This Is Not A Show/This Is Not A Blog Post

This is not my beautiful wife...

I checked out the world premiere of the new R.E.M. live film last night. Entitled "This Is Not A Show," it is culled from 2007's working rehearsals/"experiment in terror" in which the band played new songs in front of a live audience to try to shake up the way they make records. Along with a slew of songs from the usually criminally underrepresented IRS years, the band took to the stage for 5 nights in Dublin to try out these new, sometimes half written tunes, which would become 2008's Accelerate. Vincent Moon was on hand to document the shows. And he was there last night, as was R.E.M.'s longtime manager Bertis Downs.

If you're familiar with the work that Vincent Moon has done for Arcade Fire or The National, or even R.E.M. you shouldn't expect anything drastically different here. Shot mostly in black and white, the film is noticeable more for what it obscures than what it shows. There are some gorgeous moments like "Drive" and an Accelerate outtake called "On The Fly," but too often Vincent Moon interrupts songs just as they're getting good, which is especially grating during the portions of the film devoted to the early material.

But the sound was incredible. If the forthcoming live record sounds as good as this material did during the film, then R.E.M. may have finally succeeded at getting their live sound down on tape. Which, with 39 songs made up of largely IRS material along Accelerate, would do wonders to remind people of what a vital band they once were, and for at least five nights in Dublin were again.

Drive - Live at the Olympia in Dublin