Back in September I wrote a little article about the R.E.M. tribute concert at the 40 Watt, which featured a number of bands covering Athens' finest, including An Observatory, a supergroup fronted by Bill Doss (The Sunshine Fix, Olivia Tremor Control) and featuring OTC's Will Hart, Peter Erchick, and John Fernandes, with Kevin Evans, Fabulous Bird’s Peter Alvanos and Trey McManus, Sunshine Fix’s Kevin Sweeney, Jacob Morris, Dark Meat’s Charlie Estes, Pylon’s Vanessa Hay, Of Montreal’s B.P. Helium, and Beijing’s Andrew Hawthorne and Taylor Coggin. R.E.M.’s Peter Buck also played guitar with the band. Then a couple weeks ago I announced that Athens Music is planning on releasing a CD featuring excerpts from the concert (which should be up for pre-order at their site soon).

Now Trey of said band mentioned that on the 2006 R.E.M. fan club Christmas single, a bonus track featured the Observatory's cover of "These Days" from that concert. You can hear it below.

Of this track, B.P. Helium (backing vocals) wrote Optical Atlas, "After our show, Bill or somebody comes up to me and says that Mike Mills was going crazy over my vocals on 'These Days.' He said he was going to change his vocal part to mine. Then the man himself found me and ecstatically told me the same thing. He said Michael Stipe came up with the original harmony, but that he never liked it. Stipe also said he loved it. He said we sounded like Jefferson Airplane, and that I sounded like Grace Slick. Which I guess is a compliment!"

Here it is...a big thanks to Trey for sending this our way. Keep checking the Athens Music site for pre-order information, which should be coming soon!

An Observatory: These Days (Live) [R.E.M. cover]