ERM - American Landscape (REM tribute)

ERM (Adam Smith, William Drew-Batty and Mike Davison) began their creative collaboration in 2022 when they performed Flannan Isle, Drew-Batty’s part-scored, part-improvised opera set in the Outer Hebrides.

Exploring the REM songbook was perhaps an unlikely next step, but soon the three musicians were playing live in pubs and pub gardens in their home counties of Norfolk and Suffolk. American Landscape took the project further – unplugged performances in intimate venues and the introduction of poems and other texts.

The songs of Michael Stipe et al offer an alternative, often critical perspective on modern America, not unlike that found in the work of beat poets such as Allen Ginsberg, novelists like John Steinbeck and songwriters including Patti Smith and Bob Dylan. The combination of classic REM songs on piano, guitar and vocals, interspersed with carefully chosen readings, offers both the familiar and the new, enjoyable and stimulating in equal measure.