R.E.M. 1980-2011??

[Analogman]

R.E.M.'S GREEN REVOLUTION: 25TH ANNIVERSARY DELUXE EDITION OF THE BAND'S MAJOR-LABEL BREAKTHROUGH OUT MAY 14TH ON RHINO

PRESS RELEASE:

25th Anniversary Deluxe Edition Of The Band’s Major-Label Breakthrough Includes Original Album Remastered And Live Disc Spotlighting The Penultimate Show Of 1989 World Tour; Available May 14 From Rhino

 

Green Remastered Will Also Be Available On 180-Gram Vinyl The Same Day

 

Five Song Live In Greensboro EP Will Be Released

On CD As Record Store Day Exclusive On April 20

 

R.E.M. achieved global success with the 1988 release of GREEN, the Athens, Georgia, quartet’s sixth studio album and first for Warner Bros. Records, which would be the band’s label home for the rest of their recording career. While R.E.M. was fast becoming one of the most acclaimed and revered acts in the U.S., GREEN was their first album to gain the attention of a worldwide audience. Packed with tracks destined to be definitive additions to the band’s canon, including “Orange Crush,” “Pop Song 89,” and “Stand,” GREEN was certified double platinum by the RIAA and doubled the domestic sales of the band’s previous release. GREEN continued R.E.M.’s dedication to the message of social consciousness, as evidenced by the album’s title, which would go on to became a ubiquitous buzzword for environmentally friendly initiatives.

 

To celebrate the landmark album’s 25-year anniversary, Rhino is releasing a two-disc deluxe edition that features the remastered original album accompanied by a disc of live performances taken from the penultimate show of R.E.M.’s 130-date Green World Tour. All 21 songs were recorded in Greensboro, North Carolina, on November 10, 1989, just miles from where Michael Stipe, Peter Buck, Mike Mills and Bill Berry had their very first recording session at Mitch Easter’s Drive-In Studio in Winston-Salem.

 

The anniversary set is packaged in a hard clamshell box (similar to previous R.E.M. reissues) and comes with four postcards and a foldout poster, plus insightful liner notes by Uncut editor, Allan Jones. GREEN: 25TH ANNIVERSARY DELUXE EDITION will be available on May 14 as a 2-disc set and digitally. The same day, the remastered album with original art and packaging will also be available on 180-gram vinyl.

 

In anticipation of the anniversary set, Rhino will release a limited edition, five-track EP as part of Record Store Day. This exclusive CD features a handful of performances from the Greensboro show that, due to space constraints, are not found on the Deluxe Edition, including the Green track “I Remember California” and classics like “So. Central Rain” and “Feeling Gravitys Pull.” Limited to just 2,500 copies, the disc comes with an original (non-reproduction) patch from the Green Tour. These patches were recently uncovered in the band’s vault. The LIVE IN GREENSBORO EP will be available for Record Store Day on April 20 for $7.98. For a list of participating stores, please visit wrecordstoreday.com.

 

The concert spread across the anniversary set and the Record Store Day EP captures a fiery set from R.E.M., which had been forged in the crucible of nearly one year of shows. R.E.M. performed most of GREEN (“Get Up” “World Leader Pretend” and “You Are The Everything”), while mixing in early favorites like “Fall On Me,” “Finest Worksong,” “The One I Love” and “Perfect Circle” from the band’s 1983 debut Murmur. The show also finds the band testing out new songs (“Low” and “Belong”) that would appear two years later on GREEN’s follow-up, Out Of Time.

 

For more information please visit:

remhq.com and

facebook.com/REMhq

 

 

GREEN: 25TH ANNIVERSARY DELUXE EDITION

Track Listing

 

Disc One – Original Album

1. “Pop Song 89”

2. “Get Up”

3. “You Are The Everything”

4. “Stand”

5. “World Leader Pretend”

6. “The Wrong Child”

7. “Orange Crush”

8. “Turn You Inside Out”

9. “Hairshirt”

10. “I Remember California”

11. “Untitled”

 

Disc Two – Live In Greensboro 1989

1. “Stand”

2. “The One I Love”

3. “Turn You Inside Out”

4. “Belong”

5. “Exhuming McCarthy”

6. “Good Advices”

7. “Orange Crush”

8. “Cuyahoga”

9. “These Days”

10. “World Leader Pretend”

11. “I Believe”

12. “Get Up”

13. “Life And How To Live It”

14. “Its The End Of The World As We Know It (And I Feel Fine)”

15. “Pop Song 89”

16. “Fall On Me”

17. “You Are The Everything”

18. “Begin The Begin”

19. “Low”

20. “Finest Worksong”

21. “Perfect Circle”

 

LIVE IN GREENSBORO EP – Record Store Day Exclusive

 

1. “So. Central Rain (I’m Sorry)”

2. “Feeling Gravitys Pull”

3. “Strange”

