U Talkin’ U2 To Me? - R U Talkin' R.E.M. RE: ME? - Peter Buck Talks R.E.M. Live from Clusterfest

Episode Date: June 26, 2019

Live from Clusterfest, R.E.M. founding member Peter Buck joins Adam Scott Aukerman to discuss all things R.E.M. Peter talks about the Baseball Project, where he keeps his awards, showing up to the Grammys in his pajamas twice, and offers the Scotts a special gift. Plus, a special appearance by comedian Todd Barry and Peter plays two songs with the greatest R.E.M. tribute band of all time, Dead Letter Office.For a video of Peter Buck performing with Dead Letter Office go to https://youtu.be/vHNSreFfVa0

🎵 From Chronic to Collapse, Town, and Into Now respectively, this is Are You Talking R.E.M. ReMe. The comprehensive and encyclopedic compendium of all things R.E.M. This is good rock and roll music. Welcome to the show. Welcome back. Another episode, finally. Welcome back. I believe we are at the end of June and doing another episode of Are You Talking R.E.M. ReMe. And I want to welcome you to the show. My name is Scott Aukerman. I'm one of the hosts. I am the currently less famous host, although who knows what can happen who knows i mean by the time this

episode drops uh you'll be canceled i'll be canceled in one way or another one way or another which way do you think it's gonna happen either canceled from television or canceled from the human race look we've all been on shows that have been canceled certainly but us being canceled what oh no uh actor adam scott today was officially canceled as a person that would be so awesome if like it got so official that like the new york times just started having to report it that they were canceled um you know who i'd like to cancel who's that that? Scott. Again, think of certain orange-haired politicians. Ronald McDonald? Yes.

I got picked up for the back nine, so that's very exciting. That's really, really exciting. I call this thing a tabble for me, is the currently more famous half of the R-U-T-R-E-M-R-M duo. You know him from currently not really doing a lot, but are you in any movies or anything? Oh, no, you're in that Big Little Lies. The lies keep getting bigger and littler at the same time. That's right. And that's on TV right now.

And is that why you're doing this episode today? To promote it? Yeah, I'm promoting BLL2. What happened? Because as anyone knows, if you want to promote something, if you want that wide reach, you come do the REM podcast. Adam Scott is here. Hi, guys guys give us some uh bigger littler lies spoilers what happens in the last episode what's i is this a mystery show i've as you know

i've never seen it i never will i don't know what uh it's about i every once in a while i'll read a tweet or something that's like is it a murder mystery or something? What is it? Is it an Agatha Christie thing? What is this? Let me just start by saying it's always nice to have the support of your friends. I mean, I'm not gonna, I feel like if I try to define it, it's gonna spoil something for you, so. That's why they have dictionaries.

Dictionaries should have spoiler alert right on the cover. Exactly, it spoils all the words. Oh, you wanna know want to know what a book is spoiler alert you're holding it i want to i i don't want to know what any words mean because it spoils them because i just want to i want to read a word t-r-e-e who knows and then i go out and see it and it has it on it and it has it like carved into it that's right and i go oh that's what that word was that i was just reading and then i find it out as i go is my level your level is fine though because scott's incredibly loud i'm shouting and i i can't i can't hear myself you have a very uh you have a lower voice you have a more uh that's not what that means usually i can hear myself there we're bringing you have a more... That's not what that means.

Usually I can hear myself. There, we're bringing you up a little bit. How's that? You enjoy that? Let me see. Yeah. Yeah, that's better, guys. Thanks.

I appreciate that. Sure, no problem. You want to rise up to meet me. I want to try to play on your level. When I go high, you want to be as high as I am. Yeah. Instead of going low. When you go high, you want to be as high as I am. Yeah. Instead of going low. When you go high, I go higher. Love it, love it, love it.

So what is Big Little Lies about? Seriously, it's about what? Yeah, there's a murder mystery element to it, sure. An element? So that's just part of it? Oh, there's a lot going on. I can tell you, if a murder happened in my life, everything else would fall by the wayside at that at that point you know like there wouldn't be any drama at home going on there wouldn't be any subplots you'd be

like hold up let's solve this murder someone got murdered this is fucking crazy nuts i don't know what else to do for like weeks well it's not exactly a murder but maybe it is uh but yeah there's a death and uh everyone has to process and figure it out but what figure out how they're processing process the figuring out of the processing of themselves uh-huh and you're really bad yeah at describing no this is i'm reading from the official oh this is the official oh myis? Yeah. Oh, my gosh. What do you... Adam just took out what I call a Kleenex and started what is it? Snot? Wiping

snot from your nose? What's going on? No, I have blood seeping from my left eye, which is kind of weird. Oh, wow. Oh, my God. I just am noticing that. Yeah. What is that from? Oh, man. Ah, that looks painful. Oh, my God. I just am noticing that. Yeah. What is that from? Oh, man.

Ah, that looks painful. I don't know what's going on. Huh. Did anyone hit you in the face or give you an open-handed smack or something? Well, I mean, on the way here, just on the way up the stairs, I saw just one of the security guards here. Sure. Yeah, we have a lot because it's, you know, a lot of celebrities coming in and out of here. It's a fortified place.

I said, and I said to him, hey, why don't you go fuck yourself, right? What was he doing? He was just walking down. Really? And he said, hi, how are you? And I said, hey, why don't you go fuck yourself? Why would you say something like that? Just as a hello, as a general greeting.

That's not a nice greeting. Well, I figured he's a security guard. He gets that kind of stuff all the time and that's probably what they take as a friendly.

What he's used to? Yeah, and then he, he, well, what he did was he bunched up his hand, like took all, yeah, I see what, I see what you're doing.

You're making a fist. We call that making a fist. Oh, okay, because he curled all of his fingers and pressed them all his fingers. I see what you're doing. You're making a fist. We call that making a fist. Oh, okay. Because he curled all of his fingers and pressed them into his palm. Yes, that's exactly what happens. And then his thumb, he wrapped that right up with the rest of the fingers. Yeah, you don't want to do it underneath the fingers. That's how you break your thumb. Exactly. So he had it on the

outside. Outside, yeah, exactly. That's making a fist. That's standard making a fist. Okay, well whatever you want to call it, I call it bending all of your fingers, pressing them into your palm, and then putting your thumb along with the rest, but not underneath on the outside. Okay, that's just going to take way too much time if you keep saying that. And he took that fist and he pointed it at my face. You just called it a fist, by the way.

Well, I'm just going by your definition. Oh, I see. It's the first time I've ever used that word. Okay. And he— You've never said fisting before? Well, I've used the word fisting. Of course I've used the word fisting. What did you think it meant? I just thought it meant regular intercourse. Is there some other, nevermind. All right,

let's move on. What did he do with this? He took that, quote unquote, fist, and he pressed it into my eye. So he pressed it, or he propelled it with force and then returned it to- No, he gently set it upon my face and then held the back of my head and just pressed that fist into my eye until- Game of Thrones style? It started bleeding. Yes, just like the mountain. Oh my God. Yeah, it looks terrible.

It hurts. You should learn how to be nicer to people. Why don't you go fuck yourself? I'm used to it, so. Okay. Agree to disagree. Welcome to the show. We have a big show, okay?

We have, this is a- Man, do we ever. A giant, giant show. We, the bulk and majority of this show uh will be devoted to our recent and when i say recent i mean a couple of days ago appearance up in san francisco at cluster fest where we did a a live are you talking rem remi uh to about a quite a large number of people i'll wait to say how many until we get to it. Do you have an official count? I have an official-ish count, yes.

And that is going to be the majority of the show with a bunch of surprises to the audience at the time. But our big surprise guest was a founding member of the band R.E.M. R.E.M. R.E.M. Peter Dollar Bill himself came out and did the show with us. And that's very exciting. We'll be talking about that, and you'll hear the entirety of that show coming up.

But I think before we get to that, the bigger news out of the R.E.M. camp, and specifically are you talking R.E.M. Remy, is I have a new iPod whoa yeah can I see it no okay can I look at it no I'm gonna hide it okay is that the new one that just came out this is the new one now

fans of the show if you've heard this show before Adam has been making fun of my click wheel iPod for years and he says why do you have a click wheel iPod I'm about to start making fun of something else wheel ipod for years and he says why do you have okay but i'm about to start making fun of something else go ahead and explain your new ipod you're gonna make fun of this ipod well go ahead just finish what you're doing and then i'll explain to you why what you're doing is stupid adam has constantly said why do you have a click wheel ipod you should just stream

all your music and i say well because they take stuff down off of streaming. I like to own my music. Who takes stuff down off of streaming? See, we're going to get started on this. What do you mean who? The record labels. Constantly. Stuff isn't available, then they take it off of services. What do you mean when?

This happens all the time. What streaming service? Tidal. They take stuff up and down off of Tidal all the time. Like suddenly all of Radiohead's albums will be on there, but then they'll be off. Really? Yeah, it happens all the time.

That's terrible. This guy, he doesn't even know, and yet he still makes fun of me. The streaming service I subscribe to, everything seems to be available all the time. But you don't care. See, that's the thing. You're not a guy about specifics. What?

You just breeze through life. And this happened at the festival too. Like I had to make sure that my passes, like they wanted me to go pick them up and then they were going to say, okay, they're going to be in the van for you. Meanwhile, yours are delivered right to your room. Yeah.

Not mine. No. No. I got in the van and they said, you don't have your pass. We're not taking you to the show. Yeah. I figured it all out ahead of time. Oh, said, you don't have your pass. We're not taking you to the show. Yeah.

I figured it all out ahead of time. Oh, no, you didn't, by the way, because I know the behind the scenes. Well, Audrey figured it out all ahead of time. You just breeze through life and people just do things for you. Oh, that's sort of true about some stuff, but not everything. But this is what I mean about the, why are you, stop looking at your fucking watch. Listen. We're here to record. Okay. But this is, have you seen one, why are you, stop looking at your fucking watch. Listen. We're here to record. Okay.

But this is, have you seen one of these? It's an Apple. It's nice. Okay. The band looks very cheap, but the actual watch itself. The band is, it looks cheap. It looks like a sweat band or something. It's sort of, it's like the athletic, it's easier.

You look like you're starring in the movie Perfect from 1984. Thank you. So in any case, I said, well, you know, I like to own my music, and this click wheel iPod has the biggest capacity out of any. They haven't made an iPod Touch that has a bigger or equal capacity. So you download everything to it? I download everything to it, yeah. I sync it to.

It must take forever. No, it's very quick. So how many gigs does that hold then? This one has somewhere in the range of like 200 or something like that. Really? Yeah, it's above the 160, which was the click wheel. So as soon as they announced it, I bought it and I enjoy it. And so I have a nice new iPod. So now go ahead and make fun of me for whatever reason. Well, why don't you just use your phone? Your phone has the same... No, it doesn't. It has the same music app as your iPod. But it doesn't have the capacity.

What was I just talking about? So you're still stuck on this, like, I need to have all of my music downloaded on my thing. Yes, I don't like to stream in the car. Okay. I like the music that I like. I like to own it. I like to own it. I like to download it.

