This Saturday, September 18, marks exactly 20 years since the release of Superchunk’s Here’s to Shutting Up, which will be reissued on October 22 with a new vinyl color, demos, a koozie, and more. In the fall of 2001, the band embarked on a tour of Japan, Europe, and North America with Mac McCaughan’s Sony MiniDV camcorder in tow. That footage became a tour documentary called Quest for Sleep that captured not only the Chapel Hill quartet in a transitional state, but our nation and the world at large as well. Originally confined to Superchunk’s Crowding Up Your Visual Field DVD, Quest for Sleep is available to the internet age for the first time starting today. Grab some popcorn and keep your eyes peeled for cameos from a few familiar faces.

McCaughan on touring around Here’s to Shutting Up:

[The album’s] release date moved a couple weeks, but our tour dates remained and we flew to Japan in October. It was a WILD time to be traveling the world. Receptions ranged from “thank you for giving us something else to think about” to “why are you here?” We flew home from Japan and left for the UK the day the US started bombing Afghanistan. This was the climate, and the climate was not great for playing rock music. People were thinking about other things.

Our friend Annie Hayden (of the band Spent) joined us on keyboards and guitar for the US leg which was an exciting expansion of our lineup and a fun way to play old songs in a new way. We had some great shows along the way and got to tour with excellent openers like Rilo Kiley, The Good Life, and Aereogramme. But the fear in the air and the length of the tour was exhausting. Some of the most fun times of the tour were the acoustic in-stores we did, which you can hear on the first Clambake we released.

For an article about the NYC music scene in the wake of 9/11, McCaughan recently spoke with Variety about the ad-hoc show he helped organize at Bowery Ballroom with The Clean, The Ladybug Transistor, and others.

The 20th anniversary reissue of Here’s to Shutting Up is available on CD, LP, and limited-edition orange swirl Peak Vinyl. All three formats will include “Bestial Warning,” a bonus CD of 13 previously unreleased demos. The vinyl packaging features a printed vellum overwrap, and the Deluxe Peak Vinyl version also comes with a 24” × 24” color poster. We’ve also re-created the original HTSU t-shirt and koozie to celebrate the occasion, both of which can be bundled with the reissue at a discount exclusively in the Merge store. Pre-order today.