R.E.M. - Athens, GA, USA 1981

Reloaded - 05/May/2015 This is R.E.M. recorded live (soundboard sourced) at one of the bands local venues namely Tyrone's O.C., in Athens GA, USA, way back on the 23rd September 1981. This recording features both sets and includes the sound check (not proven but by sound quality etc generally agreed to be from this gig).


This was the bands 26th gig at Tyrone's O.C. the first at this venue taking place just over a year earlier on the 6th May 1980, and that performance was only their 5th ever full live gig. As regular home town shows go, the band sound incredible, full of natural energy, respectful of a growing local following and clearly enjoying and developing their craft.

Noting their early history wikipedia tells us: In January 1980, Michael Stipe met Peter Buck in the Athens record store where Buck worked. The pair discovered that they shared similar tastes in music, particularly punk rock and protopunk artists like Patti Smith, Television, and The Velvet Underground. Stipe said, "It turns out that I was buying all the records that [Buck] was saving for himself." Stipe and Buck soon met fellow University of Georgia students Mike Mills and Bill Berry, who had played music together since high school. The quartet agreed to collaborate on several songs; Stipe later commented that "there was never any grand plan behind any of it". Their still-unnamed band spent several months rehearsing and played its first show on April 5, 1980 at a friend's birthday party held in a converted Episcopal church in Athens. After considering names like "Twisted Kites", "Cans of Piss", and "Negro Wives", the band settled on "R.E.M.", which Stipe selected at random from a dictionary.

The band members eventually dropped out of school to focus on their developing group. They found a manager in Jefferson Holt, a record store clerk who was so impressed by an R.E.M. performance in his hometown of Chapel Hill, North Carolina, that he moved to Athens. R.E.M.'s success was almost immediate in Athens and surrounding areas; the band drew progressively larger crowds for shows, which caused some resentment in the Athens music scene. Over the next year and a half, R.E.M. toured throughout the Southern United States. Touring was arduous since a touring circuit for alternative rock bands did not then exist. The group had to tour in an old blue van driven by Holt, and the band members lived on a food allowance of $2 a day.

During the summer of 1981, R.E.M. recorded its first single, "Radio Free Europe", at producer Mitch Easter's Drive-In Studios in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. The single was released on the local independent record label Hib-Tone with an initial pressing of one thousand copies, which quickly sold out. Despite its limited pressing, the single garnered critical acclaim, and was listed as one of the ten best singles of the year by The New York Times.

Source: Soundboard. 

Sound Quality: Very good stereo mp3@192kbps.

Genre: Alternative rock, college rock, jangle pop.

Set: Full set.

Set List:  

First Set:

01 Just A Touch
02 Ages Of You
03 1,000,000
04 Get On Their Way
05 There She Goes Again
06 Action
07 Wait
08 Sitting Still
09 Permanent Vacation
10 Mystery To Me

Second Set:
11 White Tornado
12 I Can't Control Myself
13 Burning Down
14 Shaking Through
15 Laughing
16 Romance
17 Pretty Persuasion
18 That Beat
19 Stumble
20 Radio Free Europe
21 Carnival Of Sorts (Boxcars)

Encore:

22 The Lion Sleeps Tonight
23 Skank
24 Gardening At Night
25 Windout
26 9-9

Sound check (most probably):

27 Unknown instrumental
28 Sitting still
29 100000030
30 The lion sleeps tonight

Links: Official HERE.

Reloaded 5th May 2015 - download link in comments below.

REM - KCRW Live Session 1991

This is R.E.M. with tracks 1-15 performed live at KCRW Studios, Santa Monica, California, April 3rd, 1991. Tracks 16-17 were perfomed on Saturday Night Live, in New York, on April 13th, 1991.

Regarding the lead up to this period of R.E.M. and the gigs themselves wikipedia informs us - The band's 1988 Warner Bros. debut, Green, was recorded in Nashville, Tennessee, and showcased the group experimenting with its sound. The record's tracks ranged from the upbeat first single "Stand" (a hit in the United States), to more political material, like the rock-oriented "Orange Crush" and "World Leader Pretend", which address the Vietnam War and the Cold War, respectively. Green has gone on to sell four million copies worldwide. The band supported the album with its biggest and most visually developed tour to date, featuring back-projections and art films playing on the stage. After the Green tour, the band members unofficially decided to take the following year off, the first extended break in the band's career.   

