Nah, my liking of REM went much further than that into their catalogue. I get what you mean about the peaks, for example I'll never put Green on but the first few and last few albums I still play, occasionally. The less over-produced early albums and the later albums with the more experimental don't give a f*** this is our art and where we're at now albums still get a whirl from time to time
Maybe it's Scott Litt's production you don't like?