The album is a 40-song career-spanning retrospective that collects, for the first time ever, songs from R.E.M.s entire back catalog, including the pioneering American bands years on both the IRS label (1982 to 1987) & Warner Bros. Records (1988 to 2011). In addition to liner notes written by band members Berry, Buck, Mills, & Stipe, the album also features three new songs that R.E.M. finished after they completed their last album, Collapse Into Now: "A Month of Saturdays, " " We All Go Back