Artist.......: R.E.M.
Album........: Live from Athens (MTV)
Label........: n/a
Genre........: Rock
Catnr........: n/a
Source.......: DVBS
Rip.date.....: Oct-05-2008
Str.date.....: Oct-05-2008
Quality......: VBR/44,1Hz/Joint-Stereo
Url..........: www.remhq.com
track title time
01. Live from Athens 88:34
MTV Intro
What's The Frequency, Kenneth?
Drive
Man-Sized Wreath
Ignoreland
Bad Day
Hollowman
Electrolite
(Don't Go Back To) Rockville
The Great Beyond
The One I Love
She Just Wants To Be
Losing My Religion
Let Me In
Horse To Water
Orange Crush
Imitation Of Life
Supernatural Superserious
It's The End Of The World As We Know It
Man Of The Moon
Runtime 88:34 min
Size 139,9 MB
Release Notes:
Recorded / Performed : October 05, 2008 (Athens / MTV)
R.E.M. mark the point when post-punk turned into
alternative rock. When their first single, "Radio Free
Europe," was released in 1981, it sparked a back-to-the-
garage movement in the American underground. While there
were a number of hardcore and punk bands in the U.S.
during the early '80s, R.E.M. brought guitar pop back into
the underground lexicon. Combining ringing guitar hooks
with mumbled, cryptic lyrics and a D.I.Y. aesthetic
borrowed from post-punk, the band simultaneously sounded
traditional and modern. Though there were no overt
innovations in their music, R.E.M. had an identity and
sense of purpose that transformed the American
underground. Throughout the '80s, they worked
relentlessly, releasing records every year and touring
constantly, playing both theaters and backwoods dives.
Along the way, they inspired countless bands, from the
legions of jangle pop groups in the mid-'80s to scores of
alternative pop groups in the '90s, who admired their slow
climb to stardom. It did take R.E.M. several years to
break into the top of the charts, but they had a cult
following from the release of their debut EP, Chronic
Town, in 1982. Chronic Town established the haunting folk
and garage rock that became the band's signature sound,
and over the next five years, they continued to expand
their music with a series of critically acclaimed albums.
By the late '80s, the group's fan base had grown large
enough to guarantee strong sales, but the Top Ten success
in 1987 of Document and "The One I Love" was unexpected,
especially since R.E.M. had only altered their sound
slightly. Following Document, R.E.M. slowly became one of
the world's most popular bands. After an exhaustive
international tour supporting 1988's Green, the band
retired from touring for six years and retreated into the
studio to produce their most popular records, Out of Time
(1991) and Automatic for the People (1992). By the time
they returned to performing with the Monster tour in 1995,
the band had been acknowledged by critics and musicians as
one of the forefathers of the thriving alternative rock
movement, and they were rewarded with the most lucrative
tour of their career. Toward the late '90s, R.E.M. was an
institution, as its influence was felt in new generations
of bands.
Though R.E.M. formed in Athens, GA, in 1980, Mike Mills
(born December 17, 1958) and Bill Berry (born July 31,
1958) were the only Southerners in the group. Both had
attended high school together in Macon, playing in a
number of bands during their teens. Michael Stipe (born
January 4, 1960) was a military brat, moving throughout
the country during his childhood. By his teens, he had
discovered punk rock through Patti Smith, Television, and
Wire, and began playing in cover bands in St. Louis. By
1978, he had begun studying art at the University of
Georgia in Athens, where he began frequenting the Wuxtry
record store. Peter Buck (born December 6, 1956), a native
of California, was a clerk at Wuxtry. Buck had been a
fanatical record collector, consuming everything from
classic rock to punk and free jazz, and was just beginning
to learn how to play guitar. Discovering they had similar
tastes, Buck and Stipe began working together, eventually
meeting Berry and Mills through a mutual friend. In April
of 1980, the band formed to play a party for their friend,
rehearsing a number of garage, psychedelic bubblegum, and
punk covers in an converted Episcopalian church. At the
time, the group was played under the name the Twisted
Kites. By the summer, the band had settled on the name
R.E.M. after flipping randomly through the dictionary, and
had met Jefferson Holt, who became their manager after
witnessing the group's first out-of-state concert in North
Carolina.
