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For the Alan Bennett monologues, see Talking Heads (plays). Talking Heads was an American rock band existing between 1974 and 1991, composed of David Byrne, Chris Frantz, Tina Weymouth, and Jerry Harrison. Talking Heads married punk rock sensibilities with poppy sounds, clipped funk, art school intellectualism, and later, world music. In David Byrne, they had one of the most distinctive front men of the period; they remained popular during their lifetime, and their concert film Stop Making Sense (which was made at the Pantages Theater in Hollywood, and directed by Jonathan Demme) is widely acclaimed as one of the finest examples of the genre *.
History Formed in 1974 at the Rhode Island School of Design, the band first consisted of three members: David Byrne (vocals, guitar), Chris Frantz (drums), and Tina Weymouth (bass). Weymouth later recalled how the group chose the name "Talking Heads": "A friend had found the name in the TV Guide, which explained the term used by TV studios to describe a head-and-shoulder shot of a person talking as 'all content, no action.' It fit." Moving to New York the nascent Heads landed a gig, opening for The Ramones at the legendary CBGBs club. In 1976, they added one more member, Jerry Harrison (keyboards and guitar), formerly of Jonathan Richman's band The Modern Lovers. The group quickly drew a following and was signed to Sire Records in 1977. Their first album, Talking Heads: 77 was released soon afterward. Combining a taut rhythm section with David Byrne's signature neurotic vocals, 77, despite poor sales, quickly endeared the band to the more experimental elements in New York's burgeoning punk scene. With Brian Eno
Post-Brian Eno 1983 saw the release of Speaking in Tongues, a commercial breakthrough that produced the band's first American Top 10 hit, "Burning Down the House". Once again, a striking video was inescapable during the song's run. The following tour was documented in Jonathan Demme's Stop Making Sense, which generated another live album of the same name. The Speaking in Tongues tour would be their last. Three more albums followed, 1985's Little Creatures, 1986's True Stories (Talking Heads covering all the soundtrack songs of Byrne's musical comedy film, in which the band also appeared) and 1988's Naked. The sound of Little Creatures and True Stories were much more American pop rock, while Naked took heavy Latin influence with polyrhythmic styles like those seen on Remain in Light. During that time, however, the group was falling more and more under David Byrne's sway, and after Naked the band went on "hiatus." It took until 1991 for an official announcement to be made that Talking Heads had broken up. Post break-up A brief reunion occurred in 1991 for "Sax and Violins," an original single that appeared on the soundtrack to Wim Wenders' Until the End of the World. Frustrated by David Byrne's lack of interest in another album, Tina Weymouth, Chris Frantz, and Jerry Harrison also reunited without him for a one-off album called No Talking, Just Head under the name The Heads in 1996, featuring a rotating cast of vocalists, including Debbie Harry. Byrne has gone on to become something of a rock icon in recent years, while Harrison has become a producer of some note — his résumé includes the Violent Femmes' The Blind Leading the Naked, the Fine Young Cannibals' The Raw and the Cooked, Crash Test Dummies' God Shuffled His Feet, Live's Throwing Copper, and No Doubt's Return of Saturn. Frantz and Weymouth, who were married in 1977, had been recording on the side as Tom Tom Club since 1981. Tom Tom Club's self-titled debut album sold almost as well as the Talking Heads themselves, leading to the band appearing in Stop Making Sense. They achieved several pop/rap hits under that name, particularly in the UK; their single "Genius of Love" has been sampled numerous times, notably on old school hip hop classic "It's Nasty (Genius of Love)" by Grandmaster Flash and Mariah Carey's 1995 hit "Fantasy." They also have produced several artists, including Happy Mondays, Ziggy Marley, and are among Blur singer Damon Albarn's collaborators on his Gorillaz side-project. The band played together one last time on March 18, 2002 at the ceremony of their induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Influence Talking Heads' body of work has been extremely influential, with bands as wide-ranging as Radiohead (named after a Talking Heads song), Phish (covering the songs "Cities" and "Crosseyed and Painless" at numerous shows, as well as the entire album Remain in Light at a 1996 Halloween show), and Red Hot Chili Peppers acknowledging them among their roots. Living Colour covered "Memories Can't Wait". Numerous bands including Perpetual Groove, The String Cheese Incident and The Arcade Fire have regularly covered the song "This Must Be the Place (Naïve Melody)", while the band Widespread Panic performs cover versions of "Life During Wartime" and "Papa Legba" (from the True Stories album). The Hypertonics have covered "Psycho Killer" a number of times in concert. The band Umphrey's McGee covers "Making Flippy Floppy" and other Talking Heads songs. U2 often performed a snippet of "Life During Wartime" during performances of "Discothèque", as seen on the Popmart: Live From Mexico City video. Four Talking Heads albums appeared on Rolling Stones 2003 list of the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time. Remain in Light was ranked at At least one well-known band name has come about from Talking Heads songs. When the band now known as Hüsker Dü were doing a cover of "Psycho Killer", singer Grant Hart could not remember the French lyrics and instead started saying random phrases in foreign languages. Someone in the audience shouted out "Husker Du" (literally, "do you remember?"), the name of a popular 1950s board game, and the name stuck. In popular culture Studio albums Compilations Live albums and videos Feature-length films Singles Notes | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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