{"id":4521,"date":"2025-08-15T15:14:33","date_gmt":"2025-08-15T15:14:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/thats-them-in-the-spotlight-150868\/"},"modified":"2025-08-15T15:14:33","modified_gmt":"2025-08-15T15:14:33","slug":"thats-them-in-the-spotlight-150868","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/thats-them-in-the-spotlight-150868\/","title":{"rendered":"That\u2019s Them In The Spotlight"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>\n<div class=\"post-preview\">\n<p>On a chilly Thursday night in February, Michael Stipe took the stage at the 40 Watt in Athens, Georgia. Peter Buck was already there playing guitar and Stipe just wanted to sing backup on \u201cPretty Persuasion\u201d with arguably the best tribute band in the world right now, featuring such R.E.M. superfans as Oscar-nominated actor Michael Shannon, veteran indie guitarist Jason Narducy and members of The Mountain Goats, Wilco and Poi Dog Pondering. \u201cI\u2019m no dipshit,\u201d says Shannon. \u201cI know people would rather watch Michael Stipe than me, so I gave him the floor. He didn\u2019t disappoint.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"post-content google-ld-json\">\n<div class=\"editable-content\">\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-the-place-went-nuts\">\u201cThe place went nuts!\u201d<\/h2>\n<p>On a chilly Thursday night in February, Michael Stipe took the stage at the 40 Watt in Athens, Georgia. Peter Buck was already there playing guitar and Stipe just wanted to sing backup on \u201cPretty Persuasion\u201d with arguably the best tribute band in the world right now, featuring such R.E.M. superfans as Oscar-nominated actor Michael Shannon, veteran indie guitarist Jason Narducy and members of The Mountain Goats, Wilco and Poi Dog Pondering. \u201cI\u2019m no dipshit,\u201d says Shannon. \u201cI know people would rather watch Michael Stipe than me, so I gave him the floor. He didn\u2019t disappoint.\u201d<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<div class=\"youtube-embed\" data-video_id=\"Tb_OWQ4-Ivg\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title='R.E.M. reunite: \"Pretty Persuasion\" with Michael Shannon, Jason Narducy &amp; Friends @ 40 Watt Club' width=\"696\" height=\"392\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/Tb_OWQ4-Ivg?start=11&amp;feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<p>Mike Mills jumped up to sing along, and halfway through the Reckoning track, guitarist Dag Juhlin spotted Bill Berry at the side of the stage. He motioned manically for him to get up there and Berry happily obliged. It wasn\u2019t a reunion necessarily, but it was certainly an event. \u201cThe 40 Watt exploded,\u201d says Narducy. \u201cWe were all looking at each other in disbelief. Everybody got choked up.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Word spread fast around Athens and the following night the crowd at the 40 Watt was electric with anticipation. \u201cI heard all about the festivities from the night before and I was kicking myself for missing it,\u201d says Kevin Cregge, an R.E.M. fan and local musician. \u201cI wondered if something might happen on Friday, but then it got pretty late into the night. I was literally settling my tab at the bar when they got up to do \u2018Pretty Persuasion\u2019. The place went nuts. When I was walking home, I felt like I was floating. Now I can say I\u2019ve seen R.E.M.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Thursday night might have been serendipitous, but on Friday, R.E.M. made the decision to take the stage together and play \u201cPretty Persuasion\u201d one more time, with Stipe singing lead rather than backup. Part of R.E.M.\u2019s legacy is the finality of its end, which only made this performance all the more exciting. They could find new and different ways to get the band back together. That not-quite-a-reunion has validated a project that neither Shannon nor Narducy \u2014 nor anyone else, for that matter \u2014 ever believed would be quite so momentous.<\/p>\n<p>The 40 Watt shows were near the midpoint of Shannon and Narducy\u2019s second tour playing an R.E.M. album in its entirety; in 2024, they toured Murmur and prompted all four original members to take the stage together (although they did not perform). On this recent tour, they covered 1985\u2019s Fables Of The Reconstruction, alongside favourite tracks from 1984\u2019s \u201cSo. Central Rain\u201d to 1999\u2019s \u201cDaysleeper\u201d. Later this year, they bring the Fables tour to the UK. In 2026, they\u2019ll tour behind Lifes Rich Pageant.