R.E.M. - 6 November 1998 - Orpheum, Vienna, Austria

Before the concert, Mike, Peter and Ken Stringfellow with a staff member crossed the room quickly and went on the stage, nobody had seen them. At the beginning of the show Michael said there must be people from Austria, Switzerland here in the place and asked who came from Switzerland.

He was so smiling with make up on the eyes. We were at about one meter from the stage, at the same level and there was nothing between us and them, just some staff.

During all of the show they were drinking red wine between the songs. Michael talked about new socks he just had bought in Austria he said "since i don't have time to wash myself, since I put everything in my voice and my throat..." he finally said "not really!"

There were some jokes as " now we will play a radio song" and everybody thought that he had said "Radio song". Michael: "no, no, no I said A radio song not Radio song!"

At the middle of the show Michael made a sign to the staff to let us come just near the stage, we could touch them all.

After the break, Michael came alone and played I'm not over you on the guitar. At a moment they didn't know what to play and everybody asked Michael to play a song and he talked with us, saying "not this one, I don't remember the lyrics", or things like that.

Near the end of the show Mike sprung back in the public and we pushed him back on the stage.

During PASSENGER, the sound was cut and everybody was singing la la la, since as good fans they knew the song, and Joe Waronker played drums on it with us singing, then the sound came back and Michael sang it on.

Anne Hierholtz

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