Baltimore produced some incredible musicians (Captain Beefheart and Frank Zappa mainly, unless we’re counting David Hasselhoff) but it was David Byrne who – via Providence, RI – and Dumbarton, Scotland (where he was actually born) – who, along with the other Talking Heads, wowed the late-seventies New York clubs with their minimalist funky pop “new wave” sound. Later they produced some of the greatest albums of that era and hit the pop big time with bangers like Burning Down the House and Road to Nowhere.
They were a favourite of John’s during his later teenage years once he’d managed to see beyond an early-teen obsession with progressive rock and realise that there was more to music than seventeen-minute tales of dragons and spaceships. In a desperate attempt to discover new music, he trawled the charts – yes, he made some errors – including a Mr.Mister album that he sneaked into Gordon’s collection when he wasn’t looking (Gordon put it back) – but he also uncovered some seriously shiny gems including Talking Heads.
This was a voyage of discovery for Gordon who knew very little about the band.
(John put the Mr.Mister album back again (and Gordon put it back (and John put it back again etc.))).
In each podcast episode we talk through the artist’s history chronologically, picking our favourite tracks and ranking the albums as we go, so check that out if you want to know how we came to our decisions and why we picked the playlist tracks we did.
Our ranking and track picks are a compromise of our two different personal opinions, and of course we have to consider the Jeffrey Rulebook, it is also only a snapshot in time, so don’t take them too seriously! But do please comment below with your picks.
The Talking Heads Jeffrey Podcast playlist is also available here on Deezer.
Origins
Chris Frantz and David Byrne met at Rhode Island School of Design in Providence and formed a covers band called The Artistics – eventually Frantz’s girlfriend Tina Weymouth joined to play bass. The three-piece moved to New York and soon became regulars in the scene, especially CBGBs, adding Jerry Harrison from Modern Lovers on guitar and keyboards before making their first album.
There are quite a few documentary films (including this from The South Bank Show and Well How Did We Get Here? A Brief History of the Talking Heads) and interviews on YouTube we used in preparation for the podcast. Gordon also read Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa: The Adventures of “Talking Heads” in the 20th Century by David Bowman
We’d also recommend the excellent This Must Be The Talking Heads podcast – unfortunately this came out after our own Talking Heads podcast, so we couldn’t use it as reference for our discussion.
1977: Talking Heads 77
Our ranking: 3rd
Their debut has a cheeky punky spark about it that makes it special. It is a bit too high on this list for John’s opinion, but really this list is a compromise of such differing views that it’s pretty much meaningless, but please read on anyway …
To give its due, debut albums have a sense of excitement that comes with the newness of a band heading in a different direction than everyone else, and 77 has that in spades.
Apart from Psycho Killer, there’s not a lot of famous songs on it, and it sounds a bit sparse and dated, but it has a naïve charm and an energy that make it a great listen.
Our picks: Uh-oh, Love Comes to Town and Psycho Killer
1978: More Songs About Buildings and Food
Our ranking: 6th
The only reason this album is this low on the list is because the ones above it are so good and we’ve got to put it somewhere. It is the follow-up to the sparky debut, and feels like lots more of the same as its predecessor, but with slightly sharper production. It is the first of the Brian Eno trio of albums, and as is often the case when second albums are mainly driven by what’s left over from the first, it doesn’t come up to the level of the albums that follow it.
Our picks: Take Me To The River and The Big Country
Although a close run thing, this was probably on balance our favourite album cover from Talking Heads:
1979: Fear of Music
Our ranking: 4th
The big Brian Eno collaboration that was the great leap forward where the band turned a corner from those first two post-punk albums and put a big massive stake in the ground in brand new pop territory.
This is much more rhythmic and tighter than the first two records, with brilliant galloping funky pop fancies like Life During Wartime and Cities, the power rhythms of I Zimbra, the beautiful Heaven – and oddly, a terrible song: Electric Guitar.
