''Live at The Olympia'' is a live album by American

alternative rock Alternative rock, or alt-rock, is a category of rock music that emerged from the independent music underground of the 1970s and became widely popular in the 1990s. "Alternative" refers to the genre's distinction from mainstream or commerci ...

band

R.E.M. R.E.M. was an American rock band from Athens, Georgia, formed in 1980 by drummer Bill Berry, guitarist Peter Buck, bassist Mike Mills, and lead vocalist Michael Stipe, who were students at the University of Georgia. One of the first alternati ...

It was recorded during the band's five-night residency at the

Olympia Theatre, Dublin The Olympia Theatre, known for sponsorship and advertising purposes as the 3Olympia Theatre, is a concert hall and theatre venue in Dublin, Ireland, located on Dame Street. In addition to Irish acts, the venue has played host to many well-known ...

, between June 30 and July 5, 2007, and released on October 27, 2009. In this series of "working rehearsals" the songs on ''

Accelerate In mechanics, acceleration is the rate of change of the velocity of an object with respect to time. Accelerations are vector quantities (in that they have magnitude and direction). The orientation of an object's acceleration is given by t ...

'' were debuted, with many still works in progress. The album is a two- CD release, and contains a total of 39 songs. In addition, a

DVD The DVD (common abbreviation for Digital Video Disc or Digital Versatile Disc) is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 1995 and first released on November 1, 1996, in Japan. The medium can store any kind ...

with a documentary entitled ''This Is Not a Show'' directed by

Vincent Moon Vincent Moon (real name Mathieu Saura, born 25 August 1979) is an independent filmmaker, photographer, and sound artist from Paris. He was the main director of the Blogotheque's Take Away Shows, a web-based project recording field work music vid ...

is included. A special edition box set containing the album on four LPs as well as the two CDs and the DVD is also available.

Promotion

To promote the album, R.E.M.'s Dublin website had full streaming clips of "Driver 8," "I've Been High" and "Harborcoat," along with videos for "Living Well Is the Best Revenge" and clips from the Reckoning EP, while the video for "Drive" was made available on R.E.M.'s Myspace page. On October 22, 2009,

National Public Radio National Public Radio (NPR, stylized in all lowercase) is an American privately and state funded nonprofit media organization headquartered in Washington, D.C., with its NPR West headquarters in Culver City, California. It differs from other ...

streamed Streaming media is multimedia that is delivered and consumed in a continuous manner from a source, with little or no intermediate storage in network elements. ''Streaming'' refers to the delivery method of content, rather than the content it ...

the entire album for free.

''Reckoning Songs from The Olympia''

A digital EP containing songs from the album, ''Reckoning Songs from The Olympia'', was released on July 7, 2009, through the

iTunes Store The iTunes Store is a digital media store operated by Apple Inc. It opened on April 28, 2003, as a result of Steve Jobs' push to open a digital marketplace for music. As of April 2020, iTunes offered 60 million songs, 2.2 million apps, 25,00 ...

and other distributors. It contains "Harborcoat," "Letter Never Sent," "Second Guessing" and "Pretty Persuasion," songs from the band's 1984 studio album '' Reckoning''.

Reception

Track listing

All songs written by Bill Berry,

Peter Buck Peter Lawrence Buck (born December 6, 1956) is an American musician and songwriter. He was a co-founder and the lead guitarist of the alternative rock band R.E.M. He also plays the banjo and mandolin on several R.E.M. songs. Throughout his ca ...

Mike Mills Michael Edward Mills (born December 17, 1958) is an American multi-instrumentalist, singer, and composer who was a founding member of the alternative rock band R.E.M. Though known primarily as the bass guitarist and backing vocalist of R.E.M., h ...

, and

Michael Stipe John Michael Stipe (; born January 4, 1960) is an American singer-songwriter and artist, best known as the lead singer and lyricist of alternative rock band R.E.M. He is known for his vocal quality, poetic lyrics and unique stage presence. Pos ...

, except where noted :Disc one # "Living Well Is the Best Revenge" (from ''

'') (Buck, Mills, Stipe) – 4:07 # "Second Guessing" (from '' Reckoning'') – 2:58 # "Letter Never Sent" (from ''Reckoning'') – 3:51 # "Staring Down the Barrel of the Middle Distance" (Previously unreleased) (Buck, Mills, Stipe) – 4:11 # "Disturbance at the Heron House" (from ''

Document A document is a written, drawn, presented, or memorialized representation of thought, often the manifestation of non-fictional, as well as fictional, content. The word originates from the Latin ''Documentum'', which denotes a "teaching" o ...

'') – 3:41 # "Mr. Richards" (from ''Accelerate'') (Buck, Mills, Stipe) – 4:17 # "Houston" (from ''Accelerate'') (Buck, Mills, and Stipe) – 1:54 # "

New Test Leper "New Test Leper" is a song by R.E.M., included on their tenth studio album, ''New Adventures in Hi-Fi'', which was released in 1996. It wasn't released as a single; its only non-album issue was on a 1996 Germany-only-released Warner Bros. Records ...

