If I had a musical time machine that would allow me to experience again a concert I attend in my past, one of the finalists would be my first time seeing R.E.M. Yesterday I found a Bit Torrent of that concert and it has allowed me to experience it all over again. The audio files in this post are from that magical night.

The day was March 18, 1989. I had recently turned 17 and was just beginning to gain some of the freedoms that come when you're closing in on official adulthood. One of those liberties included the privilege of driving 99 miles up the road from Tucson - Nobody Plays Here - Arizona, to Phoenix to see some rock shows.

One of the first concerts I attended with my new freedom was R.E.M and I was fortunate enough to see them three times that year. At the time, I was an illiterate R.E.M. fan. Of course I'd heard "The One I Love" and "It's the End of the World As We Know It" from Document. Green, the album this particular tour was supporting, was the first R.E.M. CD I ever purchased. Other than that, I didn't know a thing. I wasn't exactly prepared to appreciate this night.

As that concert progressed and R.E.M. stormed through song after unfamiliar song, I realized that even though I couldn't participate or comprehend most of it, this was a special band and a special concert. When they played "Superman" (MP3) and had the entire audience stretching out their arms to fly like the Man of Steel himself, I followed right along. When they whipped through a punked-out take on Television's "See No Evil" (MP3), how could I have guessed that some 15 years later I'd see Television play the same song live in New York City?

I couldn't even appreciate a rare playing of "Radio Free Europe" (MP3), but it was during this concert that I knew this band was worthy of true devotion. In the following days and weeks I bought all of their albums, played them constantly and began to understand how incredible that March show was.

Two other shows followed in 1989, but neither lived up to that first night. They didn't play "Superman" or "Radio Free Europe" again; most of the wild covers disappeared. R.E.M. themselves disappeared from touring a few months after that night. My love continued, waning a bit during the Out of Time and "Shiny Happy People" phase, roaring back for Automatic For the People and then dying for good after Monster. I would never get to experience another night like March 18, 1989 again.

Here's the setlist from that show:

Pop Song '89 / Exhuming McCarthy / Welcome to the Occupation / Turn You Inside-Out / Shaking Through / Underneath the Bunker / Orange Crush / Disturbance at the Heron House / Feeling Gravity's Pull / Flowers of Guatemala / Begin the Begin / World Leader Pretend / Tired of Singing Trouble / I Believe / Pretty Persuasion / Superman (Clique cover) / Get Up / Auctioneer (Another Engine) / It's the End of the World As We Know It / Stand / Boy (Go) (Golden Palominos song) / Fall On Me / You Are the Everything / Finest Worksong / King of Birds / Summertime (Gershwin cover) / These Days / See No Evil (Television cover) / Dark Globe (Syd Barrett cover) / Harpers (Hugo Largo cover) / Crazy (Pylon cover) / Perfect Circle / Academy Fight Song (Mission of Burma cover) / Radio Free Europe / After Hours (Velvet Underground cover)