4. “King of Birds”

5. “I Remember California”

[Kim Bodnia]

 

R.E.M.'S GREEN REVOLUTION: 25TH ANNIVERSARY DELUXE EDITION OF THE BAND'S MAJOR-LABEL BREAKTHROUGH OUT MAY 14TH ON RHINO

PRESS RELEASE:

25th Anniversary Deluxe Edition Of The Band’s Major-Label Breakthrough Includes Original Album Remastered And Live Disc Spotlighting The Penultimate Show Of 1989 World Tour; Available May 14 From Rhin

 

Thank you for the into, it's always nice to know what R.E.M. are up to, one song I particularly recall from Green is Hairshirt, I think it-s beautiful, You are the Everything is also very good, Turn You Inside Out is a song very reminiscent of Discoverer. A good CD but I rank Accelerate even higher than Green.

[Analogman]

I was listening to all their albums today for the first time in a long time (well, up through New Adventures in Hi-Fi ). I was curious to see if they still had an active website. And sure enough, there is all sorts of stuff being posted on it. That is how I ran across the news about that re-issue. Oddly enough, I was listening to Green at the time.

[Vacant Horizon]

i was a fair weather REM fan and listened to the shit out of Green and Out of Time.  Great, great albums through and through.  Hairshirt, World Leader Pretend..I mean, come on!

[Kim Bodnia]

I was listening to all their albums today for the first time in a long time (well, up through New Adventures in Hi-Fi ). I was curious to see if they still had an active website. And sure enough, there is all sorts of stuff being posted on it. That is how I ran across the news about that re-issue. Oddly enough, I was listening to Green at the time.

 

The R.E.M. website is still online, and although they do an excellent job on facebook and on their blog, they're quite slow to react to news events. I normally find out about stuff a week or two in anticipation, for instance, the Tired Pony album was announced in late-February and they only posted about it last Friday. Some other articles they post are either too general or too vague, like an NPR story they recently ran, but I understand this, since the band no longer exists, news events that are properly R.E.M. specific are scarce and the definition of what's acceptable to post has broadened.

[bigideas]

I really need to get the early REM stuff, but I wish these reissues included all B-sides/studio recordings from the era around the albums instead of just a live disc. I'm assuming they had b-sides. Maybe most were picked up in later collections that will be reissued anyway?

[Oil Can Boyd]

I really need to get the early REM stuff, but I wish these reissues included all B-sides/studio recordings from the era around the albums instead of just a live disc. I'm assuming they had b-sides. Maybe most were picked up in later collections that will be reissued anyway?

You may know all of this but the early B-sides were collected on Dead Letter Office - which also includes the fantastic first EP Chronic Town. 

[PopTodd]

You may know all of this but the early B-sides were collected on Dead Letter Office - which also includes the fantastic first EP Chronic Town. 

Well-worth picking up if you're a fan.

[Muzzle of Dan]

I just picked up a copy of Automatic For The People on vinyl for my girlfriend for her birthday.  Looking forward to hearing it. 

 

Personally, I'd like to get a copy of Reckoning next.  I think that would probably sound pretty sweet on wax.

[bigideas]

You may know all of this but the early B-sides were collected on Dead Letter Office - which also includes the fantastic first EP Chronic Town. 

Is it complete, or is it like a lot of B-sides/rarity compilations that always leave off a few tracks?

[Oil Can Boyd]

Is it complete, or is it like a lot of B-sides/rarity compilations that always leave off a few tracks?

I'm sure there is stuff left off.  To your point, they re-released a version of Dead Letter Office in Europe a couple of years later that added two songs.  Then in the mid-1990s IRS released something called REM: SIngles Collected that added a couple of things.  And then the And I Feel Fine ... compilation had a disc of songs that were not necessarily official b-sides but it included a bunch of early outtakes and live songs. 

[jimtweedy1977]

I'm looking forward to the reissue of Out Of Time.  I would imagine that would have demos as there was no tour for Out Of Time.  I'm also looking forward to the New Adventures In Hi-Fi reissue.  Now that one would benefit from a live bonus disc, perhaps the Road Movie soundtrack.  

[Analogman]

Hooray, We're Done (The Inside Story Behind R.E.M.'s Disbandment)

 

An excerpt from Tony Fletcher's third version of his R.E.M. book - now titled Perfect Circle.

[brownie]

I saw a 2/3 of R.E.M. mini-reuinion last night.  Peter Buck and his band were opening for Robyn Hitchcock in NYC, and Mike Mills came out and they all played Near Wild Heaven.  It was wonderful!   

[remphish1]

I saw a 2/3 of R.E.M. mini-reuinion last night.  Peter Buck and his band were opening for Robyn Hitchcock in NYC, and Mike Mills came out and they all played Near Wild Heaven.  It was wonderful!  

Nice...how did Peter Sound singing live? I couldn't make this show but was excited to hear a review!

