The legendary R.E.M. - one of the world’s most successful and well-loved bands – have signed an exclusive worldwide publishing agreement with Universal Music Publishing to represent their catalogue.  

Formed in 1980 by Michael Stipe, Peter Buck, Mike Mills and Bill Berry, R.E.M.’s craftsmanship and musical impact was pivotal in defining the indie rock genre. With career sales of over 85 million albums, R.E.M. released 15 studio albums (nine of which went Top 5 on the Billboard 200), including ‘Murmur’, ‘Life's Rich Pageant’, ‘Document’, ‘Green’, ‘Out of Time’, ‘Automatic for the People’, ‘Monster’, and their final album, the critically acclaimed ‘Collapse into Now’.

“R.E.M. are one of a small number of benchmark artists who have changed the course of popular music during their renowned career. We are honoured that R.E.M. have chosen us to take care of their generation-defining catalogue,” said Jody Gerson, UMPG chairman and CEO.

“As a band and an organization, we are excited to join forces with Universal Music Publishing for the next phase of R.E.M.’s legacy career, said Bertis Downs, longtime manager of R.E.M.

Some of R.E.M.’s most popular songs include 'Losing My Religion', 'Everybody Hurts', 'The One I Love', 'Its the End of the World as We Know It (And I Feel Fine)', 'Man on the Moon', 'What’s the Frequency, Kenneth?', 'Fall On Me', 'Orange Crush', 'Driver 8', 'Nightswimming', 'Leaving New York', and 'Supernatural Superserious'. R.E.M. have won three Grammy Awards and were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2007.