Because, look, in fact, Khalees, her second album, they just put it on streaming services just the other day. And it's been unavailable for years. I've had it for 20 years. So you don't stream. You only purchase and download. You don't stream at all. Occasionally I'll stream in the house sometimes. So you belong to, like, Spotify and Tidal, just in case you feel like and download. You don't stream at all. Occasionally I'll stream in the house sometimes.

So you belong to like Spotify and Tidal just in case you feel like using it. Well, Coolop likes Spotify as well. So she mainly streams, but I like to actually have all the stuff and I like to put it into playlists and curate it and stuff like that. But you can still put it into playlists

if you're subscribing and it's streaming. But again, it doesn't have everything that I have. I have hundreds of thousands of songs that are not available on streaming services. So you're spending way more money than you would be spending if you just subscribed to Apple Music. So now you're making it about a money issue.

Well, it's partially economic. Your only defense was ease. Yes. And now you realize you've lost that argument, and now you're spinning it off into penny-pinching. I lost nothing. Here's what... No, because I used to do the exact same thing.

I had an iPod Classic that I updated twice a week. It was only for my car. It held my entire library. I loved it. It got stolen for my car it held my entire library i loved it it got stolen from my car eventually but and so i loved having that hard drive i could carry around it had all my music on it but then once streaming became uh as convenient as it is now uh and i could just stream everything through my phone i just sort of stopped doing that. And all my purchased music is mixed in with the streaming.

I actually don't know which is which really anymore, but it's all in one place. Oh, my God. Why did I even start this? Okay. Anyway, Adam's got us here. I don't know what to say. Anyway, that's the big news.

Oh, other big news out of the REM rem camp i don't even know if you know this but just breaking today do you know about this rem news today no do you know i don't think you know uh who's the lead singer of uh the band we talk about wait which band uh It's in the title. Horium. Horium. Interviewed for, I believe, an Italian outlet. Oh, yeah. And even though the translation may be wonky,

apparently says he has 18 solo songs ready to go. Whoa, really? Yes. That's very exciting. So when it comes out, we will do another episode. You can make damn sure of that. That is huge news, actually. Yeah.

Has it got, I haven't really seen, I guess I haven't checked my usual. What are your usual? I don't know. Pitchfork, Stereogum. Is it in those places? It's in one of those places, yeah. Or someone sent it to me, I think. But yeah, so that's very exciting.

We'll be dealing with that as it comes up. So let's get to the topic at hand, which is our live show that we just did up in San Francisco. I want to give a little bit of background about it because we don't really go into it during the actual show itself. And I think there's a cool element to it that we didn't really discuss during the show and i would love to just talk about it uh before people listen so that they can enjoy it while it happens as much as we enjoyed it while it happens yeah it was um i didn't see it on pitchfork unfortunately okay um it was uh please it was like get to the fucking part of the show? Can we go off mic just for one second?

Okay. Yeah. Scott, I feel like today it's just one disappointment after the other with you. Wait, I'm disappointing you? No, I'm disappointing you. That's true. Yeah, that's a fair assessment of it. Oh, okay.

Why are you looking at your watch? Well, this time I wanted to know what time it was. See, I just disappointed you by looking at my watch. People look at their watches all the time. But George Bush looked at his watch during a debate and it lost him an election. Yeah, this should lose you an election. By the way, us being hosts are in elected position. Oh so have i told you i'm running for president of are you talking rem me yeah i want to be president no no i'm running for why am i always vice president election day is in november 2020 so we start campaigning now you can campaign if you want but i already started oh all right i'm starting now too okay a little bit late oh shit i was hoping you wouldn't i wanted to run unopposed but if you yeah I'm starting now too. Okay, a little bit late. Oh shit, I was hoping you wouldn't.

I wanted to run unopposed, but if you- Yeah, I'm starting. November 2020, you can elect one of us as president. Vote for Adam for president. Vote for Scott Aukerman for president. Vote for Adam Scott. People are gonna get fucking mixed up because our names are all-

They're too similar. So vote for Scott for scott vote for adam vote for scott adam i'm gonna run as adam i'm changing my name no more scott just adam just adam yeah like the guy in the bible at the beginning that's right and my logo is gonna be a leaf and a big dong okay okay so it was an exciting weekend it was an exciting lead-up okay so here's what here's what happened we we uh oh let's go back on mike oh yeah so hi everyone we're back um so we got an offer to do uh this live are you talking rem me and um was where you were very excited to do it and of course we didn't know what we would do during the show and uh we assumed that it was going to be like most other festivals i've done

like outside lands or what would have you where there's uh like a tent and there's maybe 500 people in the tent or something like that and so that was our perception of it or or at least what we uh when we were visualizing it in our minds that was kind of what what we imagined it was going to be so we had never been to clusterfest we didn't really know what it was so we didn't have anything planned for the show and uh this band reached out to me on twitter and the band is called dead letter office they're from buffalo new york and they are an REM cover band. And they reached out to me on Twitter and said, Hey, do you need a, uh, backing band for the show?

And I thought, well, that's a cool idea. And I remember I sent it to you and, um, sent you a video that of them performing in a bar and you were like, Whoa, these guys are great. And, um, so I kind of had that in the back of my head of like oh okay that could be something that we could do that could be fun you know um uh but i but i hadn't reached out to them at that point then out of the blue out of the clear blue clear sky blue. I get an email from my agent who says, hey- Bartholomew. Bartholomew. And Barty, as I call him, says, hey, would you like to have Peter Buck on the show?

What? What? What? Is this an episode of What, What What What? I believe it is. What, what can I say when I so want you? What can I do? What can I say? Hey everyone, welcome to What What What. This is the show- What, what, what? I'm Scott. This is Scott.

Oh, this is Scott. Hey, what's up? What, what, what, what's up? And this is the show where we say what three times. What? What? What, what, what, what's up? And this is the show where we say what three times. What? What? What? See you, bye. Bye.

What, what can I say when I so want you? What can I do? What can I say? What was the... I don't know. I don't know about the staying power of that. Yeah, I don't know. It feels a little light. Yeah, it seems like they would need to put a murder mystery in it

or something like that to get people interested in. at least sort of a murder mystery yeah just something human element that's what something to hook people into because you can't just watch that or people just sitting around talking about their lives you need to like add some yeah yeah and or their lies or just uh three what's yeah be enough maybe four but i will give it four stars yes five stars five stars five stars um so they said do you want do you want peter buck to be on this show i don't i and at this point i don't know who reached out to him did he reach out i i didn't but i sent it to you and we both just wrote back yes please you know like sure how about this is at the top of the world's stupidest fucking questions uh yeah what's it what's it number two number two i don't know what do you think

i don't have the energy right now you don't have have energy? What do we need to do? Do we need to do some jumping jacks? What needs to happen? I could, when we have a break, I'm going to go get a cup of coffee. How about that? But we're going to a break and then we're not coming back from it. So you're just going to be energy less? Oh, are we not going to come back at the end and kind of catch everyone? Catch everyone up?

On what? On what we were doing while after the show. Well, cause we're playing it in real time. We're going to play the entire show. Yeah. But we're going to talk about before and then never come back. All right.

Um, so in any case, we are just like, yes, of course we would like to have Peter Buck on the show. I don't know how this is happening. And they write back and say, Oh,

okay. Call him at this number. Yeah. Should I give out the number yeah let's give it out it's two two two two two two two two two two two two two what what what so we're just like what we're just supposed to call him and we were recording the last episode i believe with uh with ezra on that day i think or something i can't remember exactly i don't remember but we were here in the studio and we got that email.

We'd gotten it the day before. I was here just to take the picture for that episode. Oh, right, right. So we got that email the day before I saw you in person and neither of us called him that day. No. And then we saw each other the next day. This is 24 hours later.

And we're like, should we call him? Should we call him right now? So we get into that little room over there we call him up he literally answers i would say on the first ring or in the middle of the first like it goes hi just immediately answers the phone and we and we're calling from one of our numbers, which is like, he doesn't know what it is. Yeah. And we ask him to do this show, and he says, yeah, yeah, that sounds great. Yeah, I'll do it.

Yeah. Just so easy. Yeah. Well, we said, do you want to come? You can come record with us, or we can go to you, record with you, or we have this live show in San Francisco that you probably heard about. And he was like, yeah, that's the one i want to do the live show yeah that sounds great now

what i found out later is i think the clusterfest people uh also represent him or something like that so they they knew they could get a message to him um but it just seemed like very much no one ever told us that i'm like oh hey by the way we know peter buck it seemed almost supernatural how it came together it seemed like the show supernatural yeah running for 12 seasons that's right and then canceled and very handsome men at the at the above the title um meaning us yes um so um so the and then we had said, okay, well, you know what would be really fun is if Peter would, we had the idea of having this REM cover band there, but we didn't want to have an REM cover band be there if that was something that Peter did not want to have happen on the same show. Like if he was like, oh no, I prefer it just be like us three talking. Yeah. We had not reached out to Dead Letter Office at the time,

so it wouldn't have been. But we were thinking like that would be awesome to have Dead Letter Office play at the show. Play at the show. But we still hadn't really thought about what we were going to do. So we tentatively or very hesitatingly asked Peter Buck, hey, what do you think about us having this REM cover band there? And would it be fun if you played with them?

Yeah. And you could play with them or you could not play with them or they could not be there, whatever version of it you're interested in doing. And he kind of went, oh, yeah, that's a good idea. Okay. Yeah. It was all really easy. And he couldn't be nicer.

Couldn't have been nicer. And it was just like, okay, well, we're going to surprise this band and have you come out and play with them. He goes, yeah, yeah, that'll be great. Yeah. So. He said, you will have to tell me what songs are so I can learn them. Right. Yeah.

Because he hasn't, I guess, played these songs in a number of years. Yeah. So we hung up with him and we wrote to everyone and said, I guess he's doing the show with us. And they wrote back and said, yep, we just talked to him. Yep, he'll be doing the show with you. So at that point, we're two months out. Something like that. Something before the show.

And we realize we have this great concept of what's going to happen in the show. So I reach out to the band Dead letter office on Twitter and I'm trying to keep it cool. And, um, I just write back something like, Hey, yeah,

we are actually interested in having you guys. What is, what's, you know, are, are you free that weekend? Are you, are you,

are you able to do it? I not knowing where they're from. I, I guess I had assumed they were san francisco local yeah you did um and then uh they they got back to me scott uh the drummer uh became my contact person and uh he got back to me and said yeah we are definitely available we would you know have to fly from buffalo all the way out from buffalo to do it we'll all have to take like a little bit of time off work too yeah it was like and then

the thing is is like the entire time i'm talking to them i just want to say oh you it'll be you'll think it's worth it at the end because peter buck is going to play with you but i can't tell them that yeah we decide that this is going to be a surprise right and little did we know how labor intensive keeping this surprise would be. But to their credit, Scott and the entire band thought that just doing the show with us was enough. Yeah. And they were willing out, willing to fly out from Buffalo and take a little bit of time off work to do it. So like one of them is the chief of staff for their congressman. Like they have real jobs. They have real jobs.

they have real jobs they have real jobs so i um i i then had like two phone calls with scott where i had to seem very blasé about everything that was happening and also i mean the show is pretty loosey-goosey like we don't plan it incredibly but i also had to sort of there the entire time i have the structure of it in my head and a giant chunk of it is talking to peter buck yes and i can't let him know that that's like the majority of the episode so because we have an hour and 15 minutes to fill which is not a small amount of time right but you know the giant 45 minutes of that is filled with peter buck so when i'm talking to him about the structure of it i'm sort of being very vague going like well i think you know you guys will come up and you'll play a song and i'm sort of being very vague going like, well, I think, you know, you guys will come up and you'll play a song and I'm sort of like going through it.