R.E.M. reconvened in mid-1990 to record its seventh album, Out of Time. In a departure from Green, the band members often wrote the music with non-traditional rock instrumentation including mandolin, organ, and acoustic guitar instead of adding them as overdubs later in the creative process. Released in March 1991, Out of Time was the band's first album to top both the US and UK charts. The record eventually sold 4.2 million copies in the US alone,[50] and about 12 million copies worldwide by 1996. The album's lead single "Losing My Religion" was a worldwide hit that received heavy rotation on radio, as did the music video on MTV.[51] "Losing My Religion" was R.E.M.'s highest-charting single in the US, reaching number four on the Billboard charts. "There have been very few life-changing events in our career because our career has been so gradual," Mills said years later. "If you want to talk about life changing, I think 'Losing My Religion' is the closest it gets". The album's second single. "Shiny Happy People" (one of three songs on the record to feature vocals from Kate Pierson of fellow Athens band The B-52's), was also a major hit, reaching number 10 in the US and number six in the UK.[22] Out of Time garnered R.E.M. seven nominations at the 1992 Grammy Awards, the most nominations of any artist that year. The band won three awards: one for Best Alternative Music Album and two for "Losing My Religion", Best Short Form Music Video and Best Pop Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal. R.E.M. did not tour to promote Out of Time; instead the group played a series of one-off shows, including an appearance taped for an episode of MTV Unplugged.

Source: FM and TV broadcast audio.

Sound Quality: Very good stereo mp3@320kbps.

Genre: Alternative rock, college rock, jangle pop

Set: Full Set.

Set List:

1. World Leader Pretend
2. Half a World Away
3. Disturbance at the Heron House
4. Radio Song
5. Low
6. Love is All Around
7. Tusk
8. Losing My Religion
9. Bandwagon
10. Endgame
11. Jackson
12. Swan Swan H
13. Spooky
14. Radio Ethiopia
15. Fall on Me
16. Losing My religion
17. Shiny Happy People

Website: Official HERE.

Download links (two) in comments below.

REM - Live In London - 2005

This is the 'broadcast' part of REM live in Hyde Park, London, on the 16th July 2005.

It was the final date of their 2004/05 world tour, and had been put back one week due to the terrorist attack on London's tube system, just days earlier.

I have seen a number of bands and artists myself in Hyde Park. I recognise it has been used considerably as a venue in recent years.

A good number of charitable events have been televised in the UK. It is easy to get the impression that this is a fine venue to play.

Hyde Park is a very big place, a very large park.

For around ten years now, the gigs are performed with the stage at the Marble Arch end. The audience are placed parallel with Park Lane going south, between the internal roads.

If nothing else, I hope I have confused some New Yorkers at there own game now, regarding concerts in Central Park (this time last year I was in Manhattan so understand this is said with kind affection).

Put simply this part of Hyde Park is flat, easy to fit in 80,000 people, not so easy to ensure they all hear, or even see the event.

In all seriousness unless you are an absolute fan, you are better off listening to the radio broadcast of the event if available, rather than risking, not being a part of the audience, close to the stage. Like I said, I have seen a number of acts there, it is a challenging venue for crowd and artist. REM did quite well!

This is REM as broadcast on BBC Radio Two live. It is not the full concert, rather the final hour. The sound quality is FM stereo, at it's best. I think it fair to say despite the challenges of the venue REM had their hearts in this gig, what do you think?

Tracks are:

01 - Kenneth
02 - One I Love
03 - Drive
04 - The Outsiders
05 - Leaving New York
06 - Everybody Hurts
07 - Electron Blue
08 - Final Straw
09 - Orange Crush
10 - Walk Unafraid
11 - Losing My Religion
12 - Man On The Moon

Replacement download link in comments below (2nd April 2010).

REM merchandise HERE.