R.E.M.-Fest! Interview on Accelerate and New Technologies!

With the band's 14th album, Accelerate, due April 1, R.E.M. and gay front man Michael Stipe know how to keep up with the times. Not only did Michael release that blog-y confession - the other members of R.E.M. are, shockingly, heterosexual - the band is also letting Facebook users hear Accelerate before it comes out.

The guys also did an interview with MTV.com, and I embedded the four-parter here - as well as some pictures from arecent performance at The Apple Store in London. In this first clip, they talk about the new rock-ier sound and about re-imagining themselves as a three-member band. ...

The rest of the interview - and more pictures - after the jump...

Michael promises he’s a happy person ... he just writes sad songs. He also reveals the one autobiographical track on the album...

Next up, the guys praise Radiohead for its own innovative way of distributing music ...

So tech-y. Fitting they performed at a Mac store, huh? ...

Accelerate is a surprisingly short album, but the name refers to more than that ...

And lastly, here's the latest R.E.M. music video: "Supernatural Superserious" ...