It started as a pop-up performance or two, then a Tonight Show appearance. Before they knew it, Michael Shannon and Jason Narducy were on tour playing R.E.M. albums front to back.
“This was not planned. This is just this thing that Michael and I were doing in Chicago, and we started getting emails from promoters around the country saying they wanted to try it, and then people showed up at the show,” says Narducy. “It built up organically.”
As the band moved from one album to the next, the tours grew. Now, performing 1986’s Lifes Rich Pageant, the verbosely titled band are making their first stop in Austin. From his home in Chicago, Narducy muses over the reasons for their growing traction.
There’s the fact that the seminal Eighties art-rock band doesn’t tour anymore, and that they gave Shannon, Narducy, and company their official seal of approval when the quartet joined them on stage in their Athens, Ga., hometown for a rendition of “Pretty Persuasion” in February 2025.
There’s also Shannon’s silver screen notoriety. The Kentucky-born actor, known for his somber and intense character roles, has appeared in countless films since the Nineties, from Eminem’s 8 Mile to Jeff Nichols’ Mud. More recently, he made an impression in 2017 Best Picture winner The Shape of Water, and as General Zod in Man of Steel and Flash. Shannon’s found his way further into the spotlight on television, starring in Showtime’s George & Tammy as George Jones and playing James Garfield in Netflix’s Death by Lightning.
“Some people go, ‘He’s an actor, so it makes sense that he can front a band.’ That’s just not true,” debunks Narducy. He would know. The guitarist, bassist, and songwriter formed Illinois punk band Verboten and went on to play with Superchunk, Sunny Day Real Estate, and Bob Mould. Alongside his current solo project, Split Single, Narducy stays busy touring with those acts and sitting in with other Eighties and Nineties-era rock acts, all stints that informed the stories in his recently published tribute to life on the road: Mostly the Van (Volume One). For true indie rock heads, Narducy’s name is enough to catch attention.
Narducy recruited many of the so-billed friends joining them on this tour from that same rotating cast of guitar-forward bands. There’s Bob Mould and Superchunk bandmade Jon Wurster on drums, who recorded with R.E.M. themselves in the early Aughts. Wilco’s John Stirratt joins the group on bass, alongside prolific folk guitarist Dag Juhlin and producer/keyboardist Vijay Tellis-Nayak.
Even with their varied, extensive experience, playing even short tours as a tribute band is new for most of the band members, including Narducy.
“Peter Buck is a great guitar player and it’s been a joy to get inside these songs,” he says. Since their shared performance, Buck has even lent Narducy some of his tips and tricks, which is “like taking a college course from an amazing professor.” Those informal classes, the guitarist realizes in hindsight, are something of a refresher course. Learning to play guitar to R.E.M.’s songs and listening to them throughout their career impacted his playing style in ways he didn’t fully recognize before diving so completely into the alt-rock act’s discography.
“It’s also a journey for me as a songwriter to recognize these unusual chord structures that I heard this band play decades ago and unknowingly integrated into my own music,” says Narducy.
The live performances, for band and crowd alike, are intended as a celebration of R.E.M.’s musicianship and the legacy of their distinct sound. “Our band takes no ownership of these R.E.M. songs,” Narducy insists. “We are celebrating them as much as anybody in the audience.”
Michael Shannon & Jason Narducy & Friends will play R.E.M.’s Lifes Rich Pageant and other songs on Feb. 21 at Emo’s.