R.E.M. 21 July 1999 - Stirling Castle, Stirling, Scotland
support: Teenage Fanclub
set: Lotus / What's The Frequency, Kenneth? / Finest Worksong / Pilgrimage / Suspicion / Daysleeper / New Test Leper / Everybody Hurts / Low Desert / The Apologist / Sweetness Follows / The One I Love / Country Feedback / The Great Beyond / Losing My Religion / At My Most Beautiful / Walk Unafraid / Man On The Moon
encore: Hope / Why Not Smile / Crush With Eyeliner / So. Central Rain / Cuyahoga / It's The End Of The World As We Know It (And I Feel Fine)
As always the setlist is taken from Darryl White's incomporable and essential REM Timeline ( www.remtimeline.com - your one stop shop for all matters related to REM shows and setlists).
The tracks are arranged in Disc One/Disc Two folders with the break coming just before Losing My Religion.
This is the sixth and final UK show that I recorded during the Up Tour as well as being the last night that they played at Stirling Castle. The weather had been pretty horrible all week but I remember this as being the least horrible. Nevertheless Michael stil commented befor Daysleeper "This is not my version of July. This is very very very very cold" He'd grabbed a Saltire that someone was waving just in front of the stage and, to the delight of the crowd, wrapped it round his shoulders. You can hear him just before 'Man on the Moon' saying 'Give me that flag, I'm freezing' and the resulting cheer.
I'd moved back to Peter side of the stage about 30 metres back from the P.A. stack.I remember being right out at the edge of the crowd. The sound quality is OK but I was surrounded by some good natured and noisy drunks. Hey it all adds to the atmosphere. You'll also spot a muffled interlude in the middle of 'Everybody Hurts' When Security Gorilla walked past me and I was forced to drop the umbrella which had the mic duck taped to it. Crap song anyway :-)
Recording Lineage: Sony ECM - MS 907 electret condensor mic>Sony MZ-R35 MD recorder N.B. in MONO mode> Cool Edit 2000 (only tweaking I did was to Normalise both channels) >CDWav>flac level 6
I'll seed the tweaked version of the Stirling Castle 19th July 1999 show next. Then I'll have a look at seeding the audience and FM versions of the 25th June Glastonbury Festival show (but I'll have to remove the three officially released tracks from both versions first) Then we'll see what else I can find in the vaults....
**********end original text**********
Disc One 74:29
01. Lotus
02. What's The Frequency, Kenneth?
03. Finest Worksong
04. Pilgrimage
05. Suspicion
06. Daysleeper
07. New Test Leper
08. Everybody Hurts
09. Low Desert
10. The Apologist
11. Sweetness Follows
12. The One I Love
13. Country Feedback
14. The Great Beyond
Disc Two
01. Losing My Religion
02. At My Most Beautiful
03. Walk Unafraid
04. Man On The Moon
encore:
05. Hope
06. Why Not Smile
Crush With Eyeliner / So. Central Rain / Cuyahoga / It's The End Of The World As We Know It (And I Feel Fine)
Notes:
-Mic noise during Pilgrimage. MM loses track of where he is during song.
-Daysleeper is introduced as a song about "Why the fuck does the sun come up at 4:30 in the morning in Scotland?" MS goes on to ask the crowd if they can get their summer straight and mentions is has been cold all three nights as noted in the original text.
Before Low Desert MS "It's a song that evokes a feeling of warmth and heat. It's a song about the American desert and a little car crash where a guy is trying to decide if he's going to hang on or if he's going to let go". After the song MS says he's not getting the warmth back from the crowd like he has the previous night and acknowledges some of the various flags people brought.
-The Apologist is introduced as being about someone who "went through a 12-step program and he emerged at the other end a much better, cleaner person, horrible, horrible, horrible monster. Much worse than what he was when he walked into it".
-Before Sweetness Follows MS discusses mic stands "I broke my mic stand so I had to replace it. They made one especially for me. Well, they made on for Iggy Pop and he couldn't break it in a whole tour and I broke it in 3 nights. So they made one that was stronger and that was especially made for me and I broke it in five shows. So then they made another one that was one solid peice of steel and I gave it away to Fugazi. So we're back to the broken Iggy Pop one".
-MS claims to have forgotten the name to TOIL before it is played.
-Country Feedback solo 1:18
-Someone throws some tea bags on the stage after AMMB, leading to "What is this tea? You're throwing tea bags at me? What the hell is that? You're supposed to throw the rose pedals at my feet everywhere I walk. It's not even Earl Grey. This is like Darjeerling or something. What is it [crowd replies] Scottish Blend? I'll make sure and take some home. If you guys can wait just a second I'm just going to pick up my Scottish Blend tea bags here".
Grade: C
-I would argue this has the best sound of Hank's three Stirling Castle recordings. It also has the most background chatter.