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The Talking Heads are great.

post #1 of 23
9/20/08 at 9:50pm
Thread Starter 
So aside from catching up on Pearl Jam I got some Talking Head CDs and also the Stop Making Sense DVD. Specifically I got Talking Heads 77 and Fear of Music. I really enjoyed 77 but I loved Fear of Music. The DVD is also great. Awesome live performance.
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post #2 of 23
9/20/08 at 10:06pm
Talking Heads was one of the most important bands of New Wave period. I don't understand why they're not more widely recognized for it. Bands like Blondie and The Police seem to have stolen a lot of their historical thunder.
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post #3 of 23
9/20/08 at 10:10pm
Despite all the talk about him apparently being kind of a cock to his bandmates, David Byrne is my longest-standing favorite musician, pretty much ever. There's nothing, from the early Talking Heads recordings to his recent solo stuff, that I can't enjoy on at least some levels.

Fun story, one of my friends can't listen to "Burning Down The House" because the "words are strangely formed and elongated." Apparently, it drives him mad.
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post #4 of 23
9/20/08 at 10:12pm
Two words: True Stories.

Both the album and DVD are must-haves. The movie isn't available in WS though, which sucks. A Criterion disc of the film would be killer.

All of the Eno produced albums are great, Fear of Music and Remain in Light are my personal favorites.

And Naked is a great swan song for the band. It's pretty much Byrne's primer for his world beat solo stuff.

The Talking Heads are great. One of my top five favorite bands of all time.
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post #5 of 23
9/20/08 at 10:18pm
Thread Starter 
Whats funny is that i dont even really like New Wave. When I think of New Wave I think Duran Duran and Devo which I never got into but the Talking Heads are so catchy. They're songs make me want to dance.


"Psycho Killer" and "Life During Wartime" are particuraly awesome.
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post #6 of 23
9/20/08 at 11:20pm
Hate new wave (fuck the Police), but love the Talking Heads. Think it's that way for a lot of people. Remain In Light is great.
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post #7 of 23
9/20/08 at 11:33pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Fat Elvis View Post
(fuck the Police)
You'd better be quoting NWA, buddy. I will not accept slagging of The Police. Except for its own members slagging each other.
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post #8 of 23
9/20/08 at 11:38pm
I can understand when people say they don't like Sting, but never understood why people hate The Police.

Fear of Music is probably my favorite Heads album, but I really love all of their albums. One of the few bands I can say that about.
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post #9 of 23
9/21/08 at 1:13am
I'm one of the few people I know who really likes Naked.
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post #10 of 23
9/21/08 at 1:29am
I guess this is cheating, but Stop Making Sense is so awesome I've just got to call it my #1 Talking Heads album (and the greatest concert film of all time). Followed by Remain In Light.

How I wish there was a chance they'd reunite for a tour, but I don't see it ever happening. Anyway, I can say without hesitation that they're one of my favorite bands ever.
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post #11 of 23
9/21/08 at 3:03am
Here comes Mr. Business man, oh uh-oh
He's got some Wild Wild Life

The Talking Heads are brilliant. Pour the sugar on my tongue.
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post #12 of 23
9/21/08 at 1:22pm
It's a personal failure of mine for being unable to enjoy Talking Heads. And they were even produced by Brian Eno in his heyday.

And I even like some New Wave music. Gary Numan and Devo were great. But I just don't get the whole funk thing, save for The Pop Group and Gang of Four's take on funk, which I guess isn't really funk at all.
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post #13 of 23
9/21/08 at 1:23pm
What have you heard of them? They have so many songs that work on a basic pop level, it's hard to believe that you couldn't enjoy any of them.
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post #14 of 23
9/21/08 at 1:30pm
I like Psycho Killer. Qu'est-ce que c'est?

I'm trying, really. But there's some 80s link to Talking Heads that I'm missing. They sound at once alien and familiar - probably because they're a rare good 80s group that didn't make 'depressing' music. The uh 'offbeat' (I guess) vibe I'm not used to. But I listen to The Soft Boys! They really should be one of my favorite bands, and I can see why they're good, but I can't take to their music yet...
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post #15 of 23
9/21/08 at 1:35pm
What, no love for "Little Creatures". I was obsessed with that album in 11th grade. It's probably their most mainstream album, but there are some great songs on it.
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post #16 of 23
9/21/08 at 2:51pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by dreary louse View Post
And I even like some New Wave music. Gary Numan and Devo were great. But I just don't get the whole funk thing, save for The Pop Group and Gang of Four's take on funk, which I guess isn't really funk at all.
If by "funk" you mean (aside from how wonderfully The Talking Heads often incorporated it) '70s stuff by the likes of James Brown, Parliament-Funkadelic, Sly and the Family Stone, Stevie Wonder, Curtis Mayfield, etc, I'd like to politely ask you WHAT THE FUCK?*