<\/p>\n<p>And they\u2019ve done it all with the blessing of R.E.M. themselves. In addition to the 40 Watt shows, Stipe joined them onstage in Brooklyn while Buck played two shows in the Pacific Northwest. \u201cListening to the fellows and hearing their interpretations of these songs live for the first time,\u201d says Stipe, \u201cone of the things that was remarkable to me was how much they studied and really did their homework, but what they\u2019re doing is not mimicry at all. It\u2019s not a cover band. It\u2019s much greater than that.\u201d<\/p>\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-they-made-sounds-nobody-else-made\">\u201cThey made sounds nobody else made\u201d<\/h2>\n<p>\u201cThis whole project has been full of surprises,\u201d says Narducy. \u201cWe never planned this thing out, and we didn\u2019t strategise at all. People asked us to tour these R.E.M. songs, and the crowds showed up. It all comes from a place of love. We\u2019re not trying to pretend that we\u2019re R.E.M. We just love playing these songs. It\u2019s sacred music.\u201d Perhaps that \u2014 along with the band\u2019s hearty endorsement \u2014 is why so many fans have responded so intensely to the recent tour. The musicians onstage are fans themselves, presenting the songs humbly but spiritedly.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cEvery show I\u2019ve been to, people are so joyous,\u201d says Jen Tiernan, Associate Professor of Media and Communications at Minnesota State University, Mankato. A lifelong fan who first saw R.E.M. in 1984, she spent her sabbatical following the band on tour. \u201cFor a lot of us Gen Xers, R.E.M. were such a huge influence. We know they won\u2019t be getting back together, so this is as close as we\u2019re going to get.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Shannon and Narducy have been covering R.E.M. for just a few years, but they\u2019ve been playing other people\u2019s music together for more than a decade. The pair met at the Hideout in Chicago back in 2014, brought together by the alt.country musician Robbie Fulks. \u201cHe had a Monday night residency there and he would play a different show every week,\u201d says Narducy. \u201cI sat in with him a lot. One time Robbie said he wanted to play Lou Reed\u2019s Blue Mask and he brought in Michael as a singer. We became good friends and started going to shows and hanging out.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>After Fulks moved to Los Angeles, the new friends continued doing covers shows together, at least when they had time: Narducy was a professional touring musician with Bob Mould and his own band Split Single, while Shannon was busy filming The Shape Of Water and Knives Out. \u201cWe did The Smiths, Dylan, Neil Young, The Modern Lovers,\u201d says Narducy.<\/p>\n<p>But something clicked when they performed Murmur in its entirety. There was enough buzz among R.E.M. fans that booking agents started asking them to tour the show. When Shannon and Narducy had some downtime, they assembled a band that included Juhlin, bassist Neil Macri and Mountain Goats drummer Jon Wurster, playing just nine dates in early 2024. \u201cWhen we did that tour, it was hard to tell what this thing was going to be,\u201d says Narducy. \u201cIt was just rolling the dice. Are fans really interested in seeing this group of people playing their songs?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>They dug into the songs, not simply replicating the parts but putting their own stamp on the music. They\u2019re reverent, but not stiflingly so. While the guitarists can reasonably re-create Buck\u2019s signature jangle, Shannon doesn\u2019t sound much Stipe; his voice is lower and grainer, bringing a terseness that matches the postpunk energy. \u201cThey made sounds nobody else made,\u201d he says. \u201cR.E.M. figured out how to make sounds only they could make. So these songs aren\u2019t easy to play. There are so many sounds floating around in there. We\u2019re trying to capture all those little gremlins.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>For Buck, watching this band perform his band\u2019s songs can be overwhelming: \u201cA bunch of my friends have seen the show and they all said the same thing, \u2018Hey, that was really great. What do you think about it?\u2019 I don\u2019t think about it. I feel a strange wave going through me of that person that I used to be and the people we used to be. It was something that I felt in my bones when I heard them do those songs.