[sonicshoulder]

I saw a 2/3 of R.E.M. mini-reuinion last night.  Peter Buck and his band were opening for Robyn Hitchcock in NYC, and Mike Mills came out and they all played Near Wild Heaven.  It was wonderful!   

 

This sounds fantastic. One of my favorite R.E.M. tunes. I know this was a Mills gem but did Stipe do the "ba ba ba ba baba" on the album?

[brownie]

Nice...how did Peter Sound singing live? I couldn't make this show but was excited to hear a review!

To be honest, Peter's set wasn't really my cup of tea.  He was having a grand old time, but it was a bit too loud and garagy for me.  I couldn't really hear his singing voice that well, whether this was due to a poor sound mix or me being too close to the guitar amps and that drowning him out.  But what I did hear sounded more like a gutteral growl than a singing voice.  

 

Robyn Hitchcock's set though - wow, I was blown away.  One of the best shows i've seen in a long long time.  Peter was born to play guitar on Airscape!  My head completely exploded during that one.

[Analogman]

R.E.M. Has a 'Lot of Stuff in the Vaults'

 

 

The defunct band packages its complete "Unplugged" sessions, with plans to make future releases special. "I mean, if we've been sitting on stuff for this long, why go cheap with it now?" says Mike Mills

A continuing series of vault-trolling archival releases, with more on the horizon, have made it easier to cope with R.E.M.'s abrupt 2011 split, according to the group's Mike Mills.

 

"It's nice in the sense that it keeps our breakup from being a cold, hard ending," Mills tells Billboard. "It softens the landing a little bit. It's like, no, I don't get to record with Peter (Buck), Bill (Berry) and Michael (Stipe) anymore, but we get to just remind ourselves of how much fun we had."

 

R.E.M. has released deluxe editions of most of its albums, expanded to include unreleased studio and live material. The group's latest project is "Unplugged: The Complete 1991 and 2001 Sessions," taken from its two MTV "Unplugged" appearances. The 33-song set, which features 11 songs that were never broadcast, came out on vinyl for this year's Record Store Day and was released on CD and digital download today, May 19. 

 

"They've been sitting there for awhile, and I guess we just never thought there was a right time to release them until recently," says Mills, who signed copies of the vinyl edition at Bull Moose Music Warehouse in Portland, Maine on Record Store Day. "We've always supported Record Store Day, and it just seemed like a perfect match-up of stuff that we had and stuff that they needed. And it's good to put it out as we wish to let it out; bootlegs are great and I love 'em, but it's nice to put your stuff out in a way that you would like to have it presented."

 

Mills says going through the "Unplugged" material brought back good memories, though he says that preparing songs in that format "really wasn't very difficult. The way we wrote...the songs can hold up to being done in a stripped-down manner, without all the volume or the studio bells and whistles. We just take all our instruments and make them acoustic; it was literally that simple. It didn't take a whole lot of reworking, but we did see it as a challenge to take these songs that people pretty much knew only in an electric format and have them work acoustically."

 

Mills says R.E.M. hasn't decided yet what its next archival release will be, but he's confident it won't be long before the discussion starts.

 

"We have a lot of stuff in the vaults, a fair amount of stuff that's never been released," Mills confirms. "We all want to do something with this stuff. We know we've got some really good things hanging around. We just want to put them out in a way that makes them as special as possible, because they're special to us. I mean, if we've been sitting on stuff for this long, why go cheap with it now? Let's try to make it be special rather than just dumping out the vaults."

 

Mills -- who's currently playing with the Baseball Project and the New Professionals and is planning a "combination of classical and rock 'n' roll" project -- says he runs into Buck and Stipe "at all kinds of places" and stays in touch with Berry by phone. But, he assures us, R.E.M.'s resolve in being broken up has not wavered. "We're all happy pretty much as clams," Mills says. "Everybody's busy and really having a great time. It's a nice relief in a way; as much fun as it was, it's nice to not have to be on the hamster wheel anymore."

[blureu]

and here is some of that stuff in digital format.

 

http://theseconddisc.com/2014/05/19/near-wild-heaven-r-e-m-bundle-warner-era-b-sides-for-digital-box/

[calvino]

and here is some of that stuff in digital format.

 

http://theseconddisc.com/2014/05/19/near-wild-heaven-r-e-m-bundle-warner-era-b-sides-for-digital-box/

 

That's looks pretty cool and I didn't know that they were doing the same with their I.R.S. stuff (and I am all for the digital only release method)

[Atticus]

[remphish1]

This is a great show..love the fast tempo's! 

[Analogman]

Interesting interview with Peter here:

 

Peter Buck on Life After R.E.M. 'I Hate the Business'

[The Inside of Outside]

That was a great read.

[remphish1]

Well I picked up a ticket for the Bowie Tribute at Radio City so I will see Michael Stipe again live! It has been over 5 years for me!