R.E.M. are an oddity to me. The only album of theirs I ever bought was Monster. Yeah, sssh. I liked Automatic for the People though my favourite track was Drive not Man on the Moon. When they decided to play 5 nights in Dublin last July a friend let me know about the offer after he got a fansite email. I bought tickets moreso for the chance of selling them on to real fans or to attend to annoy people that were gagging to g. So I went with my friend Stephen on July 4th at the Olympia and it was such an intimate gig that I felt a weak little bond form with R.E.M. I liked them after and wanted the band to do well. The fact that they played really old songs that they hadn’t played in years and Michael Stipe gave the background to them added to the intimacy. Them also trying out new songs with Stipe getting them to go back and start a song midway again was also a lot of fun. You were seeing the creative process happen right there in the Olympia. These days I feel I have to stop and listen to songs from their new album when they come on. I’m not gone on them but I’ll stilll give the band time now. They’re the lads.
Below is their new track called Hollow man and once again in a music video in 2008, typography is featuring heavily. 2008 is the year where the iPod hipsters really start loving typography thanks to Helvetica and Macbooks and the typography nerds realising they can evangelise without getting beat up. The year of typography? The YouTube vid doesn’t do it justice so have a looksee at the Quicktime version of Hollow Man if you want.