\u201d<\/p>\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-it-s-scary-as-hell\">\u201cIt\u2019s scary as hell\u201d<\/h2>\n<p>Just before they all took the stage together at the 40 Watt, Shannon, Narducy and the band members met up with R.E.M. at their Athens HQ. \u201cWe ended having a little Q&amp;A and Mike Mills and I sat down and played some of the basslines together,\u201d says John Stirratt, who joined when Macri was unable to tour for Fables. \u201cI knew these songs really well, but I can\u2019t say I knew all the bass parts. So I asked him a bunch of technical questions and he was psyched to answer them.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Beyond appearing onstage with them, R.E.M. have offered good advices to these musicians covering their songs, mapping out guitar chords or telling the stories behind songs like \u201cPerfect Circle\u201d or even giving pointers on their stage presence. What R.E.M. haven\u2019t done is dictate the performances. \u201cI\u2019ve never gotten the sense from R.E.M. that we\u2019re not doing it right,\u201d says Shannon. \u201cThey\u2019ve never said they wished we were doing anything differently. In fact, Stipe once told me that if I ever forget a lyric, just ask the audience. They know all the words and they love to tell you. They find it endearing.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The Fables tour culminated in a pair of shows in Chicago \u2014 a homecoming for Windy City residents Shannon and Narducy. They played Friday night at the 1,100-capacity Metro, then closed the tour at the more intimate SPACE in nearby Evanston. It was their fourth show in as many nights, and everyone was weary. \u201cFrankly, I was a little nervous, because I didn\u2019t know if I had another one in me,\u201d Shannon admits. \u201cI didn\u2019t know if I could even sing. We were all running on fumes by then.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Before the show, R.E.M.\u2019s manager and longtime friend Bertis Downs stopped by and gave the ragged band a rousing pep talk. \u201cSomething just took over,\u201d is how Shannon describes it. They ran through Fables with fresh intensity, then played multiple encores. They brought out the road crew to sing \u201c(Don\u2019t Go Back To) Rockville\u201d, and for \u201cSo. Central Rain\u201d, Shannon and Narducy left the stage and wandered into the audience, harmonizing together with no microphones and only an acoustic guitar for accompaniment. At the end of the night they brought everybody up onstage \u2014 including superfan Jen Tiernan \u2014 for a rousing cover of R.E.M.\u2019s cover of Aerosmith\u2019s \u201cToys In The Attic\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI love all these songs,\u201d says Shannon. \u201cI loved them the first time I sang them, and I loved them on that final stop of the tour. I\u2019ll love them when we do them in London. They\u2019re canonical to me, like The Beatles or Dylan. I love doing it, but it\u2019s scary as hell. It\u2019s just such a big responsibility.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><em>Additional reporting by Anders Smith Lindall<\/em><\/p>\n<p><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.uncut.co.uk\/news\/michael-shannon-and-jason-narducy-to-perform-r-e-ms-fables-of-the-reconstruction-on-uk-tour-148639\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Michael\u00a0Shannon\u00a0&amp; Jason Narducy and friends tour Fables Of The Reconstruction in the UK throughout August<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>The post <a href=\"https:\/\/www.uncut.co.uk\/features\/thats-them-in-the-spotlight-150868\/\">That\u2019s Them In The Spotlight<\/a> appeared first on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.uncut.co.uk\/\">UNCUT<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div style=\"margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px;\" class=\"sharethis-inline-share-buttons\" ><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>On a chilly Thursday night in February, Michael Stipe took the stage at the 40 Watt in Athens, Georgia. Peter Buck was already there playing guitar and Stipe just wanted&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31,35,46],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4521","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-features","category-interviews","category-rem"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4521","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4521"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4521\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4521"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4521"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4521"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}