And then I was like, and then it's a certain point, like, well, we might have a guest. And he's like, oh, who are you thinking about having? I'm like, um, I said, well, I knew Todd Berry was going to be at the show. Yeah. Comedian Todd Berry, who's been on the show before. I said, oh, um, we'll probably ask Todd Berry because we know he'll be there he went oh that's great i love todd and his episode was really great yeah i'm like oh dodged a bullet there but i but i know that he knows there's a giant chunk of time in there that i'm being very vague about so um so he's by the way i talked to him later and he's like getting back to the band saying like I think it's going to be very in the moment and not very planned out.

And he's like, just expect that about the show, because it seems like they don't know what they're doing. Yeah. That's hilarious. So in this first phone conversation with Scott, In this first phone conversation with Scott, I am trying to figure out how I can ask him to play these two songs that Peter – by the way, we had checked in with Peter and said, hey, what songs do you want to play with them? And he wrote us back and said, yeah, I think Sitting Still and South Central Rain would be fun to play. I would learn them again.

And we said okay sounds perfect to us my favorite email maybe i have i've ever uh received was when you put it get put it out to peter like which would you like to play first and which should we close with and his response was simply south central rain is the closer it's like yeah and i was like kira sedgwick is the closer to me but yeah i know i don't think he was aware of the of he didn't watch a lot of tv i guess i don't know but um so i'm in my head going okay so here was the plan that i came up with i i said to him so at this point in the show after i talked about what you're going to hear in the next segment which is the show i said at this point in the show, after I talked about what you're going to hear in the next segment, which is the show, I said at this point in the show, I'm going to say that we have a special guest.

And I'm going to hype it up like it's someone really important. Right. But then I'm going to play with you guys. And I'm going to strap on a guitar and play as best as I can with you. But it'll be funny because we're hyping it up like it's someone really cool or whatever. And then it's just me. Yeah. And Scott kind of goes like, Oh, okay. Yeah. That sounds funny. Yeah. Like, you know, obviously not going, Oh my God, what a great bit or whatever. Can't wait. But, but to his credit, not in his head, like saying what he probably was thinking, which is that sounds awful. Yeah.

But to his credit, he was like, yeah, okay. Well, what, what songs do you want to play? I was like, I think we'll, we'll play sitting still. Is that okay? He's like, yeah, yeah, we play that one. That's no problem. And I said, and do you mind first for, to close out the show? Could, could you play South Central Rain?

And he's like, yeah, sure. Now what I didn't know is that raised a, the only sort of question in his brain about what was going on because he knew that song was on neither of our top tens. Oh, that's right.

So he was like, why would they want South Central Rain to be the closer if that's not one of their favorite songs? Because I guess he and the band had been brushing up

on our favorites and had been playing them locally. Interesting. So that was the only question that he had in his mind of like, I wonder why they would want us to close with South Central Rain. But he kind of shrugged and said, yeah, sure, no problem. We'll close with South Central Rain. So then we went into all the details about their instruments

and the Clusterfest very nicely rented all their instruments for them so they didn't have to travel with anything, which was really great. And then Peter, meanwhile, we're like talking to Peter and saying, are you bringing your own guitar? Yeah. And he was apparently at first he thought he was going to bring his own guitar, the famous Rickenbacker. Yep. At first he thought he was going to bring his own guitar, the famous Rickenbacker. Yep. But then the day after we taped our episode, he had a very early flight at 7 in the morning and then had to race from the airport to get to a show to play a show and wouldn't have had time to check the guitar.

Right. So he asked us if we could get a Rickenbacker for him, which the festival again, you know, provided us. But the entire time I'm worried that they're going, because they offered to soundcheck with me. And they're like, hey, so should we soundcheck with you so you can play and hear how you sound with us? And I'm like, I think it'll be better without a soundcheck. I think I'll be like, it'll just be funnier if it's awkward or whatever. It'll be great. They're like, okay, well, do you want the guitar on stage? And in my mind, at the time, it was going to be Peter's famous guitar.

I'm like, oh, no, we'll just bring it out when the moment comes. Because I was like, I think I'm going to be practicing in my hotel room, so I don't want to have it be with your gear. So they, through all of this, they never thought something was up. No, they were like, I think they were nervous enough about just doing the show with us. So at this point, they don't know what's up. And they fly out. We all fly out to San Francisco.

And Peter Dollar Bill wants to hang out with us the night before and talk a little bit about what the show is going to be like. So the three of us go get dinner. We got dinner at a nice Italian ristorante. Oh, we had pasta. We had ravioli. We did. A pizza lasagna.

We did have one piece of lasagna. Or did you say pizza lasagna? Did we have lasagna. We did have one piece of lasagna. Or did you say pizza lasagna? Did we have lasagna? We didn't. We didn't even have pizza. No, we didn't have pizza. You and I had big, thick, juicy steaks. Sticks.

And fries. So we have dinner with Peter the night before, and um we how cool that was very cool was that because we've you know we've told you about hanging out with the people that we talk about on the show i mean it's crazy that we've hung out with all four members of of you two mainly though in an interview setting yeah uh other thano, we were at that party with him later. This was like having a couple of hours just to chat. Right. Which was great.

And we're not going to talk about exactly what we chatted about because, you know, he was on background the entire time. On deep background. Some parts of our lives, they just need to be private. They need to be private. Yeah, it was great. But we were talking a little bit about what we were going to do the next day on the show. And not too much. Like, we didn't want to spoil.

We basically were trying to say, like, so the questions are not incredibly serious. And one thing that he said to me which i thought was very cool is he said you know every time i do an interview everyone always asks me the same like serious questions i'm not that serious of a guy yeah so he goes great yeah they shouldn't be serious we also asked him what's the number one question you're the most sick of and he said where where does the band name come from right yeah just do a little research you can find that info out um he uh he uh what was he gonna say well i don't know because you give me no clues you took the extra precaution of finding a restaurant that could give us a private

room yes because we were worried about word getting out we were worried about any fan seeing a picture or seeing us in like, because some of the restaurants that we scouted beforehand, the tables were like by a window, you know? Or like patio seating. Yeah, and we were worried about any fan taking any picture of the three of us and saying, hey, all three of these guys are in town. Peter must be doing the REM show.

And then somehow the band hearing about it. We were like, wait, let me tell you, because the band texted me the next day the REM show. Right. And then somehow the band hearing about it. Right. We were like, wait, let me tell you, because the band texted me the next day after the show. And we're like, I don't know whether you were keeping it secret from us because you thought we would tell the crowd or we would like leak it or something or whether you wanted it to be a surprise for us. And I was like, it's exclusively the surprise.

Just for them. Like we didn't care that it was a surprise for the audience at all. We were so in our heads excited about just surprising these five guys. One hundred percent. That's all it was. And it was worth it. It was completely worth it. So we got a private room.

It's the three of us in a curtained off, dark, private room at a huge table. Which, by the way, Peter did not seem surprised by. He seemed like, yep, this is the way that it always is for me. Yeah. I mean, he did say on the way, he was like, this is not necessary, you guys. Oh, okay. No one's going to recognize me. Right.

I was like, no, someone would, and we don't want that getting out, so it's just a precaution. So we're talking to peter about the next day a little bit we you know we we didn't really want to fill him in on too much of what the questions were going to be or anything like that um because we wanted to be in the moment with him and you'll hear that um but the the one thing we were sort of talking about was the surprising the band and like towards the very end of the meal he's looking at his schedule and he goes wait what time is the show and we said 3 45 to 5 and he said well i my car is i'm getting picked up at 3 45 and now i know that like he's just staying 15 minutes away from the venue so

i'm like yeah that's probably fine because like you're not going to come on until 4 10 or whatever and we don't want the band to see you like if we go on at 3 45 we don't want the band to see you i go you know we could move it a little bit earlier i think like 3 30 and he goes whoever was making the schedule was taking the precaution of him arriving when the band is already on stage so they don't see him. Yeah. So I go, do you want to change it to 3.30? Because if it takes you 15 minutes,

then we'll be on stage at that point. He goes, you know what? I'm going to change it to 2.15. Yeah. No, 2.45. Okay, 2.45. Which is still way too early. He told us he hates being late.

Right. And he's paranoid about being late so he just wants to get there and be early and so that began this whole thing of like oh we cannot ruin the surprise we cannot ruin the surprise for them so it so we started like trying to figure out exactly when he can get in a car while making contingency plans to try to make sure that the band does not see peter buck so uh um the uh stage manager uh great guy uh jeremy cluster clusterfest jeremy he set up uh an entirely like private office where he put the rickenbacker back there and tuned it and everything so that peter could be spirited away into that and then we were saying to the band

we're being very cagey with the band and very like and you and i are constantly like saying like hey pow wow out in the hall yeah and and they must think we're insane because we're constantly like come out in the hall and talk to me for a minute um and we're saying like oh we maybe we got to get the band down there on the stage at 3 30 because if he's getting picked up at 3 30 even if he's early hopefully they'll miss each other yeah and at like 2 45 we're like let's just go down check out the stage see where we could put the band where right peter's gonna be yeah but because we're like if this is a small stage which is usually the fact in these um um festivals we just need to make sure the stage setup is fine we go down there okay now i had i had seen the venue and it's the bill graham uh civic auditorium in san francisco and i looked it

up and it said capacity 8500 and i was like oh this must be like a cordoned off smaller section or a different room or something like that stage yeah yeah because i've been to shows that like madison square garden they have like a tinier stage down below and stuff. We walk out on stage and it is truly the 8,500 seats. Yeah, well, Jonathan Van Ness' show

was going and we were backstage and so we could look out and we were both in shock. We were like, wait, this is the actual Bill Graham stage?

We did. We asked someone, is this where we're doing our show on this stage? After this show? Yeah. And it'll be great. Yeah. And it's in 25 minutes. Right.

So we're like, we had no idea. So we're like, are there going to be enough people here? And they go, yeah, it'll be fine. So we're freaking out at like the size of it and the band were like i i asked them is this the biggest crowd you've ever played in front of and i i didn't i then was like oh i hope they don't think that i'm saying it like snobby like i'm used to this because i go because it's the biggest crowd i played in front of and they're like yeah it's it's pretty big so um that's kind of raised the stakes a little bit.