" (from ''

New Adventures in Hi-Fi ''New Adventures in Hi-Fi'' is the tenth studio album by the American alternative rock band R.E.M. It was their fifth major-label release for Warner Bros. Records, released on September 9, 1996, in Europe and Australia, and the following day in ...

'') – 5:26 # " Cuyahoga" (from ''

Lifes Rich Pageant ''Lifes Rich Pageant'' is the fourth studio album by the American alternative rock band R.E.M., released on July 28, 1986. R.E.M. chose Don Gehman to produce the album, which was recorded at John Mellencamp's Belmont Mall Studios in Belmont, Indi ...

'') – 4:22 # " Electrolite" (from ''New Adventures in Hi-Fi'') – 4:03 # " Man-Sized Wreath" (from ''Accelerate'') (Buck, Mills, and Stipe) – 3:09 # " So. Central Rain" (from ''Reckoning'') – 3:44 # "On the Fly" (Previously unreleased) (Buck, Mills, Stipe) – 5:01 # "Maps and Legends" (from ''

Fables of the Reconstruction ''Fables of the Reconstruction'', also known as ''Reconstruction of the Fables'', is the third studio album by American alternative rock band R.E.M., released on I.R.S. Records on June 10, 1985. The Joe Boyd-produced album was the first recorde ...

'') – 3:10 # "

Sitting Still "Sitting Still" is a song by American rock band R.E.M. that was issued on their first single in 1981 and on their 1983 debut album '' Murmur''. Writing and recording "Sitting Still" was one of the first songs written by R.E.M., in late 1980, alo ...

" (from '' Murmur'') – 3:42 # " Driver 8" (from ''Fables of the Reconstruction'') – 3:44 # "Horse to Water" (from ''Accelerate'') (Buck, Mills, and Stipe) – 2:45 # "I'm Gonna DJ" (from ''Accelerate'') (Buck, Mills, and Stipe) – 2:16 # "Circus Envy" (from '' Monster'') – 4:27 # "These Days" (from ''

'') – 4:53 :Disc two #

" Drive" (from ''

Automatic for the People ''Automatic for the People'' is the eighth studio album by American alternative rock band R.E.M., released by Warner Bros. Records on October5, 1992 in the United Kingdom and Europe, and on the following day in the United States. R.E.M. began pro ...

'') – 4:49 # "Feeling Gravitys Pull" (from ''Fables of the Reconstruction'') – 5:10 # "

Until the Day Is Done "Until the Day Is Done" is a song by American rock band R.E.M. from their fourteenth studio album ''Accelerate''. It was debuted on ''Anderson Cooper 360°'' to promote the ''Planet in Peril'' special and was released as a single on November 14, ...

" (from ''Accelerate'') (Buck, Mills, and Stipe) – 4:07 # "Accelerate" (from ''

'') (Buck, Mills, and Stipe) – 3:35 # "Auctioneer (Another Engine)" (from ''Fables of the Reconstruction'') – 3:38 # "Little America" (from '' Reckoning'') – 3:11 # "1,000,000" (from ''

Chronic Town ''Chronic Town'' is the debut EP by American alternative rock band R.E.M., released on August 24, 1982, on I.R.S. Records. Containing five tracks, the EP was recorded at the Drive-in Studio in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, in October 1981, eig ...

'') – 3:28 # " Disguised" (early version of "Supernatural Superserious" from ''Accelerate'') (Buck, Mills, and Stipe) – 3:20 # "The Worst Joke Ever" (from '' Around the Sun'') (Buck, Mills, and Stipe) – 3:42 # "Welcome to the Occupation" (from ''

'') – 2:47 # "Carnival of Sorts (Boxcars) (from ''Chronic Town'') – 4:09 # "Harborcoat" (from ''Reckoning'') – 4:16 # "Wolves, Lower" (from ''Chronic Town'') – 4:33 # "I've Been High" (from '' Reveal'') (Buck, Mills, and Stipe) – 3:40 # "Kohoutek" (from ''Fables of the Reconstruction'') – 4:12 # "West of the Fields" (from '' Murmur'') (Jerry Ayers, Berry, Buck, Mills, and Stipe) – 4:13 # "

Pretty Persuasion ''Pretty Persuasion'' is a 2005 American black comedy film directed by Marcos Siega, written by Skander Halim, and starring Evan Rachel Wood, James Woods, Ron Livingston, Elisabeth Harnois, and Jane Krakowski. Its plot follows a 15-year-old stu ...

" (from ''Reckoning'') – 4:23 # "Romance" (from the ''

Made in Heaven ''Made in Heaven'' is the fifteenth studio album by the British rock band Queen, released on 6 November 1995 by Parlophone Records in the United Kingdom and by Hollywood Records in the United States. It was the band's first and only release s ...

'' soundtrack; appears on ''

Eponymous An eponym is a person, a place, or a thing after whom or which someone or something is, or is believed to be, named. The adjectives which are derived from the word eponym include ''eponymous'' and ''eponymic''. Usage of the word The term ''epon ...

