R.E.M. have completed work on their 15th studio album, the band has announced on their official website, www.remhq.com. The Athens, Georgia band put the finishing touches on their new collection of songs in Nashville, after recording the bulk of it between New Orleans, USA and Berlin, Germany. "I will not report on the sound or the dimension of the recordings so far, to my ears it all sounds like quite a wonderful set of songs," R.E.M. manager Bertis Downs wrote in an update from the Berlin studio recently.

He reveals on the website that the band are planning a Northern Hemisphere Spring release so we should hear the new record in the first half of 2011. The website also shares photos from the Nashville studio sessions.

Meanwhile REM frontman Michael Stipe has assisted his superstar buddy and self-confessed “obsessed foodie” Gwyneth Paltrow by contributing an article to her newsletter/website, GOOP. The singer wrote an extensive feature on the Louisiana town of New Orleans, after spending so much time there recording the band’s next album.  Stipe reveals his favourite culinary hot-spots and mentions places where he went with actor John Malkovich and legendary singer Patti Smith.