And we were getting close to showtime. And I remember we walked up into the dressing room, Kulop, Naomi, and my family was there, my kids. We walk in the room and we kind of look like ghosts. You don't consider Naomi to be part of your family? No, no, no, no, no, completely separate. We walked in and Naomi and and kulop were like are you guys okay what's going on we're like uh we had just found out how big this was like uh i think we're playing to 8 500 people yeah

um which by the way i'm not like nervous about the number of people i'm nervous about there being like nervous about the number of people i'm nervous about there being 6 000 empty seats yeah i was i was nervous about that but i was also mostly thinking about i knew that once we start the thing with the band that leads to peter coming out great but that first like 20 minutes right that we had to fill right when we walked neither on stage. Neither of us had talked about it at all. We had nothing planned at all. And we were so in our heads trying to deal with the surprise part of it. We never really checked in with each other. I had like thought about it in my head a little bit,

but, and that's not to lower your expectations or whatever, because I think it was fine. Yeah, it was really fun. It just was like us, that's how little we were thinking of the actual show itself. That's, little we were thinking of the actual show itself. When we were backstage about to go on, I remember saying, so wait, right when we go out there, the first part, what are we doing? And you said, just like catch up with each other and stuff.

I was like, okay. But that's how much we were like anticipating just surprising these five guys was like our main we'd never met our main job that day um so we we come down stage um and the band is there and jeremy comes over to us and says by the way i have peter secured he's here already and he was he was early yeah he was it was early this was like at uh 3 25 or something and he was already there yeah um but jeremy had secured him and they hadn't seen him and we're like okay well uh all right and uh you know we got the band out there and they in their heads are just kind of like not knowing what's gonna happen

and um so you'll you'll hear it in the show but uh i don't i don't think that we ever like really go into it on mike about how much of the show was about the surprise for these guys and so that's we really just wanted to let you know about that before you hear it, because we don't really discuss it all that much. Yeah. And the guys, when I say instead, when I'm hyping up the person who's going to be coming out and they all think it's me. Yeah. And then I say it's Peter Buck instead, they all look at me. By the way, there's a video out that you can all take a look at of of them of peter buck walking out and being surprised

um they all assume that i'm kidding fucking around and that i'm gonna say no no it's just me and then they all turn their backs and peter comes out behind them and he's there and they're all just like blown away by it so it was absolutely worth it yeah it was it was really cool. Really, really fun. And, uh, and, uh, and, and, and really great. I think that, um, that Peter, uh, did an incredible job out there. And, oh, and the thing about the band is they sounded great. Yeah. We had, we had only seen this, like on our phone, a video of them in a bar. So we, we were like, oh, I wonder how the, how these guys will be on this big stage.

Yeah. And I heard heard first of all just from our perspective they sounded amazing and then i heard a lot about other people like walking by and hearing it and going oh my god is rem playing yeah and and going in and going is that the actual band because they sounded so good yeah and we they opened with a full song before we come out and just watching them back there uh before we went out it was like oh yeah these guys are fucking awesome and this and the songs themselves sound so good live it's just like great hearing anyway if if anyone is looking for uh a band for any sort

of special event um including i don't know what would a special event be to you? Backyard barbecues. Backyard barbecues. Weddings where you need a live drummer. I'm sure that Scott would play along to the DJ as well. Just a bunch of drummers standing around a DJ booth. But Dead Letter Office is... No, but having an R.E.M. tribute band as your band at a wedding would be so fun. That would be really fun if you were into R.E.M. tribute band as your band at a wedding would be so fun. That would be really fun if you were into R.E.M. That's true. But if anyone wants to follow them on Twitter,

they are R.E.M. Tribute D-L-O, Dead Letter Office. And hire them. And this is like the biggest crowd they played to, and they kicked ass. It was really great. And you're going to hear them play several R.E. rem songs over over the course of this is there they're all cool they're all like cool guys yeah really nice guys and they all were just you'll hear it uh but uh you'll hear the actual episode but after the episode they were all just like so over the moon about it and um you know they'd kept it a secret from their fans about what they

were doing because we had asked them, don't tell anyone you're going to be on this show. And, um, they're, they're now today, now that this episode is out, they can finally talk about it with, uh, you know, and, and, uh, put up the videos and we're, and if you want to see videos of Peter, uh, Peter Buck playing with them, Uh, Adam and I just basically like 20 seconds into each song. We're like, Oh, we should be videotaping this. Like we should be filming this on our phone. So we pulled out our phones and just filmed it. Um, the one part that I want to say about the surprise is Todd Berry texted me, uh, like 45 minutes before the show started, he was at the festival and he's like, Hey, do you want me to do a drop in on the show? And I was like, yeah, come by.

But then I suddenly realized the band thought that he was our guest. And so I like called him frantically. I'm like, Hey Todd, when you walk into the dressing room, they all think that you're, you're like the special guest on the show. I like filled him in on it so that he would like walk in and go, Oh yeah, these guys contacted me. Yeah. Weeks ago. That's a really good Todd Berry. Oh, thanks.

But he sounds, he was in on the whole Peter Buck thing. He became- When he showed up. When he showed up, yeah. Because once he got into the dressing room, he didn't give it away. Because I remember when Todd arrived, you were like, okay, Todd's here.

He knows about Peter Buck. He knows about Peter Buck. So everything's cool. Like we were freaked out so i hope that's i think all we have to set up in this show um we're gonna go to a break uh and when we come back i hope that you enjoy this very special episode live episode of are you talking rem me with uh an incredible guest uh it really was very special to happen and to happen. It was special to happen.

Well, it was like an old fashioned like happening, like with this tribute band who ended up being so kick-ass. Right. And then this genuine moment of... Well, I was very glad that for a big, huge auditorium and 8,500 people that we had booked a band that was

like it elevated it was like it was it was really great um so we're gonna go to a break when we come back the show will start and uh it'll it'll play all the way through the entire hour and 15 minutes um uh we did get some viewer mail but we'll talk about it the next time uh so uh enjoy this and we'll see you after the break with, are you talking REM Remy? Radio's gonna stay. Reason it could polish up the brain. Put that, put that, put that to the wall. That this isn't country. Radio Station. Rain, deep station

Desire, your self Keep me out of country and the world Disappointment leading you to sin me out of country in the world disappointment leading you to say push that push that push that to the floor

that this isn't nothing at all straight on the road Well to go Calling out in transit Calling out in it's rancid Calling out, it's rancid

Radio, radio, radio Decide to fire medium too fast Instead of pushing passes too fast Put that, put that, the fact is the fact That this is it for shooting Radio station Decide your sound Call it out in transit Call it out in transit

Radio, radio, radio The sound, the sound Coming out of old The media's too fast To keep me out of Country and the world The disappointment Leading you to sin country and the world disappointment leading you to serve straight

out of the hole where to come home call it out To come home Call it out in transit Call it out in transit

Radio, radio, radio, radio Call it out in transit Call it out in transit Calling out in transit Radio, radio Radio, radio From chronic to collapsed Town and into now that is This is Are You Talking R.E.M. Re-Me

The comprehensive and encyclopedic compendium Of all things REM. This is good rock and roll music. I think it is. I think it is. San Francisco, how are you? Cluster Fest! Wow, wow, amazing.

Everyone, first of all, give it up for Dead Letter Office. This sounded incredible. Our house band for the... You guys are going to be playing with us the entire show, is that right? Yeah, hopefully. Okay, great. All right, cool. We'll check back with you in a second.

They're doing bits with us. Off mic. Always good. How's it going, Clusterfest? My name is Scott Aukerman. Thank you. And there's a man that I want to introduce. He's to the right of me.

You know him from such movies as Tork. Krampus. Krampus, Hot Tub Time Machine 2, and of course, the thing he's most proud of, Ghosted, Adam Scott! Thank you very much, and thank you, Scott. Of course. Adam Scott! Thank you very much, and thank you, Scott. Of course. Thank you.

Before we start the show, is there anyone that you want to say hello to? Oh, anyone? Yes, actually. I would like to say hello to my friends. I would like, yes, thank you. I would like to say hello to my fans. Hello. I would like to say hello to my family. And thank you.

Wow. They're all here. Fans of Adam's family. I would also, I would like to say hello to my family's fans. Thank you very much. And also, Scott, I would like to say hello to you. Thank you so much, Adam. No problem.

Wow. Let me ask, this is a massive, massive crowd, by the way. I believe there are thousands and thousands of people here. Far more than we were expecting. To be honest, we thought there'd be about 100 people here, but we need to figure out how many people have ever heard of our show, Are You Talking R.E.M. Remake? Okay. Okay. Because we thought this was like 18 times our audience when we walked out. How many people here know the band R.E.N.? Maybe a little more than know the podcast, I would say. Slightly more.

So we wanted to try a chant here, because you know of this band that we're gonna be talking about. And it goes a little something like this. When I say R, you say E-M. R? E-M. R? E-M.

That's it. That's the way to do it. There you go. Okay, you're primed. Well done. Well done. So if you've never heard what the show is, Adam and I, we started a podcast where we talk about

the band Hariam, and Hariam. We talk about things like band member names. That's right. We talk about things like album

song titles. And what were you going to say? You were going to say album titles? I was going to say those things they collect all the song titles on the albums. Albums. Album titles. See, album titles.

And song titles. And song titles, yeah. So important. Very important for a band. No matter what the band, you have to have titles for your albums. You have to have titles for your songs. If you don't have those two things, you're nowhere.

Just pack it up. Just pack it up if you don't have those two things. Go home. Go the fuck home. And we're serious. Get the fuck out of here. Seriously. Album titles, song titles.

If you're in a band here today and you don't have song titles and album titles, there's the door. The door's right there. Get the fuck out of here. Get out. So we talk about those things during the show, so this may come up during today's show.

That's right. And hopefully our goal is that you leave here knowing everything about the band R.E.M. that we know. That's right. And here's a REM that we know. That's right. And here's a promise that we make. If we find out something about REM that we didn't know before, that's when you'll know about it.

That's the Are You Talking REM Remy promise. And we make a lot of promises at the start of every episode. That's right. Mainly to each other. Yes. I promise to be a good partner to you. Thank you.

I promise to receive your partnership. Thank you very much, Adam. We have a great show today. We have some special guests. You guys like special guests? I mean... We have some various crazy things that are going to go on today. But before we get to that, Adam, I just want to know,

how do we make our way over to the sitting area without it seeming weird? Okay, hold on. Yeah, let's map this out. All right. I mean, it's not that far. fall well now it's further away back I wish you would have said something okay I feel I want the audience to be able to see us both so now I did this and now I'm even further away if we go here's yours I'll tell you what it looks like a straight shot can we get off mic just

for a sec yeah yeah sure so listen sure. So listen. What's up? I feel like it's gonna be less weird if we go over at the same time, but also super close together so it only looks like one person. You're a genius. Thank you very much. Let's go.

Do you think they're noticing? I don't think they notice a thing great and here we are we did it whoo that wasn't weird so Adam I gotta ask you ever been to I call it the city by the bay. Oh, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. The big city. That's what they call it. The big city. San Francisco. The chilliest of cities.

The chilliest of the big cities. That's what they call it. Have you ever been? Sure, yeah. It's a great city. A great city. San Francisco. Oh, my God.

I grew up nearby in Santa Cruz. More people like Santa Cruz than like San Francisco. It seems that way, which is weird. So, yeah, I've been here at least... How many times? Because I know you. If I know Adam, he's counted every single time that he's ever been to San Francisco. And can list them right now.

That's right. And I'm going to say there was that time, then there was another time, and there was... Oh, there was this other time, and... Twelve times. Twelve times? That's right. Twelve times. Buddy. Thanks. Ow!

