Wasn't a fan of their last Live CD (although I loved the live bonus discs on the Murmur and Reckoning Deluxe Editions) however the tracklist on this one is dream come true. I'll be picking it up for sure.

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“R.E.M. Live At The Olympia,” is a two-CD set featuring 39 songs from their acclaimed 2007 working rehearsals in Dublin, Ireland. R.E.M. set up camp at the venerable Olympia Theatre in Ireland’s capital city and tested new material over five nights before passionate, capacity crowds. This live album was produced by Dublin native Jacknife Lee who, along with R.E.M., co-produced Accelerate, the album which emerged from these shows. “Live At The Olympia” gives fans an opportunity to hear those songs at their earliest stages of development. In addition to the new material, the band also served up twenty-nine other songs, spanning their entire career, all of which can be found on this album.
A special edition 2 CD & DVD set will contain a film of the Dublin shows by Vincent Moon and Jeremiah, who previously worked with R.E.M. on Ninetynights, Six Days and the Supernatural Superserious Video.

Tracklist:

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

That is a great set list. A while ago I was trying to find those shows on the net with no luck. There are supposed to be really good.

Really looking forward to this one. Accelerate was a welcome return to form for them.

Sold!

Notice there's like one song from Up, Reveal and Around the Sun combined. Do they realize this period sucked too?

Yep, they've mentioned that they lost their way with Reveal and, especially, Around the Sun.

However, Up certainly doesn't suck, IMHO.

I really like Up. Also, Reveal has a few good songs. I would rank Around the Sun as their worst though.

Found this quote on Wikipedia

After the release of their following album, Accelerate, guitarist Peter Buck said that for him Around the Sun "... just wasn't really listenable, because it sounds like what it is, a bunch of people that are so bored with the material that they can't stand it anymore."

Yep, that's the quote I remember seeing. At least they hit bottom and turned it around. Accelerate wasn't perfect, but it was a nice return to form.

The songs on Up are decent but the music sounds like amateur Radiohead. REM were great to me from the beginning because they had great songs that sounded like no one else. A lot of Up sounds like Michael fronting a different band.

I wouldn't necessarily disagree with that.

Interesting...especially considering that of the trio of Up, Reveal, and Around the Sun, the one I like best is...Around the Sun. I realize I am in the extreme minority on that, but oh well. I will grant that I've never hated an R.E.M. album but if I had to pick, I'd agree these were their weakest years overall.

As for Live at the Olympia, I knew it was coming but I'm pretty astounded by the set list. Really expansive and impressive. I will buy it for sure.

Now I just have to decide if I want the CD by itself or the one with the DVD included. Bought the two-disc Accelerate and wasn't overly impressed with the DVD, and from the clips that are emerging of Olympia, it looks like we have more of the rapid-cutting, high-contrast, hand-held camerawork designed to induce motion sickness. We shall see.

EDIT: For those who haven't seen it, here is a link to the site with full-length video and audio clips from the upcoming album: http://www.remdublin.com/

To be fair, he was, wasn't he? Isn't Up the first album as a trio?

I'm still a fan of New Adventures in Hi Fi for its sound, but any REM is good REM b/c it means they're still making music. However, if the downward trend had continued after ATS and Reveal with Accelerate, I might be singing a different tune.

I'll be interested to see how this collection differs from the boots that were released following these sessions b/c the boots themselves sound pretty damn good.

As a fan (well, one of the few...lol) of Monster, I am so glad to see that Circus Envy is on here!

I like Monster very much. For some reason, let me in is one of my favorite songs on there. I really like the accoustic version on one of their Christmas cds.

Wow, I'd like to hear that acoustic "Let Me In".

I'll look around my computer and see if I can find it.

I am more than a little annoyed that I can not find it. I sold the fan club package a number of years ago. I am going to look through my backup cds and DVDs to see if I can find it.

Not as good as the recording I (apparently used to) have, but it gives you a good idea:

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Monster has somewhat grown on me over the years. Didn't love it when it first came out and considered it their weakest for a long time. It's still not among my favorites but as of now I'd probably award Reveal the spot at the bottom of the list if I had to pick a least favorite.

I also think that New Adventures is probably the album most deserving of more respect than it seems to get.

I'm about half way thru listening to the cds and it's pretty awesome. It doesn't sound tired like the live album they put out a couple of years ago. They sound re-invigorated. Highlights of what I have heard so far are:

New Test Leper
Mr. Richards
On The Fly

Approaching the home stretch and there is a lot of early stuff yet to come.

BTW,you can listen to he whole thing here:

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/s...ryId=113995872

Thanks for the link.

This album sounds really good. Theie best live album IMHO. I assume these are the shows where Stipe stood and read the lyrics off a laptop which is why there won't be a DVD.

I thought there was a version w/ a DVD (a film of some kind).