“It’s a cool performance of a lot of songs that we didn’t really play live that much, so it’s nice to have that out there”
R.E.M. have announced a 25th anniversary reissue of ‘Reveal’, featuring a previously unreleased 17-song live session from 2001.
The expanded edition of the band’s 12th studio album will arrive on November 20 via Craft Recordings, pairing the original 12-track record with ‘The Black Sessions Revealed’ – a performance recorded for Radio France in Paris on May 7, 2001 (pre-order here).
Taking place just days before ‘Reveal’ was released, the 17-song session saw Michael Stipe, Peter Buck and Mike Mills joined by guitarist Scott McCaughey, keyboardist Ken Stringfellow and drummer Joey Waronker.
The set mixes then-new material including ‘Imitation Of Life’, ‘All The Way To Reno (You’re Gonna Be A Star)’, ‘I’ve Been High’ and ‘She Just Wants To Be’ with older favourites such as ‘Losing My Religion’, ‘The One I Love’, ‘Man On The Moon’ and ‘It’s The End Of The World As We Know It (And I Feel Fine)’.
Unlike most R.E.M. albums, ‘Reveal’ was not followed by a conventional tour, with the band instead playing a relatively limited series of promotional shows around its release.
A live version of ‘Imitation Of Life’ from the session has been released on September 30 as the first preview of the collection.
