LISTEN: R.E.M. might be disbanded, but their music endures. GPB's Kristi York Wooten goes behind the scenes with musicians who perform songs from the legendary Georgia band's catalog.
R.E.M.'s music will always be in the ether. After more than 93 million records sold and billions of streams reaching new generations, the group's recorded legacy is perfectly positioned for the future even though band members Michael Stipe, Peter Buck, Mike Mills, and Bill Berry no longer record or tour together, apart from side projects and one-offs.
So, who is performing R.E.M's music these days?
Over the past few years, traditions have formed around the anniversaries of R.E.M. recordings, such as the celebrations of the Chronic Town EP in Atlanta and Athens in 2022. Last year, actor Michael Shannon and guitarist Jason Narducy lured all four members of R.E.M. on stage when they toured together to perform songs from the band's 1985 album, Fables of the Reconstruction. Now the pair returns to the 40 Watt Club on Feb. 26 and 27 to present a 40th anniversary tour of Lifes Rich Pageant.
Narducy told GPB how it all started: "Michael Shannon and I have been playing music for 12 years, only in Chicago where we pick a record, I assemble a band, we practice the night before and play the show, play the entire record, whatever it was — a Bob Dylan record, a Neil Young record, Modern Lovers — and then it's gone, you know?" he said. "It was a really fun kind of pop-up project, and that's all we did for R.E.M.'s Murmur in 2023. But what happened was, it resonated."
The success of that Chicago show led to a tour.
"The fact that the band R.E.M. heard about it and went to our first Athens show, that was so wild for us," he said.
Narducy said his R.E.M. knowledge began with 1987's Document album, and then he backtracked to discover Lifes Rich Pageant. He said playing songs like "What If We Give It Away" on this tour is giving him a new appreciation for their music.
"That's a song that, in high school, I learned how to play, and I learned the main electric guitar part, and now I'm playing the acoustic part, which is very different and more sparse," he said. "But I'm also doing a ton of singing with Michael [Shannon] on that one. So it's really interesting to take a different angle than how my ears were hearing it for decades. And that's just part of putting together a presentation of a beloved record and trying to do it in a way that people will enjoy."
Setlists for Shannon and Narducy's shows on their current tour include not only tracks from Lifes Rich Pageant but other R.E.M. gems, too. But don't expect it to be an imitation. Narducy taps into his own punk-rock influences as well as R.E.M.'s reputation for nonconformity.
"People talk about the Replacements being all anti-corporate rock by not doing videos," he said. "It's like, 'Well, there was a band years before that that did that!' And of course, R.E.M. didn't sound like any other bands that were on my radar. Tons of bands tried to sound like them afterwards, and I can't think of one that really did it and were able to create their own path. So they were singular."
Narducy and Shannon are not the only ones playing R.E.M.'s music night after night. Tribute bands have sprouted up across the U.S. and the U.K. especially. Current and former acts include Dead Letter Office, The Reckoning Crew, REMbrandt and others.
Stephen Williams plays guitar in a British group called Stipe, a band he hopes captures a little bit of the R.E.M. ethos.
"I definitely got that Southern Gothic aesthetic," Williams said. "I'd read around the disaster in the Cuyahoga River, for example. I really enjoyed learning about the different political statements that were being made. "The Flowers of Guatemala," of course. So for me, I got it. The message the band was putting out there, I was hearing loud and clear."
He said he admires Peter Buck's playing style, which is a big part of R.E.M.'s distinctive sound.
"Learning the guitar parts has just been an absolute joy, especially on the the Rickenbacker 360 I have, which is the same guitar, obviously, and that guitar forces you to play in a different way," Williams said. "Because you can't do, you know, Eddie Van Halen-type guitar solos on a Rickenbacker."
Geoff Melkonian is a successful Atlanta business owner and longtime Atlanta musician who performed with the Josh Joplin Group. He currently leads Georgia R.E.M. tribute band The REMakes and is also a member of the Bad Ends with R.E.M. drummer Bill Berry.
He'd known Berry professionally for a while before he got up the courage to tell him he was in an R.E.M. tribute band.
"That's so cool," Berry told him.
"We're going on 17 years now of doing performances," Melkonian said of the REMakes, who rocked out Valentine's Weekend at Atlanta's Variety Playhouse. "But prior to that, the two guys I played with, I've been playing with since high school and we've got 35-plus years of just knowing each other ,musically. And of course, our age, Reckoning, Fables of the Reconstruction, Lifes Rich Pageant and Document were all released my freshman, sophomore, junior and senior years. And so, you know, especially being in Atlanta where just all of us kids were, that's what we listened to."
Melkonian said R.E.M.'s music lends itself especially well to frequent reinterpretation on stage.
"There's an innocence to what they've written; it's just this healthy songwriting progression over the years," he said. "It's loved so much [by the audience]. I think all of the [band members] have a great sense of melody. And one of the things that I've always found to be true-to-form with their songwriting and their recording style is how simple they keep it."
Jason Narducy said playing at the 40 Watt Club is still the holy grail for musicians who grew up with R.E.M. and still love the music.
"It is the most amazing to me, looking back, is how well the music stands up," he said. "I mean, I think we all have music that we discovered when we were young or even 20 years ago that we listen to now and go, 'Wow, that doesn't really stand the test of time. There was something about it that connected to me then and now that's gone.' And that's just not the case with R.E.M. In fact, it might be stronger."
Michael Shannon and Jason Narducy and friends perform at the 40 Watt Club in Athens on Feb. 26 and Feb. 27.