Over the next year and a half, R.E.M. toured throughout
the South, playing a variety of garage rock covers and
folk-rock originals. At the time, the band was still
learning how to play, as Buck began to develop his
distinctive, arpeggiated jangle and Stipe ironed out his
cryptic lyrics. During the summer of 1981, R.E.M. recorded
their first single, "Radio Free Europe," at Mitch Easter's
Drive-In Studios. Released on the local indie label Hib-
Tone, "Radio Free Europe" was pressed in a run of only
1,000 copies, but most of the those singles fell into the
right hands. Due to strong word of mouth, the single
became a hit on college radio and topped the Village
Voice's year-end poll of Best Independent Singles. The
single also earned the attention of larger independent
labels, and by the beginning of 1982, the band had signed
to I.R.S. Records, releasing the EP Chronic Town in the
spring. Like the single, Chronic Town was well received,
paving the way for the group's full-length debut album,
1983's Murmur.
With its subdued, haunting atmosphere and understated
production, Murmur was noticeably different than Chronic
Town and was welcomed with enthusiastic reviews upon its
spring release; Rolling Stone named it the best album of
1983, beating out Michael Jackson's Thriller and the
Police's Synchronicity. Murmur also expanded the group's
cult significantly, breaking into the American Top 40.
R.E.M. returned to a rougher-edged sound on 1984's
Reckoning, which featured the college hit "So. Central
Rain (I'm Sorry)." By the time the band hit the road to
support Reckoning, they had become well known in the
American underground for their constant touring, aversion
to videos, support of college radio, Stipe's mumbled
vocals and detatched stage presence, Buck's ringing
guitar, and their purposely enigmatic artwork. Bands that
imitated these very things ran rampant throughout the
American underground, and R.E.M. threw their support
toward these bands, having them open at shows and
mentioning them in interviews. By 1985, the American
underground was awash with R.E.M. sound-alikes and bands
like Game Theory and the Rain Parade, which shared similar
aesthetics and sounds.
Just as the signature R.E.M. sound dominated the
underground, the band entered darker territory with its
third album, 1985's Fables of the Reconstruction. Recorded
in London with producer Joe Boyd (Richard Thompson,
Fairport Convention, Nick Drake), Fables of the
Reconstruction was made at a difficult period in R.E.M.'s
history, as the band was fraught with tension produced by
endless touring. The album reflected the group's dark
moods, as well as its obsession with the rural South, and
both of these fascinations popped up on the supporting
tour. Stipe, whose on-stage behavior was always slightly
strange, entered his most bizarre phase, as he put on
weight, dyed his hair bleached blonde, and wore countless
layers of clothing. None of the new quirks in R.E.M.'s
persona prevented Fables of the Reconstruction from
becoming their most successful album to date, selling
nearly 300,000 copies in the U.S. R.E.M. decided to record
their next album with Don Gehman, who had previously
worked with John Mellencamp. Gehman had the band clean up
its sound and Stipe enunciate his vocals, making Lifes
Rich Pageant their most accessible record to date. Upon
its late summer release in 1986, Lifes Rich Pageant was
greeted with the positive reviews that had become
customary with each new R.E.M. album, and it outstripped
the sales of its predecessor. Several months after Lifes
Rich Pageant, the group released the B-sides and rarities
collection Dead Letter Office in the spring of 1987.
R.E.M. had laid the groundwork for mainstream success, but
they had never explicitly courted widespread success.
Nevertheless, their audience had grown quite large, and it
wasn't that surprising that the group's fifth album,
Document, became a hit shortly after its fall 1987
release. Produced by Scott Litt -- who would produce all
of their records over the course of the next decade --
Document climbed into the U.S. Top Ten and went platinum
on the strength of the single "The One I Love," which also
went into the Top Ten; it also became their biggest U.K.
hit to date, reaching the British Top 40. The following
year, the band left I.R.S. Records, signing with Warner
Bros. for a reported six million dollars. The first album
under the new contract was Green, which was released on
election day 1988. Green continued the success of
Document, going double platinum and generating the Top Ten
single "Stand." R.E.M. supported Green with an exhaustive
international tour, in which they played their first
stadium dates in the U.S. Though they had graduated to
stadiums in America, the group continued to play clubs
throughout Europe.