Scott, how about you? How about your relationship with the big city? The big kahuna of cities? That's right. San Francisco? I've been here, this is my first time. Oh, interesting. In San Francisco, yeah.

What do you think? I mean, I didn't expect there to be a roof. Yeah, well. And all these lights. Right. And this band over here. Okay. But it's cool, I didn't expect there to be a roof. Yeah, well... And all these lights. Right. And this band over here. Okay. But it's cool. I like it.

Yeah, this is just the theater we're doing the show in. The city is much bigger than this. Really? Bigger than this? Well, it's twice the size of this. So, yeah, it's much bigger than this. Holy shit, this is fucking huge. Yeah, watch your language, but yeah. Which word did you not like that I said?

Holy. Oh, okay. Incredible shit, this is fucking huge. There you go, that's fine with me. Adam. Yeah. I kind of want to tarry no further, and I want to get to the meat or the heart of the show.

Have you ever sat down to dinner? Yeah. And you have, of course, you start with an amuse-bouche. Oh, every night, an amuse-bouche. And you make your wife make them, right? That's right. Honey, I'm home. Amuse-bouche time. I'm ready for my amuse-bouche.

She just pops it right in your mouth. She pops it in my mouth, and I say, thank you, honey. And then it's off to sleep. She pops it in my mouth and I say, thank you, honey. And then it's off to sleep. And then I go to bed. So you've never had meat at a dinner table then before? Well, no. Have you?

I have indeed. And actually, it's my favorite part of the meal sometimes. Meat? Meat, yes. Okay. The protein, as they say. Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. So what I want to do now is get to the meat of the show. Oh, the red meat.

Throw a little red meat to the crowd. Is that what you mean? That's exactly what I mean. All right. And I want to stop fucking around with you. Okay. And I want to turn... Again, language, language, language.

I want to desist fucking around with you. Thank you. So I want to turn my head slightly to the right. Oh, yeah. And talk to our friends in Dead Letter Office. You know what? What do you say? I can't wait for you to turn your head to the right

and we start talking to Dead Letter Office. Well, you're stopping me from doing it right now. I know, because I can't wait. If you would just shut up for a second, I would turn my head and I would talk to the guys from Dead Letter Office. I am so sorry. I'm just excited. Just you talking right now is infuriating me. But I want to do it. I want you to do it. I want to the guys from Dead Letter Office. I am so sorry. I'm just excited. Stop. You talking right now is infuriating me.

I want you to do it. I want you to do it. Would you stop it? Do it. Do it. Do it. Do it. Do it. Do it. Okay. Dead Letter Office. Hi, guys. Hello. Welcome to the show. We, of course, have Scott, Dave, Paul, Chris, and Chuck from Dead Letter Office.

Where are you guys? Let's explain how this happened. We have Scott, Dave, Paul, Chris, and Chuck from Dead Letter Office. Where are you guys? You guys, let's explain how this happened. You reached out to me on Twitter, and when you heard about this show, and you said, do you guys need a house band to do the show? And we said, that's a good idea, because we have nothing planned, obviously. So you guys came, you flew out from where?

From Buffalo, New York. Just to do this show? All the way out here. Yes, right. And how long have you been a band? About three and a half years. Three and a half years? So where do you play normally?

Do you play places like this all the time? Constantly. Yeah. Toronto, Boston, New York. We stay in the Northeast for the most part. Okay. Cleveland, yeah. I guess I meant less cities as actual venues. Stadiums, dive bars, you know, anything. So this is a big crowd for you guys.

It is. Yeah. Absolutely. Beautiful. It is. Yeah. Absolutely. Beautiful. Beautiful. Thank you. And why did you decide to get together to be a band? Well, we all share the same passion, R.E.M., and found each other through different venues, avenues,

and got together, and this is what we're doing. So the story of your band is you wanted to start a band and you decided to. Yeah, it was that easy. You could make an awesome biopic out of that story. Any of you hooked on drugs at least? Give me something interesting. That'll be on the Behind the Music episode coming up. So are there a lot of R.E.M. cover bands out there in the world episode coming up. So are there a lot of REM cover bands

out there in the world? A handful. When you say a handful, what are you talking? How many bands can you fit in your hand? I would say less than 10 that I know of in the United States. Currently in existence,

probably seven, eight. Okay. And are you the premier? Are you considered the best? Well, I... We consider ourselves to be the best. We might be a little biased. I think we can unequivocally say that you are the best here tonight. Yes! Thank you!

You just being here on this stage at the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium means you are the best. That's amazing. Thank you. It's awesome. Ram Civic Auditorium means you are the best. That's amazing. Thank you. That's awesome. So now you guys know a lot of REM songs, and you sent us a list of all the songs you know. And to be honest, I didn't even look at it.

But we thought it would be fun to play a little something called Stump the Band, where we think of REM songs and see if you can play them. Songs. Now, Adam, should there be a punishment where we think of REM songs and see if you can play them. Songs? Now, Adam, should there be a punishment if they don't know the song, or...? Yeah, just a super hard, fast slap across the face. Okay. Who's going to administer the slap?

Are you the slap master? I'm going to slap you really hard across the face. Oh, shit. Guys, please. Do you the slap master? I'm going to slap you really hard across the face. Oh, shit. Guys, please. Do you know the song Happy Birthday? Oh, shit. Okay, so Adam here knows most of the titles, the aforementioned song titles of R.E.M. songs. See, now is the point.

Can we talk a little bit about song titles? Did we cover this? No, no, no. Song titles. Yeah, we talked about songs. See, now is the point. Can we talk a little bit about song titles? Did we cover this? No, no, no. Song titles. Yeah, we talked about it. Okay, sure. Yes, we can throw some song titles out, and then we'll see if these guys can... So what do you got, Adam? I'll give you first pick. Okay, well, let's see here. How about Disturbance

at the Heron House? Disturbance at the Heron House. Disturbance at the Heron House. Oops. Yeah. To change a guitar for that one. We got it. Oh, wow.

I feel like we might be on the verge of a stump. We'll stall it for time. We'll see. That's what she said. Okay. Who said that? Hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on. Who said that? Hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on. Who said that?

Hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on. Who said that? She said that? She sure did. When? When did... Wait, what exactly did she say? She said...

What was it that she said? Like, word for word. We're on the verge of a stump, I think. That's crazy. That is so... Was she talking about my penis? Better yours than mine. That is...

You know what that is? Insulting. That's insulting to me? As a man? It's insulting to me? As a man? It's insulting to me as your friend and co-host. And more than that, it's insulting to my penis. That's right. Tell her.

You know what? I'm too scared. I don't want to say it. I don't want to say it. It's okay. It's okay, Scott. But tell her, fuck. No, no, no, no, no, no. Watch your language. Never mind. I'm sorry scared. I don't want to say it. I don't want to say it. It's okay. It's okay, Scott. But tell her, fuck. No, no, no, no, no, no.

Watch your language. Never mind. I'm sorry. All right. Disturbance at the Heron House. The going wild call came in early morning pre-dawn man

follows the chaos out of control The number in the monkeys monkeys in the monkeys Monkeys and the monkeys The powers of chaos and control The cocking and the cocking Is such a mean and a great example

Try to tell us something we don't know. Okay. Beautiful. They knew it. They did it. They knew it. I thought that was like an obscure one. That was incredible.

Amazing. Scott, how about you throw one of those song titles out there and we'll see how it goes. I'm just gonna, look, I don't know a lot about the band REM. I'm just gonna throw a bunch of random words out and hope that they're a song title. But I remember a friend of mine who once was in the news recently for something. He once said this, and it's stuck in my brain ever since, but what about, what's the frequency, Kenneth? Ooh, that's one of my favorites. That's one of your favorites?

Of the song titles. Right, how do you like the song itself? It's fine. We can try it, right? Another guitar switch. We'll give it a go. Looks like we might be on the verge of a stump. She didn't say it again?

Okay. Let me know. Thank God. She only said it once. Okay. I was printing my time Not to speak I found a picture Hitting its tree It's got a dimension

On the outside screen I never understood The purpose of how I I've never understood something before Give more expectations than I've ever seen All right! That was great. Dead Letter Office, great! That was terrific. Dead Letter Office, great! That was terrific. Amazing.

Well, there's one song that I hope you guys know. It's Adam and I's favorite REM song. It's a song called, How Does It Feel When You're in REM? Do you guys know that? Oh, I hope so.E.M.? Feels good! How does it feel when you're in R.E.M.?

Feels good! Feels good. How does it feel when you're in REM? Feels good. Feels good to be in R.E.M. How does it feel in R.E.M.? Feels good. I love it. I'm stoked.

Oh, Dead Letter Office. Wow. Wow. Now, should we explain that song a little bit for people who might not be aware? Okay. All right. They genuinely probably think it's an R.E.M. Wow. Now, should we explain that song a little bit for people who might not be aware? Okay. All right. They genuinely probably think it's an R.E.M. song.

And a great one at that. Probably their favorite. And they're right. Well, guys, Dead Letter Office, that's amazing. You guys are incredible. You guys are incredible. Thank you so much. Thank you, thank you, thank you. All right, we mentioned special guests

at the top of the show. You guys ready for our first special guest? And this special guest wants to play with the band. Is that okay? So start it up, and we'll describe who it is. Go ahead. All right, this person is an incredible guitar player.

My favorite guitar player ever. Bring it down just a little bit, just a little bit. This person is so handsome. So handsome that people faint when he walks by other people. faint when he walks by other people. This person is an incredible friend. Wouldn't you say so?

Oh, a very close friend. Very close friend. And this person is actually a founding member of the band Hari M. Please welcome Peter Buck. Peter Buck, everybody. Peter, come on. They did not know this was happening. This is real. Let's go. This thing we got, we ought to be She could stop, stop, we were ready

We could fight it in the sand We could gather through a bell Once upon a teeny-fancy Kitchens I could not make City's chopped off, the wind is killing Waste of time, city's dead On the sun and you can't read On the sun and you can't read On the sun if you're not alive

We could party in the cells We could gather from up there On the sun, creepy bottle Kitchen side for nothing Thank you. I mean, we got it all the time. She could stop, stop, we're the world. We could fight it in the sand. We could gather from a hill Off to fall off, keep my turn Kitchen's hot, but I'm laying

Selling dry for money, kill Waste of time, saving the stand How are we? How are we? How are we? How are we? We get together when I talk Talk of 10 more things You can't get away from me

Get away from me At the bar to bar, Katie Bizer Kitchen sauce with nothing Selling trash for nothing Waste of time, sitting still Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha Ha ha ha ha ha ha Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha Peter Bach!

Yes! Dead Letter Office with Peter Bach. Dead Letter Office with Peter Buck. Dead Letter Office with Peter Buck. Amazing. Incredible. Incredible. Peter, come on over here. Oh my God, Peter Buck, everyone. Actual member of REM.