'') – 3:31 # "

Gardening at Night "Gardening at Night" is a song by American rock band R.E.M. It was recorded for the band's 1982 debut EP '' Chronic Town''. Writing The song is said to have been written on a mattress in the front yard of the Oconee Street church in Athens, Geo ...

" (from ''Chronic Town'') – 4:16

''The Times Presents R.E.M. Live in Dublin''

A 10-song live album, with all songs recorded live in Dublin, was made available by Dublin's newspaper ''

The Times ''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper '' The Sunday Times'' (f ...

'' as a reader download through the iTunes Store during October 2009. The first five tracks were originally released on ''

R.E.M. Live ''R.E.M. Live'' is a live album from R.E.M., recorded at the Point Theatre, Dublin, on February 26 and 27, 2005, the closing nights of the winter European leg of the ''Around the World Tour'' in support of their thirteenth studio album ''Around t ...

'' (recorded on February 26–27, 2005); tracks 6–10 would later gain an official release on the then-upcoming ''Live at the Olympia''. # "

Losing My Religion "Losing My Religion" is a song by American alternative rock band R.E.M., released in February 1991 as the first single from the group's seventh album, '' Out of Time'' (1991). Built on a mandolin riff, the song was an unlikely hit for the grou ...

" (from ''Out Of Time'') (live in Dublin) – 4:50 # " Man on the Moon" (from ''

'') (live in Dublin) – 6:45 # " The One I Love " (from ''

'') (live in Dublin) – 3:24 # "

Orange Crush Crush is a brand of carbonated soft drinks owned and marketed internationally by Keurig Dr Pepper, originally created as an orange soda, Orange Crush. Crush competes with Coca-Cola's Fanta. It was created in 1911 by beverage and extract chemi ...

" (from ''Green'') (live in Dublin) – 3:56 # "

(Don't Go Back To) Rockville "(Don't Go Back To) Rockville" is the second and final single released by American rock band R.E.M. from their second studio album, '' Reckoning''. The song failed to chart on either the ''Billboard'' Hot 100 or the UK Singles Charts. Backgroun ...

" (from '' ''Reckoning'''') (live in Dublin) – 4:39 # "

" (from ''Reckoning'') (live at The Olympia) – 4:23 # " Man-Sized Wreath" (from ''

'') (live at The Olympia) (Buck, Mills, Stipe) – 3:09 # "Mr. Richards" (from ''Accelerate'') (live at The Olympia) (Buck, Mills, Stipe) – 4:17 # "Wolves, Lower" (from ''

'') (live at The Olympia) – 4:33 # "I've Been High" (from '' Reveal'') (live at The Olympia) (Buck, Mills, and Stipe) – 3:40

Personnel

:R.E.M. *

–

guitar The guitar is a fretted musical instrument that typically has six strings. It is usually held flat against the player's body and played by strumming or plucking the strings with the dominant hand, while simultaneously pressing selected strin ...

bass guitar The bass guitar, electric bass or simply bass (), is the lowest-pitched member of the string family. It is a plucked string instrument similar in appearance and construction to an electric or an acoustic guitar, but with a longer neck and ...

on "New Test Leper" *

– bass guitar,

background vocals A backing vocalist is a singer who provides vocal harmony with the lead vocalist or other backing vocalists. A backing vocalist may also sing alone as a lead-in to the main vocalist's entry or to sing a counter-melody. Backing vocalists are us ...

, keyboards, acoustic guitar on "New Test Leper" *

–

vocals Singing is the act of creating musical sounds with the voice. A person who sings is called a singer, artist or vocalist (in jazz and/or popular music). Singers perform music (arias, recitatives, songs, etc.) that can be sung with or withou ...

, harmonica on "Harborcoat" :Additional personnel *

Jacknife Lee Garret "Jacknife" Lee is an Irish music producer and mixer. He has worked with a variety of artists, including the Cars, U2, R.E.M., the Killers, Robbie Williams, Snow Patrol, Bloc Party, Two Door Cinema Club, AFI, the Hives, Weezer, One Dir ...

–

production Production may refer to: Economics and business * Production (economics) * Production, the act of manufacturing goods * Production, in the outline of industrial organization, the act of making products (goods and services) * Production as a stati ...

Scott McCaughey Scott Lewis McCaughey is an American singer, guitarist and songwriter and the leader of the Seattle and Portland-based bands The Young Fresh Fellows and The Minus 5. He was also an auxiliary member of the American rock band R.E.M. from 199 ...

– guitar, keyboards, harmonica on "Driver 8", background vocals *

Bill Rieflin William Frederick Rieflin (September 30, 1960 – March 24, 2020) was an American musician. Rieflin came to prominence in the 1990s mainly for his work as a drummer with groups (particularly in the industrial rock and industrial metal scene ...

– drums

Chart positions

References

External links

''This Is Not a Show''
{{DEFAULTSORT:Live At The Olympia Albums produced by Jacknife Lee R.E.M. live albums 2009 live albums Warner Records live albums