REM Live at the Olympia Album Review, Songs, Rating

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R.E.M.
Live at the Olympia
Release Date: 2009 10 27
Label: Warner Bros.
Rating:

"This is not a show," murmurs Michael Stipe at the start of Live at the Olympia and it's not quite misdirection. R.E.M.'s five-night residency at Dublin's Olympia in the summer of 2007 functioned as working rehearsals for their fourteenth album Accelerate, with the band testing out each of the songs, exploring arrangements, finding breaking points, and pairing them with older songs that informed their back-to-basics move. As rehearsal, it paid off splendidly -- road-testing the material made it stronger, resulting in their best album in years -- but the audience was in for a real treat, with the band digging deep into their back catalog to play some of their best non-hit songs. R.E.M. leans heavily on Reckoning (so much so, an accompanying digital download EP contained nothing but material from that record), plays over half of Chronic Town, and a good chunk of Fables of the Reconstruction, pulling two songs a piece from Murmur and Lifes Rich Pageant, creating a set list that any longtime fan will find near ideal. Just as importantly, the band sounds completely engaged with the material, enjoying playing the songs again, with this energy in the process rescuing cuts from Reveal and Around the Sun, suggesting that the problem was with the fussy arrangements, and that the tunes needed to be played as rock & roll. And that is what R.E.M. is here -- a tighter, cleaner band than the scruffy renegades of the '80s, but still the same band, which is evident here in ways it never was on the perfectly fine R.E.M. Live. That was a production. This is rock & roll. Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Music Guide

Tracks:

	Title	Composer	Time
1	Living Well Is the Best Revenge	Mills, Stipe, Buck	4:07
2	Second Guessing	Mills, Buck, Berry, Stipe	2:58
3	Letter Never Sent	Buck, Stipe, Berry, Mills	3:51
4	Staring Down the Barrel of the Middle Distance	Buck, Stipe, Mills	4:11
5	Disturbance at the Heron House	Berry, Mills, Stipe, Buck	3:41
6	Mr. Richards	Mills, Stipe, Buck	4:17
7	Houston	Stipe, Mills, Buck	1:54
8	New Test Leper	Buck, Stipe, Berry, Mills	5:26
9	Cuyahoga	Mills, Buck, Berry, Stipe	4:22
10	Electrolite	Berry, Mills, Stipe, Buck	4:03
11	Man-Sized Wreath	Stipe, Buck, Mills	3:09
12	So. Central Rain	Berry, Buck, Mills, Stipe	3:44
13	On the Fly	Mills, Stipe, Buck	5:01
14	Maps and Legends	Berry, Buck, Stipe, Mills	3:10
15	Sitting Still	Stipe, Mills, Buck, Berry	3:42
16	Driver 8	Stipe, Mills, Buck, Berry	3:44
17	Horse to Water	Mills, Stipe, Buck	2:45
18	I'm Gonna DJ	Stipe, Buck, Mills	2:16
19	Circus Envy	Stipe, Buck, Mills, Berry	4:27
20	These Days	Mills, Buck, Berry, Stipe	4:53
21	Drive	Berry, Mills, Buck, Stipe	4:49
22	Feeling Gravity's Pull	Mills, Berry, Buck, Stipe	5:10
23	Until the Day Is Done	Stipe, Buck, Mills	4:07
24	Accelerate	Buck, Stipe, Mills	3:35
25	Auctioneer	Berry, Buck, Stipe, Mills	3:38
26	Little America	Mills, Buck, Berry, Stipe	3:11
27	1, 000, 000	Mills, Buck, Stipe, Berry	3:28
28	Disguised	Mills, Stipe, Buck	3:20
29	Worst Joke Ever	Stipe, Buck, Mills	3:42
30	Welcome to the Occupation	Mills, Buck, Berry, Stipe	2:47
31	Carnival of Sorts (Box Cars)	Berry, Buck, Mills, Stipe	4:09
32	Harborcoat	Stipe, Mills, Buck, Berry	4:16
33	Wolves, Lower	Stipe, Mills, Buck, Berry	4:33
34	I've Been High	Buck, Mills, Stipe	3:40
35	Kohoutek	Buck, Berry, Mills, Stipe	4:12
36	West of the Fields	Berry, Buck, Mills, Stipe	4:13
37	Pretty Persuasion	Buck, Stipe, Berry, Mills	4:23
38	Romance	Stipe, Mills, Buck, Berry	3:31
39	Gardening at Night	Berry, Mills, Buck, Stipe	4:16

Other Releases:

Live at the Olympia [2CD/1DVD]
Release Date: 2009
Label: Warner Bros.

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