Yeah. Hey there. How's it going man great great wow well thank you thank you so much for being here peter coming good lord how did that feel to be in rem well i think that that song was pretty great and I'm going to get my copyright lawyers on it really quick so good yeah that's a pretty good song it was a good song yeah holds up when was the last time you played that song sometime in 2008

wow on the Accelerate tour if I'm not mistaken yeah and I think you are correct about that. If you haven't heard the show before, Adam cannot stop spouting off information

that he knows about REM. So I hope that's okay for you to be sitting next to uncomfortably next to a super fan if that's alright. It's okay, I've forgotten so much of what happened that it's mostly news to me anyway. Oh, great. So there's a purpose for all of this information in my brain. Adam, do you think Adam knows more about the band REM than you know?

Absolutely. Should we try to play Stump Peter? It's not going to be that hard. And hopefully we're not on the verge of a stump. And hopefully she didn't say that about this. When's somebody going to get into that territory? Peter, thank you so much for being here. You flew in just for this, am I right?

Yeah, I was on tour with the Minus Five, and I agreed to do this a few months ago. And I don't know what prompted me to do this. Looking at the audience, I'm really not sure why I'm here. Did you ever even play to an audience this big? Occasionally we might have reached this size, yeah. We will say that we can't really believe

you're doing this either, and a few months ago when you did agree, I remember the phone call, Scott and I looking at each other like, holy shit, why is he doing this? Also, can I say about the phone call, we were emailed your number and told to call

you personally. We both didn't get really the nerve to do it for 24 hours. We called you 24 hours later and you picked up literally on the first ring yourself from a number that you had no idea what it was. Are you that accessible? You know, I don't even carry my phone. It was just one of those days. But I was actually expecting a possible phone call from a number I didn't know carry my phone. It was just one of those days. But I was actually expecting a possible phone call from a number I didn't know,

and I must have been really bored or something. Thank you so much. It worked in our favor. Yeah. Let me say that. Peter, you're, you know, obviously such an amazing guitarist, songwriter. I mean, that song you wrote back in 1980,

you would say, something like that? Somewhere around there? Yeah, exactly. And it just leads, there's so many questions that Adam and I have had that we've thought of to ask you. And I think primarily the first one, when I started thinking,

and not to get too serious with you, because I know this is a comedy show and this is Clusterfest, but the first thing that just kind of popped in my mind that I was like, okay, to get too serious with you, because I know this is a comedy show and this is Clusterfest, but the first thing that just kind of popped in my mind that I was like, okay, I've always wanted to ask Peter this, is when did you first hear of REM? Well, our first three shows we went unnamed. So I would say our fourth show was the first time I'd heard of REM,

and I was really quite impressed at how well they had their shit together. Great. What an answer. Amazing. Probably the best answer we've gotten yet for that question. Yeah. You've been out on tour recently.

In fact, you flew in from St. Paul or... Yeah, St. Paul. Where you are rehearsing for your new tour, is that right? No, we actually did a show and then I got up at 7 and flew here and prepared for this. Or did not prepare. So nice of you. So you were touring

with Filthy Friends and now you're touring with Minus Five. The Minus Five and we're doing a bunch of stuff. We're doing the Wilco Festival in Massachusetts. Right on. I'm assuming it's in Massachusetts. I don't know.

And then the Baseball Project is another thing Scott and I do. Baseball Project. Baseball Project. If people don't know, you're in a band where you write songs exclusively about America's pastime, as far as I'm concerned. Baseball. I don't even like baseball. Or any organized sport whatsoever but

what about unorganized sports like if something just breaks out yeah absolutely and suddenly like people are tabulating points and you're like great I love it freeform log rolling anything's fine with me

like if this crowd right now in an unorganized fashion and we're not trying to organize it by the way not at all that's not what we're about but just say one of you picked up, you know... A soccer ball. Yeah.

Well, that would be organized. It's a soccer ball. It doesn't make your own... Okay, so it would have to be like a seat back. That would be acceptable. And then you, I don't know, threw it into the air. Or slid it across the ground. We don't know.

We're not trying to organize this. You might want to back off from... Sorry, sorry, sorry. I apologize. But that would be more interesting. As long as there was an opposing force trying to stop them from doing that, that's what makes it a sport.

I don't know. Figure skating? Name the opposing force. There you go. I think figure skating would be a lot more fun if there were people actively out there on the ice trying to stop them. Teams of two, dressed very well. They throw them to the ground, and then they start skating.

That's right. It kind of reminds me, never mind, I was going to say something bad. I'm not going to. What were you going to say bad? Is it something like what she said? No, no, no. Let's just skip that and go on to the very next thing.

Have you ever written a song about a ground rule double? You know, I'm not the songwriter in the baseball band. I've named some of the records. High and Inside was my favorite title. It has at least two meanings. But I'm in a band with these guys who like baseball, and a gal, and they love baseball. And the last baseball game I saw personally, Willie Mays hit a home run, and Willie McCovey hit a grand slam, a candlestick, in 1964.

Wow. Were you there in the field? I don't mean playing. I was in the stands. I mean, I didn't really have an organizational role at that point. I was six. You weren't the manager of the... No. Didn't have a field seat. No.

And yeah, Mike Mills, fellow former REM member, is a huge baseball fan. Yeah. I was a bass player originally, and they were doing these things like playing at baseball stadiums in front of people who thought that Margaritaville is the best song ever written. And it just really, you know, maybe it's the top five.

Yeah, top five, definitely. That's more than fair. Probably top two, and if we're being honest, it's the best song ever written. Okay. But I didn't want to be confronted with that on a daily basis, so I kind of kindly asked Mike to pin shit. And he is a baseball fan. So they could do all those things that are super fun where for them, where they go see a baseball game and hang out with elder gentlemen who have no idea who they are wearing polyester. I mean, you'd think these guys would

not wear polyester, but polyester is still big among that older generation. Yeah, way into polyester. But I play with them for fun, and we're doing some shows, and we're doing five days in Cleveland. And that's where the Baseball Hall of Fame is? Is that correct? No, that would be Cooperstown, New York. Wait, I'm thinking of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. That's indeed where that one is.

They're interchangeable, as far as I'm concerned. Pretty much the same people in each one, yeah. There's nine people in each thing. Yeah. So just to running tabulation, five best songs ever written, Margaritaville, Number one with a bullet. and then Cheeseburger in Paradise four times. In a row.

I've heard Cheeseburger in Paradise more times than I've heard most R.E.M. songs. Why? Anywhere you go where there's water and they sell cheeseburgers, it's the song. And I'm sure it's a lovely song, but I will never eat a hamburger again. Sure.

I used to go to a bar and put $20 worth of Cheeseburger in Paradise in just to see what people would do. I once went on a first date with someone and there were those jukeboxes on the table and I put in $20 to have Tijuana Taxi played over and over and over again. But that's a good song. And a great date, it sounds like.

Well, Peter, you're a founding member of the band Hariam. Hariam. And you've toured all around the world, and you've done everything that a rock star can do. But tell us about your humble beginnings, because you started off working in a record shop, right? As just a clerk in a record store. That's not super humble.

I mean, I was the arrogant record store guy. If you didn't buy what I told you, then you're an idiot. Thankfully, I had really wonderful taste and turned many young children into Miles Davis and Cheap Trick and the Ramones. Wow. That's a great place to start. Which Miles Davis is your favorite? Well, when I worked in retail, that guy Chuck Mangione with the little hat, he sold more records than God. And I'd go, you know, if you like this Chuck Mangione guy, he's certainly fine. But you know, there's this record, Kind of Bloom by Miles Davis. It's kind of a better record. Maybe you could listen to this guy.

And then, you know, I'll get to Bitches Brew a little bit later in our conversation. I think I heard Feels So Good more in my childhood than maybe you've heard Cheeseburger in Paradise. Was that when your mom was touching your penis? Oh, because... Feels So Good. Not that I know of, but my brother was really, really into Chuck Mangione, and I thank him for that because, wow, what an amazing song that is.

Great way to steer it back towards music. I appreciate that. I went a little rogue and I made a penis joke. No, no, no. But I appreciate how you took it right back into the music talk. That's a good host. Adam Scott, everyone. Thank you very much.

So let's talk about your penis. Let's say it's had enough exposure for a lifetime, and I'm done in any way discussing it. This is like probably the biggest crowd that we've ever played to, but you've played to, of course, you know, like huge places, but now you're back sort of playing smaller venues. What do you like better?

Do you like smaller venues, or do you miss the big, just huge arenas and stadiums? You never played stadiums, you just played arenas, right? Is there a difference? I mean, I don't know. Sports occurs in both. I don't know. You know, I'm just really lucky that I got to do this,

and I'm really lucky that I got to see the big stuff, and I'm really lucky that I can go play San Francisco at the Independent or one of those places and get 200 people. Now there are, what, 3,000 people in here? So many of y'all did not attend that show. But just keep me in the morning. I come through San Francisco once or twice a year and do shows, and it's gratifying to have someone come out, you know?

Yeah, even when REM was active, you had tons of side projects and would be playing clubs in between REM days. You just love playing guitar and love playing live. I've been doing it since I was 13. I'm not sure I even understand why or how it happened. And it's probably going to outlast every other thing in my life. How do you mean?

You mean you're going to be... Do you think... Let's say that you had 24 hours to live, and you knew this for whatever reason. I can't even sort of backwards try to figure out why you would know this, but I guess a doctor would tell you. Sure, go ahead. Or a person like a time traveler comes back and lets you know.

And I can't avoid it. And you can't avoid it. And you know, like, the, you know, time is unchangeable. Whatever happens, happens. But they say you have 24 hours to live. What do you want to be doing in those 24 hours? And does it include playing guitar? Yeah, absolutely.

Mostly be my kids. Ideally, I could do something really fun playing guitar with my kids around. Open a bottle of wine and toast the last however many years I've had. And then the executioner comes and just boom, right in the back of the head. Is that

how I'm going? Are you sure? I assume it's a hitman scenario. I don't know. I was kind of assuming it was like a tree falling on me from a random place. Oh, no, no, no. This is like you have powerful, powerful enemies, and they're looking to take you out. Yeah, I got a couple of those, but they're inept. So, you know, having powerful, inept enemies is a good thing. That sounds awful.

It sounds like the cartel is after him. Oh, yeah, and it's in front of your daughters. It's like, you know, just a spatter, the blood spatter everywhere. They've been on tour with me since the week they were born. They've seen everything. It's not going to blow their minds. Yeah, they've seen worse. Adam, this is your chance.

You've wanted to ask Peter Buck questions your entire life. Adam, REM super fan. Yeah. Do you remember the first time that you met Peter or were in close proximity to him? Actually, I was going to ask you, Peter.

I know. That's why I said it. Thank you very much. Again, what a great host, Peter. I know. That's why I said it. Thank you very much. Again, what a great host, everybody. Scott Aukerman. I don't know if you know this, but I was an extra in the video for Drive way back when. And it took two nights to shoot it, as I remember. And on the second night, you were walking towards the band's base camp where you had some trailers and cars and stuff.

And you were about 100 yards away. And I went like this. And you gave me one of these as you were walking. Do you remember that? Absolutely. Absolutely. Right on. It was a thing. Right on. See, that's what I thought. What did you mean by this? Did you mean like one second, I'll be back? Dude. Yeah. That's the dude finger. That's right. Wow. The dude finger. That's what I got that from you. That's what this one is.

