that moved the group from alt-rock heroes to the top of the pop charts, to “The Great Beyond,” an inviting new song written for “Man on the Moon,” an upcoming film about Andy Kaufman that takes its name from another R.E.M. song about the late comedian.

And the integrity?

That was showcased in the design of the concert.

Because R.E.M.’s last two albums, “New Adventures in Hi-Fi” and “Up,” both fell way below the multiplatinum sales levels of such predecessors as “Automatic for the People,” there has been a lot of whispering in the industry that time has passed the group by.

Call it the curse of SoundScan.

Ever since that company began making precise sales figures available in the early ‘90s, there has been an increasing emphasis on commercial performance--so much so that albums are written off as losers if they don’t meet sales expectations, even though the quality of the work might be quite high. It’s a tendency that has hurt the image of R.E.M. and other stellar bands such as U2, the Smashing Pumpkins and Pearl Jam.

So it must have been tempting for R.E.M. to play it safe this time around and come out with an audience-friendly greatest-hits survey. Instead, R.E.M. showed no sign of compromise or surrender, focusing on material from the last two albums as if they had both been mega-sellers.

After a 45-minute opening set by Mercury Rev--whose music was built around marvelously rich soundscapes, but whose set suffered from a distressingly flat presentation--R.E.M. opened its show with “Lotus,” one of the more upbeat tunes from “Up.” The group served up seven others from that album alone during the evening.

Listening to those songs as well as two numbers from “Adventures,” it seemed obvious why they didn’t enjoy the kind of massive radio airplay that earlier R.E.M. songs received. These are stark and challenging works--not exactly what radio programmers are looking for in a time of disposable pop and novelty rock. There is nothing light about even the most accessible R.E.M. songs. All are backed by imagination and thought.

It doesn’t mean that R.E.M. isn’t lighthearted. The staging Monday underscored that point--decorated with all sorts of neon lights, many of them in the shape of images from the songs. Yes, there was a man and a moon.

But singer Michael Stipe’s manner was fun also. He not only struck a few poses of Andy Kaufman adopting Elvis Presley’s martial arts stance during “Man on the Moon,” but also went through a ragged version of Presley’s “Suspicious Minds” during the encore.

Besides Joey Waronker on drums (replacing Berry, who suffered a brain aneurysm in 1995 and then decided to leave the band for personal reasons in 1997), R.E.M. has also brought along two other musicians this time to supplement guitarist Peter Buck and bassist Mike Mills on keyboards and guitars.

The additional musicians are needed to execute the increasingly complex, multilayered textures in R.E.M.’s songs, which have changed substantially over the years.

Where the jangling, guitar-driven pop-rock of its early years neatly fit the often oblique tales of society’s searching for values in a restless age, the themes in recent years have become much more inner-directed--probing looks at personal values and struggles.

That has stripped R.E.M. of some, though not all, of its accessibility.

“At My Most Beautiful” and “Walk Unafraid,” two songs from “Up,” are wonderfully comforting and uplifting tunes that should have been huge radio hits. The former, which Stipe dedicated to Brian Wilson on Monday, is as soothing a love song as Stipe has ever written, and “Unafraid” has the anthem-like quality of U2’s most inviting works.

As Stipe sang “Unafraid” near the end of the set, the neon lights were turned off, focusing all attention on the gentle, comforting sentiments.

When R.E.M. returned for the encore, however, all the lights were ablaze for “Crush With Eyeliner,” an aggressive rocker that combines the sass of the Rolling Stones with the wild-side aura of the Velvet Underground.

By the end, the band and audience were in such good spirits on a strange medley of the spirited “It’s the End of the World as We Know It (And I Feel Fine)” and “Suspicious Minds” that no one seemed to care that Stipe didn’t know most of the words to the Presley hit.

For all the rough spots, the show ended on a triumphant note and R.E.M. showed that it remains one of the great bands ever in American rock. Buck, Stipe and Mills were even jumping about with the same enthusiasm they exhibited all those years ago when they were playing to a couple hundred fans at Hollywood’s Club Lingerie.

In those days, Stipe said his goal wasn’t just to make hits, but to make a body of work that he could be proud of--music that wouldn’t be filled with embarrassing compromises. At the Greek Theatre, R.E.M.--wherever its place on the charts at the moment--showed it is still living up to that goal.

* R.E.M. and Mercury Rev, tonight at Irvine Meadows Amphitheatre, 8808 Irvine Center Drive, Irvine. 8 p.m. $25-$45. (949) 855-2863.