*I'm busting your chops a little here, knowing full well your ears don't belong to me. It still kind of blows my mind, though, that someone couldn't love a lot of that stuff.
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post #17 of 23
9/22/08 at 11:59am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ratty View Post
What, no love for "Little Creatures". I was obsessed with that album in 11th grade. It's probably their most mainstream album, but there are some great songs on it.
I like that one lots, too. I admire the early albums, but I probably listen to the pop stuff and Remain in Light a lot more than '77. I love that they could put out something as complicated and lyrically oblique as "Born Under Punches," but also these fantastic, straightforward pop songs like "This Must Be the Place" (plus, those that split the difference between pop simplicity and lyrical weirdness like "And She Was").

I always think of New Wave as the commercial radio version of punk and post-punk, so I have trouble squaring that idea with the Talking Heads. They made it on the charts, sure, but they were also there with The Ramones, Television, and Blondie at the beginning of New York punk, and their Fear of Music and Remain in Light-era stuff is as experimental as anything that came out of what might be considered post-punk. I save the "New Wave" label for stuff like Missing Persons, Flock of Seagulls, maybe Duran Duran. Bands that were a little more image conscious in the early 80s, basically.
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post #18 of 23
9/22/08 at 12:19pm
I love Naked, though it's almost a trial run for Byrne's solo career. I love '77, and More Songs About Buildings and Food so much, mostly for the lyrical construction. Byrne's mind, his ability, his interpretation of pop and soul music still awes me. The B-52's were doing something similar, but less impressive.

Though I love the film, True Stories is the album I'm probably least interested in, followed by Little Creatures, and then maybe Speaking in Tongues - which can't lose its overproduced 80's-ness. And I like to love all these albums. I'm also fascinated by the evolution from 77 to Stop Making Sense, how it is all of the same, and yet, no band has changed their fundamentals so much in six albums. Nothing But Flowers is one of the perfect songs ever.
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post #19 of 23
9/22/08 at 10:45pm
Nothing But Flowers is ingenious. I never get tired of those lyrics.
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post #20 of 23
9/22/08 at 11:19pm
I agree with this thread.

I've never met a Talking Heads album I didn't like, but I think More Songs about Buildings and Food is unfairly overlooked. Personally, Fear of Music is the masterpiece.

I have a problem with the slagging of New Wave by some of you. If The Police (greatness) and Duran Duran are all you think of when you think New Wave, then you have some listenin' to do. Check out Television, the work of Stan Ridgway, just to name a few.

EDIT: And I can't read. Said better by others. Throwing out some love for Cross-Eyed and Painless.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Greg David View Post
Talking Heads was one of the most important bands of New Wave period. I don't understand why they're not more widely recognized for it. Bands like Blondie and The Police seem to have stolen a lot of their historical thunder.
Although normally it means jack shit to me, I'm glad the Talking Heads are in the rock and roll hall of fame. Not totally overlooked, I suppose.
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post #21 of 23
9/23/08 at 1:36am
Quote:
Originally Posted by DaveB View Post
(plus, those that split the difference between pop simplicity and lyrical weirdness like "And She Was").
I caught Byrne (and a number of his Luaka Bop musicians) at the Calgary Folk Fest where he did a version of And She Was that was part Brazillian folk tune and part Bollywood musical number all without losing that stunning pop tune at the heart of it.

The whole concert was amazing but that was the highlight for me. Though the version of Dance on Vaseline was very cool as well.

You can third the love for Nothing But Flowers for me. Probably my second most played Talking Heads tune after their cover of Take Me To the River.
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post #22 of 23
9/23/08 at 1:57am
So much great stuff going on in the first four albums. "Heaven", "Naive Melody", "Cross-Eyed And Painless" - this was original and exciting music. "Girlfriend Is Better" might have been the apex for me.
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post #23 of 23
9/23/08 at 3:20pm
David Byrne is my hero and Talking Heads are my favorite band of all time.

I had the great fortune to have my dad take me to see Byrne on the Rei Momo tour. He played the long lost City Colliseum in Austin. This place was an old warehouse with barely adequate air conditioning and "festival seating" on a concrete floor.

He was touring with a full band including Latin percussion and horns and backup singers. They were all dressed in white, and by the end of the first song were completely sweaty. The energy level was insane. The rythmic nature of his songs, the heat, the happy crowd and energized Byrne led to an insane display of music and showmanship. Nearly everyone was dancing, and the band played for more than two hours. Until I saw Sigur Ros a couple of years ago, it was the single greatest live performance I'd ever seen.

If you can find a VHS copy of the long out-of-print concert film "Between the Teeth" you can see a similar show from his follow-up tour for "Uh-Oh". It's nowhere near having been there, but still very, very good.
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