R.E.M. : HYDE PARK LONDON 2005

1. What's The Frequency, Kenneth ?
2. The One I Love
3. Drive
4. The Outsiders
5. Leaving New York
6. Everybody Hurts
7. Electron Blue
8. Final Straw
9. Orange Crush
10. Walk Unafraid
11. Losing My Religion
12. Man On The Moon

Label : no label

Venue : Hyde Park, London, UK

Recording Date : July 16, 2005

Length : 55:55

Quality : FM recording (A+)

Review : Excellent FM (off air) BBC Radio2 broacast recording. This concert was postponed one week due to the terrorist atrocities in London. This is only a small part of the concert. R.E.M. performed 25 songs that day in Hyde Park, London.

Concert Review (The Guardian) : Postponed from the previous Saturday because of the London bombings, this end- of-tour performance from REM managed to be both valedictory and celebratory. They had some assistance from another perfect summer day and an enthusiastic crowd who were au fait with most of Michael Stipe's lyrics, but the band are currently hitting new peaks as a live act. Twenty-five years into REM's career, the planets of the band's universe seem to have slid into an especially harmonious alignment. The additional musicians - Ken Stringfellow on keyboards, Scott McCaughey on guitars and drummer Bill Rieflin - have settled in so comfortably that this feels like the authentic REM version 2. Advertisement That sense of completeness is enhanced by a scintillating lights-and-video show, which interweaves live video feeds of the performance with pre-recorded footage, while every song arrives in colour coordinated packaging. Icy blue tones flagged up Electron Blue, Walk Unafraid shimmered in fluorescent green, and Orange Crush glaringly reflected the colour of its title. Among many show-stopping visual moments was one where Stipe stood at the foot of one of the towering video screens, a tiny marionette silhouetted against huge images of the crowd watching itself watching the singer. In a little over two hours, they revisited most of their historical phases. It was back to the debut album with Sitting Still, on through their bestselling period with Losing My Religion and Drive, and up to date with a cluster of songs from Around the Sun. Stipe's singing was at its most evocative in Leaving New York and Everybody Hurts, and his frontman's gyrations at their most uninhibited during The End of the World As We Know It. During E-bow the Letter, Stipe had a belated opportunity to duet with Patti Smith, having missed her recent Meltdown festival. Sadly, Horses-style abandon was not on the agenda, and Smith confined herself to intoning a sombre mantra over the band's sustained drone. Delirium did finally break out at the end of the show, with Stipe raving about "the end of the tour as we know it" as Mike Mills and Peter Buck carried him offstage. Not too old to rock'n'roll, apparently. It's 2021 ...

Concert Review (Rockbeatstone) : A week later than initially planned due to the atrocities on London's tube system, REM completed their world tour at London's Hyde Park. When the concert was announced in late 2004, it was going to be London's hottest ticket in town. However, a subsequent announcement that U2 were going to visit London and also Bob Geldof, meant that R.E.M.'s Hyde Park gig was going to now going to be the third largest date of the summer. It seemed that some force was stopping R.E.M. from making a claim to be the world's biggest band. Despite the hot weather, queuing already started the day before and was a must for anyone who wished to entertain a hope of being in the first quarter of the ground. If you were unlucky, it meant that you would be stuck half a mile from the stage behind 80,000 people. However, if one was prepared to ignore these inconveniences and watch the event on one of the large screens, then it was an entirely enjoyable concert.despite being nothing particularly spectacular. The obvious highlight of the night was Patti Smith's guest appearance for 'E-Bow the Letter' from New Adventures in Hi-Fi. However, even here the gremlins followed R.E.M. Poor old Patti's microphone was too high to sing into and did not seem to be moveable, she subsequently forgot some of the words. However, some inspired ad-libbing and a generous crowd meant that the worst was averted. Other songs well received by the mass of people at Hyde Park included the obvious greatest hits: 'Man on the Moon', 'Losing my Religion', and 'Everybody Hurts' - especially poignant after the events of 7/7. A beautiful 'Nightswimming' and a delirious rendition 'It's the end of the World as we Know it (but I feel fine)' were also well performed - at least so it seemed from behind the large screen to the left of the back of the field. Despite strong performances, the concert was made the weaker with issues were to do with the 'venue' itself. Unlike a 'proper' stadium gig, 80,000 people were amassed on a flat field in a park in London. Unlike a stadium gig, the noise wandered with the breeze and was occasionally lost for parts of the audience. Technical issues aside, concerts like this can not help but illustrate that R.E.M. are not U2 or the Rolling Stones - admittedly they have never professed to be similar - but in order to entertain the crowd in such conditions they should have adopted some of the stadium 'tricks'. This could have been a smaller secondary stage in the centre of the audience, more screens, better special effects, some fireworks even. But the simple fact remains that Michael Stipe is no Bono, Mick Jagger, or even (dare I say it.) Chris Martin. R.E.M. are easily capable of selling 80,000 tickets - whether they can make the majority of the crowd beg for more when the concert is over and race to the phones to order tickets when they return to town for another massive show is another question.