Forward. Yep. Right there. You're the guy. You're the dude right there. Amazing. Adam also has an embarrassing story where he found out where you guys were recording. Which album was it? Yeah, you were recording Monster. Don't say that. I'm sorry. It's a scary word for Scott. Just say the scary album.

The scary one. So frightening. You guys were recording on Sunset Boulevard at, I forget the name of that studio, but we somehow found this out, and so my friend worked at a coffee shop, so we all put on green aprons and put coffees in carriers and went there and pretended to be coffee delivery people.

And whoever it was that was manning the door did not buy it because they could see right through us. But the door was cracked open a little and we saw you guys at the boards and heard like a rough version of what's the frequency kind of coming through there. Do you remember that? I don't remember that,

but we were working at the same time as Dionne Warwick, and she had some mean-ass guardians and bouncers. So that was probably her people keeping you out, not mine. Really? Dionne Warwick? Warwick. How do you pronounce her name? Warwick? It doesn't really matter anymore. Yeah.

I thought she was a really nice person, but she was surrounded by like five people who thought that if you looked at her, trouble was coming. Yeah. This is post That's What friends are for? This is kind of post Dionne Warwick. Everything. And I've worshipped her records, and I would have actually loved to say hello, but I saw her and I kind of did the almost hey dude finger, and this guy grabbed

me and shoved me against the wall. Good lord. So that was kind of the end of any camaraderie between the two of us. Shoved you against the wall. Good lord. So that was kind of the end of any camaraderie between the two of us. Shoved you against the wall. I'm relatively certain that it was the Dionne Warwick camp. Probably. That gave you the problem. Not in my camp. Because I did see Microwave and recognized him and talked to him and

I don't know if he was used to... Hold on, hold on. You saw someone named Microwave? That's right. Microwave is a guitar tech? Guitar tech for 17 years. Yeah. Yeah. He's a really nice guy.

Yeah, he's a great guy. Give it up for Microwave. Anyway, he didn't seem like he got recognized that often, and he was super nice. I think that might have been the single time. That's right. Does he remember that? Unfortunately, the gentleman is no longer with us.

Nice one, Scott. He brought that one right with him to his grave. I was once recognized as a guitarist. That's right. Is that on his tombstone? One would never know. Yeah. Peter, we have to, look, there's breaking news in the REM camp

and we have to ask you about it and we would not be the journalists that we are if we did not bring this up but breaking news came out about the Universal fire that if people don't know about this, basically there's a huge fire at the Universal Studios backlot

and a bunch of bands stored their the masters of their recordings in there, and they were all burnt to a crisp, supposedly, and news of this is just coming out. And you were mentioned in the New York Times article as REM's master recordings might have been in that fire and might be lost forever. What can you say about that? I was under the impression that we kept that stuff ourselves. That doesn't mean there aren't things of ours that are there, but I don't know. I think my

lawyer told me I should never talk about this ever. Well, he's not here, so fuck him. Yeah, he'll hear about it in like, oh, eight minutes. I actually don't know what burned up. I don't know whose stuff burned up, but it seems to me the stuff that actually burned up that was most important was probably like the chess records and the unreleased Muddy Waters stuff and things that we'll never get a chance to hear again. I know there are copies of the REM stuff somewhere

if the world finds it necessary to have all that stuff. Well, they are finding it necessary for a 25th anniversary release of the Scary record. Sorry, Scott. Thank you. Wait, I had a follow-up about Universal Studios.

Have you ever ridden that Jurassic Park ride? No. It's pretty terrifying. Yeah, talk about scary. Oh, my God. Yeah. I played their amphitheater. No, I didn't.

I saw The Grateful Dead at their amphitheater. You did? Yes. In 1973, and it was great, and there was a fire, and everybody was so high that they just kind of watched the firemen put it out and applauded. That's not the fire that burnt up all the recordings, is it? I hope it wasn't the same one. Because you might have started that.

No, I was just watching The Grateful Dead, and believe me, I was in no-fit state to start a fire. I believe you guys did play the uniform. We did. They put a roof on it. That's right. It's a lot like this place. Yeah, it had no roof. And it was a really beautiful outdoor thing. And then when we played there, I was going,

yeah, this place is totally cool. I saw the Dead here in 72, and man, it's like you can see these fields and everything. And we walked in, and they had a roof on it. So I was really confused. Do you remember the first band that you ever saw live? Yeah, actually, I do. It was T-Rex.

T-Rex. Really? Whoa. But that doesn't quite count because the Doobie Brothers opened. The Doobie Brothers opened for T-Rex. Yeah. And the great thing, Atlanta had a fairly big gay scene. I was 14 and I pushed away to the front and there was a bunch of people

men, some of them in dresses, you know when I was 14 and it was a little different for me, but it was like, that's cool. And Mark Boland sat down and did an acoustic set right in front of the stage, right a foot from me. And he was drinking this little glass and he handed it out to the guy right there. Yeah. And the guy took a sip and handed it down.

That guy took a sip and handed it down and handed it to me. I took a sip and I drank it. Wow. And I went, wow, what's that? And the guy looks at me and goes, don't you know? That's Mark's favorite drink, red wine and Coca-Cola. Delicious. That might have been the first time I ever tried red wine.

Barfarama. It's called Cala Mocho, and they dig it in Spain. Really? All right. I'll try one tonight. It might have been the first time I drank red wine. It's certainly the only time I ever shared a cup with Mark Bolan. And it all went on from there. That's amazing. What an incredible first band to see. My mom took me to see Jesus Art, Christ's Stupid Star before that, but I don't really count it as I went with my mom.

Yeah, it wasn't a real band. No, I was 12. My first band is Dead Letter Office. Them right there. Tonight was the first time. Yeah, tonight's the first band I Dead Letter Office. Them right there. Tonight was the first time. Yeah, tonight's the first band I've ever seen. You don't get on much. Oh, no. Wow. Wise. Wow.

You got a question, bro? Sure. I do have to say, I'm getting a text, and we have another special guest. Oh. Is that, and it's someone, not to, you know, kind of neg you or anything, but it's someone not to, you know, kind of neg you or anything, but it's someone a little bit bigger than you, actually.

I like tall people, it's okay. Okay, great. Dead Letter Office, are you ready for this? Because you're gonna be doubly excited. Please welcome to the stage, Todd Berry. Wow. Wow. Todd Berry, everyone.

Todd fucking Berry. It's Todd Berry. Watch your language. It's Todd Berry. You guys know how to build a show. Don't say Todd. I like to build with a show. You have R.E.M. tribute band.

You have someone from R.E.M., you have someone from R.E.M., and you have someone who had four lines in Road Trip. Do you know Todd, Peter? We have never met, I don't believe. We actually have met. You have met. When did we meet? I have a picture of you on my phone.

I actually showed it to you in Seattle. We met in 1984. Oh, in 84. So let me guess. We both had more hair then? We did. That's why it's hard sometimes. This is an extraordinary photo, as far as I remember.

Yeah, I mean, it's a little... Were you at a party? We were at a party in Boca Raton. After you played F.A.U. Oh, my God. Boca Raton. Yeah. No wonder I don't remember.

I can't believe you forgot the Boca Raton gig. No, I remember the gig. I don't remember what happened afterwards. This is what happened afterwards. If you've got the photo, I want to see it. You want to see it right now? Well, I mean, no time like the present, Todd. Roll it out.

Let's see that fucking photo. We want everyone to chant, Todd, pull it out. Todd, pull it out. Todd, pull it out. Todd, pull it out! I don't know if I'm going to be able to find it. Oh, great. You know, you're all big talk, Todd Berry. I didn't know that I was going to be pulling out a photo at a podcast.

Life is crazy, isn't it? Nobody really explained this whole podcast that is with people, their thing. I'm still a little confused. You're still confused. Well, do you remember something called the radio? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Tubes, it glowed. Yeah. Yeah, it's Lone Ranger, that kind of stuff. Yeah, it's all Tubes. It's all the Lone Ranger. Yeah. Do you remember the first song of yours that you ever heard on the radio? Was that a big thrill for you? Yeah, it was, I think, Radio Free Europe Europe and the first single was mastered really badly

and it was so depressing sounding next to the other stuff that I just wanted to start crying oh man and did you cry like a pussy? no I kind of I might have shed a manly tear or two one manly tear is okay

that's fine someone just texted me the picture. Really? Texted you the picture? This is the world we live in. Thank you very much. Someone in the audience? There it is. You might be embarrassed to be in.

Can we get the camera to zoom in on this? Oh, you're right over here. You're able to do it, maybe. This is perfect for a 5,000-seater. I'm going to bring it over to them. I was in a band, and we handed you a flyer, and you shoved it down your pants. I can't believe I did that. I do remember that.

I looked pretty good considering I've been up for four days. How did they get that on the big... Yeah, I'm going to walk over to the cameraman, and we'll see if everyone can see it. But this is a picture of Todd Berry, and how far back do I need to be? Like about here? This is a picture of Todd Berry in REM. Check that out. Wow. Amazing. Well, I hope that did your band some good

You know, Peter, you talk about really loving to sequence your albums Is there, I don't know if you know this but on the podcast, Scott and I have fussed with the sequencing of a couple of albums Every once in a while we'll listen to one of your

records and go like, we would have sequenced it a little bit differently. I feel the same way about many of my records too, so don't feel bad. Really? So it's okay. We have fun doing it and we'll put it in different orders, but you like to do that for your records, right? Yeah, it was kind of my job for quite

a long time until it was decided that it was no longer my job. Not saying that it got any worse it just got a little different um i kind of like i don't know i think i it's like doing a show it's like what's the singer got to say my job is to stand there and make sure that whatever that guy's got to say it's got to flow from one thing to the next and end up you know you start at the beginning you end at the end like almost everything you Sequencing is just the order that the song's gone. Adam, shut up. They don't care.

They're not even listening. No, it is really interesting and there are, one thing that REM did really well was finish albums. Had these big epic closers. Todd, anything to say about that? About sequencing? Sure. I leave it up to the band to do that.

I don't try to reset. I don't go and I'm going to go, hey, I should take a stab at sequencing? Sure. I leave it up to the band to do that. So you... I don't try to... I don't go ahead and get an album and go, hey, I should take a stab at sequencing this myself. But I do remaster albums. You do? That's great. I will remaster an album on my own. I remember you saying when you came on the show

that you were a huge R.E.M. fan as well. Yeah, I just... I'm in the picture. That's right. So that means you were a huge R.E.M. fan as well. Yeah, I'm in the picture. That's right. So that means you were a huge R.E.M. fan. I'm not a Johnny-come-lately. Now, what year was that that you saw horror R.E.M.? I think that was 84. Okay. Reckoning era?

Yeah. Who was with us? The DBs. The DBs, yeah. We did the Dreams to the DBs that year. Amazing. Still two great bands that are still kind of working. Yeah. I think the band, Dead Letter Office, probably has some questions for Peter Buck, right?

You probably have always wanted to ask him something, right? So, you know, feel free to ask a question over here. Now is your chance, guys. It could be about, like, different chords. Like, A minor. It could be about album or song titles. It could be about sequencing. People seemed really interested in that.

I'll explain it again if I have to. Peter, what is your favorite REM record? Wow! Whoa. Peter, what is your favorite REM record? Wow! You know, I don't know. I got an email from someone mentioning a song, and I didn't have any idea what the song was. So I went online and looked it up, and it was from our last album, Collapse Into Now.

