Produced by Mitch Easter and Don Dixon, the album was recorded at Reflection Sound Studio in Charlotte, North Carolina, over 16 days in December 1983 and January 1984.

Lead singer Michael Stipe dealt with darker subject matter in his lyrics, with water-related imagery being a recurring theme on the album.

They wrote new material prodigiously, mostly in Mike Mills' living room on Barber Street in Athens.

[7] In November 1983, the band recorded 22 songs during a session with Neil Young producer Elliot Mazer in San Francisco.

president Jay Boberg, they expressed dismay at the comments he made when he visited during the last day of sessions.

Dixon wanted the guitars to sound more like they did in concert, but originally they met resistance from both the band and the label; however, by the time R.E.M.

Easter recalled that Dixon "made this sort of fake binaural head out of a cardboard box and stuck two microphones in it" to record the group.

In Easter's opinion the method made drummer Bill Berry's parts "fresher sounding".

Dixon explained, "Mike Mills was often singing 12 to 15 feet away from the microphones that were recording his part, but because it was in a studio binaural field, we would tend to hear him as behind [Stipe].

"[18] Biographer David Buckley wrote, "While the music moved away from Murmur's slightly airless feel, the subject matter was a little darker.

The producer tried to get Stipe to sing a better take, but the singer was more intent on getting the feeling of the song across, and at one point refused to record further.

The band was reluctant to record "Pretty Persuasion," as the members considered it too old, but Dixon and Easter convinced the group to do so.

The end result was considered a disappointment, as Stipe had to work with Finster on a long-distance basis, and the reproduction of the artwork for the album sleeve was problematic.

hoped to "convince reluctant programmers to add the group by pointing to the press response, word-of-mouth reaction to local live performances and sales figures", according to a July 1984 Los Angeles Times article.

[41] Within a month of its release, Reckoning peaked at number 27 on the Billboard 200 albums chart, and it remained there for nearly a year.

Reviewer Christopher Connelly wrote that in comparison to Murmur the "overall sound is crisper, the lyrics far more comprehensible.

's considerable strengths – Buck's ceaselessly inventive strumming, Mike Mills' exceptional bass playing and Stipe's evocatively gloomy baritone – remain unchanged".

"[35] Joe Sasfy of The Washington Post felt that the songs on the album "trump even Murmur's outstanding songwriting" and stated "there isn't an American band worth following more than R.E.M.

[50] A 25th anniversary deluxe edition of the album, which was remastered and packaged with a bonus disc featuring a concert recorded at Chicago's Aragon Ballroom on July 7, 1984, was released in 2009.

Stipe's concept was to film the project at folk artist R.A. Miller's Whirligig Farm, and he recruited Athens filmmaker James Herbert to direct it.

[38] The short film draws its title from the fact that it is soundtracked by five songs that appear on the "L" side of the vinyl version of Reckoning: "Harborcoat", "7 Chinese Bros.", "So.

[38] Herbert utilized rephotography during the editing process, which involved taking photographs of film frames at random, while also closing in or pulling back from the image with no regard to narrative.