I am still bamboozled by the opening lyric of Cities: “Think of London, a small city” – is there a different London he’s talking about, because the one I know is massive?
Our picks: Life During Wartime and Heaven
1980: Remain in Light
Our ranking: 5th
This is oddly low down in our list because it was a divisive album. John loved it (would probably put it second or third), Gordon would put it bottom, so this is a compromise position in the middle … so it’s either brilliant, or not very accessible to the casual fan, or both.
This is possibly due to the liberal use of polyrhythms and experimentation with African musical ideas, partly in response to the beginnings of hip-hop music, but whatever the reason, not everyone is going to love it apparently.
The tour following this album was the first to feature additional musicians, and the bigger sound works brilliantly, really showcasing how much more punch and pizazz the songs gain from being played live – the grainy Rome concert footage (below) is magnificent, and Adrian Belew! What a wonderful addition to the ranks!
Our picks: Listening Wind and Once in a Lifetime
Speaking in Tongues (1983)
Our ranking: Top!
The first post-Eno album is where they manage to achieve the perfect blend of post-punk pop and rhythmic funk, It is simply magnificent with absolute classic bangers like Burning Down the House, Slippery People, This Must Be The Place, Girlfriend is Better … the list goes on. It is also the album they seem to have collaborated best on, with all tracks credited to all four members, but that didn’t last … (see below).
They followed this with the brilliant Jonathon Demme concert film Stop Making Sense, one of the few concert movies you can just sit and watch. They never really played live again, until they were inducted into the Hall of Fame in 2002.
Our picks: This Must Be The Place (Naïve Melody) and Slippery People
1985: Little Creatures
Our ranking: 2nd
This album usually gets put a lot lower on ranking lists because it has a much more commercial poppy sound that feels a bit like a sell-out when compared to their previous work. Talking Heads honed their innovative chops with five groundbreaking albums, and then went and produced a pop masterpiece! How dare they!
But … it is a pop masterpiece … it is an absolutely wonderful pop record of brilliant songs (mostly penned by David Byrne as this was the start of his drift away from the others) … so get off your high horse and embrace the brilliance of this fantastic beast.
Our picks: The Lady Don’t Mind and And She Was
The album cover came a close second for us:
True Stories (1986)
Our ranking: 8th
Talking Heads never made a bad album, but it was these last two that are notably several notches below the rest of the catalogue, suggesting the band were on the wane by this point. David Byrne had distanced himself from the others and was indulging his interest in visual art and film-making … and so he produced a film called True Stories which is a slightly incoherent long music video with some perfectly nice bits (especially Hey Now, see below) and then some other bits, some of which are fun, some of which are just weird.
The album is enjoyable, it’s just not vintage Heads, and Byrne’s trademark shouty vocals reach their peak (Love For Sale, Wild Wild Life) to the point where they start to become off-putting.
putting.
Our picks: Hey Now and Love For Sale
1988: Naked
Our ranking: 7th
The last album has some really good songs on it, but definitely feels like a band getting to the end of the line. Bands are a dynamic, it’s about the relationship between the members, and what makes a band great is often the space between them as much as anything else, and by this time, Byrne’s distancing himself from the others and his dominance of the songwriting meant that that balance had got completely out of whack – whatever magic had made the Talking Heads special was pretty much absent.
Most lists put this album bottom, and on any given day we might have done so too, but as opposed to the shouty pop of True Stories, Naked feels like it’s trying to edge into new territory and develop more interesting ideas, so it nudges above its predecessor in our list.
Our picks: Democratic Circus and (Nothing But) Flowers
The Jeffrey Music ranking of Talking Heads albums (2020):
- Speaking in Tongues (1983)
- Little Creatures (1985)
- Talking Heads 77 (1977)
- Fear of Music (1979)
- Remain in Light (1980)
- More Songs About Buildings and Food (1978)
- Naked (1988)
- True Stories (1986)
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