Life and How to Live It.

So R.E.M. came to town Saturday night and played probably the best show I’ve seen by Athens’ finest. (This is my fourth over the past decade.) First the setlist:

1. Finest Worksong

2. What’s The Frequency, Kenneth?

3. Driver 8

4. Drive

5. Animal

6. Fall On Me

7. Daysleeper

8. Bad Day

9. The One I Love

10. World Leader Pretend

11. (Don’t Go Back To) Rockville

12. The Great Beyond

13. Country Feedback

14. Losing My Religion

15. Find The River

16. She Just Wants To Be

17. Walk Unafraid
18. Man On The Moon

19. Life And How To Live It

20. NYC (Interpol cover)

21. Nightswimming
22. The Final Straw
23. Imitation Of Life

24. Gardening At Night
25. It’s The End Of The World As We Know It (And I Feel Fine)

So all in all, a truly excellent show. There were other R.E.M. songs they’re playing on this tour that I’d have loved to hear (Exhuming McCarthy, Feeling Gravity’s Pull), but they played my two favorites (and my top two requests) — Fall on Me and Country Feedback — so I left happy. I was particularly impressed with Walk Unafraid and She Just Wants to Be, two songs off Up and Reveal respectively that really came into their own tonight, when Peter Buck chose them to show off his considerable guitar mojo. And the band wisely skipped some of their more saccharine moments — Everybody Hurts or Strange Currencies, for example — to showcase old hits (Rockville, Gardening) and political tone poems (Final Straw and World Leader Pretend, a special treat.) In sum, Stipe, Buck and Mills still got it, and I’m very much looking forward to their next swing through the area.

This Just In…

R.E.M. ready their new song “Bad Day” (off In Time, the Greatest Hits for the Warner years, due out next month) for release by creating MorningTeam.Com. I guess now we know what Buck and Mills would’ve been doing if the Athens Fab Four had never taken off.

Hard Times in New York Town.

Alas, I’m not going to be around (and my limited discretionary funds for concert-going was already spent on R.E.M. tickets), but if you live in NYC and you’re looking to wash the taste of Masked and Anonymous out of your mouth, Dylan’s playing the Hammerstein Ballroom August 12-14. Should be grand.

Give ’em what they want.

Via Do You Feel Loved?, R.E.M. is taking online song requests for their 2003 tour, which kicked off last night in Utrecht. Good to see they’re playing “Welcome to the Occupation”…I’m all for Document-era protest songs over saccharine ditties like “Imitation of Life” and “Electrolite,” particularly in these trying times. Update: Now this is more like it. “Exhuming McCarthy,” “Cuyahoga,” and “Fall on Me” all were part of the second show, as well as good ole “Country Feedback,” still my favorite song to play on the guitar (2/14). Update 2: These setlists are off the hook – the third show of the tour (in London) saw “Life and How to Live It,” “Feeling Gravity’s Pull” and “Pilgrimage.” And the NYC show (10/4) has moved from Liberty Park to the Garden, so now I’m definitely going. W00t.

These Days.

The LA Times checks in with REM as they gear up for a fall tour, pay their respects to Dylan, and talk about what songs they’ll never play again. “Shiny Happy People” is no surprise, but I always kinda liked “Pop Song 89.”

Harder to Wake Galileo.

Via Lots of Co., the Annotated R.E.M. So that’s what Stipe’s talking about…

Welcome to the Occupation.

Also in music news, R.E.M. announces their fall 2003 tour dates, and it looks like they’ll be coming to the NYC environs October 3 and 4. See you there.

Music for the Masses.

One minor comfort as war rages in Iraq: Some of my favorite artists are emerging from obscurity to step up with new material. Michael Stipe and R.E.M. have released “Final Straw”, while the Beastie Boys offer “In a World Gone Mad.” (The former and better song via WebGoddess.)

On the Bandwagon.

Come on aboard, I promise you, you won’t hurt the horse… The Democratic field in 2004 continues to grow, with Senator Carol Moseley-Braun and Rep. Dennis Kucinich joining the ranks of the contenders. At this point, the more the merrier, I say – it’s just too bad a that frontloaded primary season is going to make it all about money in the end.

Marat’s Bathing.

Speakin’ in tongues, it’s still worth a broken lip. R.E.M.’s Murmur turns twenty. (Via Looka.) Unlike the cover bands of today (The VU Strokes and Interpol/Joy Division immediately come to mind), these four Athens lads put out a first record (Chronic Town E.P. notwithstanding) that still sounds original and distinctive two decades later, and we’re still reaping the rewards. Up the stairs and to the landing…