The Green tour proved to be draining for the group, and
they took an extended rest upon its completion in 1989.
During the break, each member pursued side projects, and
Hindu Love Gods, an album Buck, Berry, and Mills recorded
with Warren Zevon in 1986, was released. R.E.M. reconvened
during 1990 to record their seventh album, Out of Time,
which was released in the spring of 1991. Entering the
U.S. and U.K. charts at number one, Out of Time was a lush
pop and folk album, boasting a wider array of sounds than
the group's previous efforts; its lead single, "Losing My
Religion," became the group's biggest single, reaching
number four in the U.S. Since the band was exhausted from
the Green tour, they chose to stay off the road.
Nevertheless, Out of Time became their biggest album,
selling over four million copies in the U.S. and spending
two weeks at the top of the charts. R.E.M. released the
dark, meditative Automatic for the People in the fall of
1992. Though the group had promised a rock album after the
softer textures of Out of Time, Automatic for the People
was slow, quiet, and reflective, with many songs being
graced by string arrangements by Led Zeppelin bassist John
Paul Jones. Like its predecessor, Automatic for the People
was a quadruple platinum success, generating the Top 40
hit singles "Drive," "Man on the Moon," and "Everybody
Hurts."
After piecing together two albums in the studio, R.E.M.
decided to return to being a rock band with 1994's
Monster. Though the record was conceived as a back-to-
basics album, the recording of Monster was difficult and
plagued with tension. Nevertheless, the album was a huge
hit upon its fall release, entering the U.S. and U.K.
charts at number one; furthermore, the album won praise
from a number of old-school critics who had been reluctant
to praise the band, since they didn't "rock" in
conventional terms. Experiencing some of the strongest
sales and reviews of their career, R.E.M. began their
first tour since Green early in 1995. Two months into the
tour, Bill Berry suffered a brain aneurysm while
performing; he had surgery immediately and had fully
recovered within a month. R.E.M. resumed their tour two
months after Berry's aneurysm, but his illness was only
the beginning of a series of problems that plagued the
Monster tour. Mills had to undergo abdominal surgery to
remove an intestinal tumor in July; a month later, Stipe
had to have an emergency surgery to remove a hernia.
Despite all the problems, the tour was an enormous
financial success, and the group recorded the bulk of a
new album. Before the record was released in the fall of
1996, R.E.M. parted ways with their long-time manager
Jefferson Holt, allegedly due to sexual harassment charges
levied against Holt; the group's lawyer, Bertis Downs,
assumed managerial duties.
New Adventures in Hi-Fi was released in September 1996,
just before it was announced that the band had re-signed
with Warner Bros., reportedly for a record-breaking sum of
80 million dollars. In light of such a huge figure, the
commercial failure of New Adventures in Hi-Fi was ironic.
Though it received strong reviews and debuted at number
two in the U.S. and number one in the U.K., the album
failed to generate a hit single, and it only went platinum
where its three predecessors went quadruple platinum. By
early 1997, the album had already begun its descent down
the charts. However, the members of R.E.M. were already
pursuing new projects, as Stipe worked with his film
company, Single Cell Pictures, and Buck co-wrote songs
with Mark Eitzel and worked with a free jazz group,
Tuatara.
In October of 1997, R.E.M. shocked fans and the media with
the announcement that Berry was amicably exiting the group
to retire to life on his farm; the remaining members
continued on as a three-piece, soon convening in Hawaii to
begin preliminary work on their next LP. Replacing Berry
with a drum machine, the sessions resulted in 1998's Up,
widely touted as R.E.M.'s most experimental recording in
years. It was only a brief change of direction, since the
band's next album, 2001's Reveal, marked a return to their
classic sound. Around the Sun followed in 2004. A
worldwide tour followed in 2005, which included an
appearance at the London branch of Live 8. In 2007, the
band was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
That same year, they began work on Accelerate, which was
released in 2008.