The 40 Watt Club
Athens, GA
Aug. 19, 1987
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soundboard recording
(Pat the Wiz's digital revision from his master reel)
01 Finest Worksong
02 Welcome to the Occupation
03 The One I Love
04 Begin the Begin
05 Orange Crush*
06 Disturbance at the Heron House
07 Title
08 Superman
09 return to the stage
10 It's the End of the World as We Know It (And I Feel Fine)
*LIVE DEBUT
SAMPLE TRACK: "Disturbance at the Heron House" (live Aug. 19, 1987 - sbd)
ROB SEZ: This recording prompted my return to blogging after years away. It’s easily one of my top 3 live recordings ever by the band. Michael, Peter, Mike and Bill are firing on all cylinders and sound elated to be playing 5 songs from album number 5, plus a few chestnuts and one brand-new song: Orange Crush, heard here in an early Michael-is-ranting version. Document had been completed by the time of this performance, but hadn't yet been released. I got the idea of compiling an alternative version of Document, and dug out of my archive an old, rare soundboard recording of this performance. That recording had some problems with digi noise, not to mention an unknown lineage. For some time, I’d been aware of the audience recording for this performance that came from the JEMS team. But once I knew there was a soundboard recording out there, possibly in better shape than the one in my archive, I was determined to find it. Eventually, that led me to the guy who recorded it in the first place: the true southern gentleman T. Patton Biddle (Pat the Wiz), who’s still living in Athens, GA after playing his part in the early career of R. E. M. Pat was utterly gracious in agreeing to send me a transfer from the safety cassette he dubbed from his master reel. I am proud to present what I believe is the definitive version of this gob-smacking performance, absent a direct transfer from the master. Please enjoy.
Someone who was there must’ve said:
What the hell just happened?
If you want to hear my alternative version of Document, featuring demos and live takes, that's HERE. A generous handful of tracks come from this live recording.
Further details & recording lineage:
REMTimeline says:
Silent Peas show. R. E. M. perform unannounced as a supporting act & the live debut of “Orange Crush” features a totally different vocal arrangement, with Stipe just singing/rambling various army and war statements etc. Mike Mills & Bill Berry's usual backing vocal is not present in this version. Mike Mills thanks the Silent Peas for letting R. E. M. open the show for them.
LINEAGE: T. Patton Biddle's master cassette —> TPB's digital transfer, using unknown equipment —> unknown digital editing, including added compression —> Audacity for tracking, fades, normalization, editing out dead air, and 1 pass of eq to boost bass frequencies and lower treble —> FLAC
Find a link for the original raw, untracked, unprocessed file under Comments.
That's it (for now) for my R. E. M. special shares.
Plenty more to come from The dB's and other artists.
This is for hardcore R.E.M. archivists who want the raw, untracked, unedited file as I received it from Pat the Wiz. Here you go, Nakeddave & Bert13:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/gsoktlvuiiqzv822xknqo/R.E.M.-1987-08-19-40-Watt-Athens-GA-sbd-M1-RAW-FILE-FLAC.zip?rlkey=bgkatfe5p2qclchx9wzqtq721&st=yixofx6r&dl=1
Awesome! Thanks!
DeleteCan't thank you enough for your generosity over the years hosting this blog and sharing the tunes, Rob. Looking forward to whatever's next...
ReplyDeleteHey, anonymous. I do this to share my love of great music. Glad you're enjoying.
DeleteI never realized they played so many unannounced shows in Athens.
ReplyDeleteYup. Especially when they still lived there and weren't yet going on massive world tours...
DeleteGreg from Washington DC
ReplyDeleteSorry for the late "Thank You". This and that 1981 B&L Show are the super gems of a fun series of posts. I consider myself a connoisseur and collector of High Quality (by my rating: A- or better) REM Shows from the period 1980-1988. Both these shows make the cut and are amazing additions. I owe you a beer for each!
Hey Greg - thanks for the thanks. Lucky for you, I can only manage a beer a night these days... 8-)
DeleteOver here in Scotland, I saw them every time they came over touring the records from Reckoning to Green, always great live. I've got loads of live bootlegs from the 80s but the one hole in my collection was the scarcity of good quality SB recordings from the Pageant/Document period, so this is a treasure trove. Thanks for posting! And thanks to those who passed the on to you.
ReplyDeleteCheers, Ed. Come back in a day. I think you'll like the next post a LOT.
Delete