And I just didn't have any memory of the song or the album, so played it and just kind of thought you know that's a great record to say goodbye you know maybe it's not our best record but we knew it was the end we wanted to send it out to everybody great record great record yet yeah in the Hall of Fame show your amp was acting up and at the, you threw it off the stage. Yeah. And I was wondering what happened, what was going on. Well, you know, you sound check for five hours and you have all these little nobodies running around fixing things, and the second you're on stage,

your amp doesn't work. And anyone who's ever picked up one of those knows they weigh 80 pounds. I managed to get it about 10 feet off the ground and 15 feet out in the audience. It was really great. And, you know, what else was I going to do?

It's a Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. It's a bunch of bullshit. I mean, who cares? Great questions from Dead Letter Office. Amazing. Now, I think you guys were a very political band. You were very outspoken. And we're similarly outspoken about politics on this show.

Mainly, you know, sometimes I think that the commander-in-chief is a little more like the Cheeto-in-chief. Okay, that's about as far as we go. I don't get it, but yeah, that sounds pretty... Well, Cheetos are orange, and he's sort of orange. Oh, right, that's about as far as we go. I don't, I don't get it, but yeah, that sounds pretty. He's, well, Cheetos are orange and he's sort of orange.

right, right, right, that's really funny. But you, you grew up, you were like a teenager when Richard Nixon

stepped down, stepped out of office and you had a band called Richard M. Nixon. How did that affect you as a teenager and what do you think about what's going on now? I give you the floor to just let it rip. You know, as an old person, it's hard to get quite as enraged as a young person. You know, my main fear when I was 14 is that Richard Nixon was

going to kidnap me, shave my head, send me off to Vietnam to die for a rich man's accident. send me off to Vietnam to die for a rich man's accident. And I look around now, I don't know. Honestly, my kids are 25, and I meet all kinds of 25-year-olds. They're kind of amazing people, way more amazing than my generation was. Certainly the ones before us. You know, I just got to hope that the good people win, you know? And the thing Kurt Vonnegut said, the last thing he said was,

just be nice to each other. Yeah. Shut the fuck up for a second. Sorry. I think that that is such good advice. Just be nice to people, because life's too short to be Kurt and to, like, you know, be mean to the people that you love.

Shut the fuck up! Sorry, sorry. I'm talking to Peter Buck to the people that you love. Shut the fuck up. Sorry, sorry, sorry. I'm talking to Peter Buck. He stole my fucking line. Well, that's wonderful. Todd? Same question. Oh, what was the question?

You had a band called Richard M. Nixon. I did. I did a band called Spiro. Nixon. I did. I did a band called Spiro Agnew. Spiro Agnew. Did you know that Spiro Agnew, the anagram for that

is grow a penis? I'm sorry, what was that? The anagram for Spiro Agnew is grow a penis. Oh my God. Do you think

that it's someone That's what she said. Like a suit. That is what she said. Look how happy that guy is. I was making fun of you. Just

so there's no... Just so we're clear about that. Do you know anagrams for other people in politics? No, that was actually just, I read it in National Lampoon when I was 13, and it stuck with me for many years. Really? It's a really good one. Yeah, it's like everything's

there. Grow a penis. Yeah, grow a penis, Spiro Agnew. Do you think he knew that about himself? It would explain a lot. Yeah, yeah. He was a real piece of shit, wasn't he? You're not getting any laughs because nobody knows who he is. Yeah. Yeah. He was a real piece of shit, wasn't he? You know, you're not getting any laughs

because nobody knows who he is. Yeah. My, my, when I used to be kind of popular, my hotel room name was Richard M. Nixon and I'd check into hotels and not once did anyone even look twice. Yeah. And then, you know, I mean, he was president and, you know, and let me check in a hotel in 1995. Yeah. Richard M. Nixon, please. Hmm. How do you spell that? It's like, you know, maybe check in a hotel in 1995 and go, yeah, Richard M. Nixon, please. Hmm, how do you spell that? It's like, you know, like the fucking president. Yeah. Well, that's what's going to happen to all of us. We'll just drift away and fade away

and no one will remember anything we ever did. And we will all be forgotten. I'm three quarters of the way there now and it's pretty good how many people know who Richard Nixon is and was okay

how many people know what sequencing is more people know sequencing than Richard Nixon and it might be because I just explained it really well. I can re-explain. Is there anyone that didn't get it? Because I can... No? Okay. I'll talk about it after. We have a sequencing

mini-forum after. Alright, this is the part of the show where we take your questions. Does anyone in the audience have a question? Yeah, right there. I wanted to hear your favorite memory associated with REM. Well, I remember being a 15-year-old boy and seeing the poster to Chronic Town up on my friend's wall, and I said, who is that, what band is that?

And he told me it was REM and I went out and bought it the next day and loved it and that kinda changed the way that I viewed about music. Anyone else? Yes, right there. This one's for Peter. I didn't hear it. He wants to know if you want to hang out with him

and listen to REM. You buying the drinks? Yeah, cool. I'll meet you in the lobby right after. Done. Right there. She wants to know out of all the subjects to make a podcast about why REM. You know, I asked this guy that too.

It seems really ridiculous. It's a good question. Well, I don't know that much about that much. But I know quite a bit about this man's band. And I had to put it somewhere. My family was sick of hearing me talk about it. Did you consider up your butt? See, after the podcast is done,

and we're probably pretty close to finished, I am, for the record, going to take all of the information and put it up my butt. And by the way, if you have not heard our show before, you also have a promise that if you ever win an Oscar, what are you going to do with it? Do you remember? I don't remember. You're going to take it and say,

thank you to the Academy, I'm going to go put this up my butt. Oh, right. Right. Did I make that promise on the show? Yes, you did. I'd like to make that promise as well. So you're making that promise? Yeah.

Let's all join hands and say we will do that together. All of us. I, unfortunately, have an actual shot at it, so no. Wow. Talk about chickening out. Wow. My Rock and Roll Hall of Fame thing holds the toilet paper roll in my guest bathroom.

Is it really? But it's my guest bathroom, so the guests can enjoy the humor as well as myself. Wow. Those that have to use the bathroom at my house. I wonder how many photos of that have been taken. My niece calls it the toilet paper champion. That's great.

How many Grammys did you guys win? You know. You wore your pajamas to the Grammys, if I remember correctly. I wouldn't go to the award shows because honestly I think they're all bullshit and I hate them all and it's not a competition. Other than the Oscars,

the Emmys, the Tonys, and the Grammys, of course. Spike Guy's Choice Award. The Blockbuster Awards, I remember as being really terrific. But the guys in the band basically forced me to go. And I said, I'm not fucking going. I hate this thing. And they said, it really makes us look bad if you don't.

So I said, okay, fine. I'm going to wear my fucking pajamas. And he went, okay, great. And I rolled out of the car in my pajamas. And everyone took a look at me and their jaws dropped. And I was like, you know what? Fuck every one of you people in your tuxedos. The next year we went and I wore a different set of pajamas

that were even nicer than the others. And Michael, in his all-out attempt to beat me, had rented a powder blue tuxedo with a cowboy hat. And we both got out of our separate limos and looked at each other and I don't know, I still think I had them beat. Wow. Of course, we were beat by Whitney Houston like a gong. So it really didn't matter what I wore.

But when you think about it, you beat her in life. Because you're still here. Oh, man. What? I never would have agreed to be your special guest if I knew you were going to go. That poor woman. I like some of her records. Doesn't mean that I think that she should have beat us like a

goddamn gong, but you know, it wasn't her fault. It was all the idiots who vote for that crap. Right. So how many did you win? It's like less than ten and more than two. He doesn't care, Scott. I'm interested! You know, I don't know if we ever won for anything good.

I think it was all like, you know, good. Oh, yeah, you did. It's like design or, you know. Oh, right. No, but you guys won for some stuff for out of time and losing my religion and stuff, like Grammys. Yeah, like best video or something, which I have nothing to do with.

It doesn't really matter. All that stuff, it's in a closet somewhere. And when I die, my kids are going to have to deal with it. with it and they're gonna look at it and go what is all this crap and that's exactly what it is i don't i don't it's a grammy you i think people where your kids want it you can have your grand wait wait wait hold on we can have it i'm pretty sure i have enough for at least the two of you yeah fuck yeah right i'll take it. I'll take it. I met you first, man. That's not cool. Well, Todd, you can come over and spend some time with it.

I can hang out with Peterbuck's Grammys? Yeah. Wow. We're going to take you up on this. Cool. We just have time for one last question, and it takes a little bit of explaining, but Adam and I, basically we started this podcast because we want the band R.E.M. to reunite and play a backyard barbecue in one of our houses.

And basically the reason for doing this is because we figure we can fit like about 100 people into our backyards, charge like $10 a head. That's like $1,000. That's real money. It's real money. But just to be clear, the money is for us. The money is for us. It's not for you. And the contract I saw also suggested that all publishing rights and ownership of the Masters would go to you two guys also.

Yeah, I mean, there's some fine print that you don't even have to really take a look at. It was a very enticing offer. It's just we were kind of busy that weekend. The best part about it is we will give you eight comps. Two per band member. Andy Warhol will be one of mine. Is he still around? I think he went the Whitney Houston route.

I'm not sure. Well, then I only really need one. You only need one? One comp. Great. So we've already talked to Mike Mills on the show, and he's agreed to it. You're the second REM member that we've talked to.

What do you think about playing this backyard barbecue? Also, the set list is written up by Scott and I. You guys have no say. You will sequence the set list. Yeah, yeah. We will sequence the set list. And just putting the set list, what order the set list goes in? Is the sequencing...

Shut up, shut up. He's on the hook. Okay, sorry, sorry. I'll do audience warm-up for the show. Yeah, that'll be part of it. I'm in. Okay. You're in!

He's in! I'm in. This is a verbal commitment in court that holds up. Vocal commitment. Well, Adam and I want to thank our guests. First of all, Todd. What a treat. Todd Berry, thank you. Thank you for coming out here

and blow everyone away. Thank you for coming out. You have some shows, you're opening for TIG tomorrow, is that right? I am, in this very venue. In this very venue. Yeah. I want to thank our band, Dead Letter Office. So wonderful.

You're going to play another song here with us. And Peter, Peter Buck, everyone. Peter Buck, thank you so much. Peter, will you play this song with the band? Peter's going to play one last song. We want to thank everyone so much for coming out to see us. This has been a really fun time. Yeah, this has been great.

Thank you for coming out and actually filling this place. This is crazy. This is crazy. Thank you very much. So we'll see you soon. And until then, we hope that you found what you're looking for. Bye. I'm waiting for your call Rivers of suggestion

Are driving me away The trees were bad The city's washed away City on a river That's a girl without a dream I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry

I'm sorry I'm sorry Listen to the magic That I'm putting on This is the man with the money power That has a telling why I'm not a man of my own I'm not a man of my own The trees were high The conversation was dead

But there's yourself in the room I'm sorry. I'm sorry. guitar solo I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. guitar solo Dead Letter Office, Peter Buck! Thank you very much! Thanks, everybody!