Talking Heads

So weird. I had no idea TMBTP was a popular TH song. I don't think I've ever heard it other than when I play it myself. I would have thought Once in a Lifetime, Burning Down, And She Was and WWL were way more popular.

i have a vague memory of hearing it in the trailer of some 80s or 90s movie, possibly at the beginning of a VHS rental, years and years ago, but i can't figure out what movie and it wasn't mentioned in that article or anywhere else.

also features prominently in your mainstream rom-coms a lot these days too; a quick rummage on IMDB reveals it's in both Crazy Stupid Love and He's Just Not Tht Into You.

then there's this of course

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zppYSFPKrQ8

"This Must Be The Place" is the sentimental favorite, maybe, like "Solisbury Hill." But I don't know anyone who would call "Solisbury Hill" their favorite Peter Gabriel song.

Of course, "This Must Be The Place" is such a lovely track, totally wistful and simple. There are very few Talking Heads songs in its mode.

FWIW, on the radio I hear "And She Was" more than any other Talking Head song, save perhaps "Burning Down the House" and the Al Green cover. Sometimes "Psycho Killer," sometimes "Once in a Lifetime."

I wish "Road to Nowhere" and "(Nothing But) Flowers" got more airplay, as far as late-era Heads goes.

But I don't know anyone who would call "Solisbury Hill" their favorite Peter Gabriel song.

i might, actually

Solisbury Hill is a good analogy.

"In Your Eyes" probably fits better tbh -- on a big album but initially a major hit, slowly became a pop culture touchstone through covers and movie placements etc.

but NOT initially a major hit

Oh YEAH. Definitely.

I associate all these songs with age 10/11 mixtapes, before anybody our age knew anything about Peter Gabriel/Talking Heads but heard TMBTP and "In Your Eyes" on the radio and found they fit in nicely as a segue between "Iesha" and Timmy T "One More Try"

i'm a little too young to have been listening to the radio when it was new, but i've never head "Place" on the radio ever.

also, i must say it's pretty funny to be discussing one of the central bands of the indie canon and tar any one track with the "song that hipsters like" brush. ESPECIALLY since the song in question is essentially the gooey ballad from their pop breakthrough.

MTV showed the video for "Place" in fairly light rotation, but I never heard it on the radio either.

last.fm stats, last six months:

1. psycho killer
2. once in a lifetime
3. burning down the house
(big drop)
4. road to nowhere
5. this must be the place

Oh man, reading this in half-awake mode, at first I thought maybe there was a Skrillex remix I was unaware of...

I did happen to see a weird screamo-with-vocoders duo mangle "Psycho Killer" at an open mic a few nights ago, so it made more sense than it should have.

I like Talking Heads, was a pop-devouring kid when Speaking In Tongues was new, & didn't ever hear of "This Must Be The Place" until adulthood. I've listened to it a few times today & I can't remember how it goes still. The hook is like "Genius of Love" but not as good (def. remember GOL from the radio as a kid though). so I'm puzzled too that TMBTP is held in esteem now.

"Solsbury Hill" might be my favorite Gabriel song too – but in its 1982 live incarnation (also released as a single iirc).

Yeah, "This Must Be the Place" is only their #14 seller on iTunes. I never even heard the song until this year whereas I've been hearing "Psycho Killer", "Burning Down the House", and "Road to Nowhere" since childhood, "Once in a Lifetime" at least since adolescence. I'm not buying yet that "This Must Be the Place" is held in great esteem by the general public.

xposts

I was wrong. It's their #8 seller. Still.

Statistics 1 Oral history 0

I will say that the performance of "This Must be the Place" plays an important roll in "Stop Making Sense."

Also, fwiw, Arcade Fire covered it a bunch during their first big tour, back when people were inexplicably comparing them to Talking Heads.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7J-900xpiI0

Anyway, a reminder of a lovely rendition:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cqg_ZGcuybs

(lamp dance)

Tina playing gee-tar too.

The story goes that the song got its title because everyone swapped instruments for it in the studio, right?

that's what they say but in the credits the only swapping is Tina playing guitar and Byrne keyboards.

From Wiki:

In the "Self Interview" on the DVD of the concert film Stop Making Sense, Byrne admits that it is a love song, a topic he tends to avoid because it is "kinda big". He also said of the song:

"That's a love song made up almost completely of non sequiturs, phrases that may have a strong emotional resonance but don't have any narrative qualities. It's a real honest kind of love song. I don't think I've ever done a real love song before. Mine always had a sort of reservation, or a twist. I tried to write one that wasn't corny, that didn't sound stupid or lame the way many do. I think I succeeded; I was pretty happy with that."

According to the Stop Making Sense commentary track, the title "Naive Melody" refers to the music. On the track, the guitar part and the bass part are doing the same thing throughout the whole song. According to David Byrne, many professional musicians would not play a song written in that fashion, and that is what makes the melody naive. Byrne played the lead keyboard solo.

Which also gets at what I was saying, that it's the rare "love" song in the band's catalog.

Love song outlier is certainly a quality it has with "In Your Eyes." I want to say Gabriel up until then had specifically avoided using the word "love" or writing in the first person, as an anti-cliche exercise.

But I can see why some people so many years down the line might confuse both "This Must Be the Place" and "In Your Eyes" for the hits that they weren't.

My initial exposure of "This Might Be The Place" came from deciding to check out the performance from Stop Making Sense because he alluded to it in his self interview and I wanted to watch him sing and dance with a lamp.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dE-mxVxFXLg

R.I.P. mywalloftapes.blogspot.com

why'd it go down?

Who was that guy? I wanted to know the story.

Oh no. So many great tapes. Dude said he was dying and was gonna post stuff until he got legal complains or something

someone at yankee stadium has good music taste - a couple days ago, they played "Native Melody" right before the game started.

https://41.media.tumblr.com/d959a82fda7a8c0fd8487ebe687bb6e8/tumblr_nkhxq2JL8O1rqe2plo5_1280.png

You may ask yourself: Why is this suit so large?

You may ask yourself: Does this store not have any mirrors?

HEARD SOMEONE SAY TO ME "DAVID, I LOVE YOU"

woah

gotta remember to yell that if i ever see him live and he does this song

HEARD SOMEONE SAY TO ME "DAVID, I LOVE YOU"

you may say to yourself yourself. My God!...What have I done?

There's a picture of Byrne hanging out with Billy Gibbons in the new Rolling Stone.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B-_PC6TlIhs&list=PLhnmhDNF1JJgdRw46c-l-CY8dtfUU5PF8

wonderful, thanks!

What do people here think of Byrne's musical/oddball comedy TRUE STORIES (1986)? I think it's
immensely funny and heartfelt simultaneously. It could've become a disastrous vanity project, but I
believe it's an amazing achievement. Shame that he's never directed another fictional feature.

After a decade of writing off this band as overrated and trading in all of their albums, I've decided to give them a second try and dive back in headfirst.

My main takeaways at this point are:

—Remain in Light is so dark! I don't remember it being so slow and, well, dreary. I love it!
—More Songs About Buildings and Food is roughly fifty times better than I remember it being. Every song is catchy as heck.
—Little Creatures is probably my most listened to album of theirs and it's held up really well.
—The biggest rediscovery has been 'This Must Be the Place (Naive Melody).' That song is so good, jeez.
—True Stories and Naked are really a lot better than their reputations.

It's funny what a little passing of time can do for one's attitude toward music. I don't think the Talking Heads are destined to become my favorite anything, but this reassessment has at least got me truly enjoying their music for the first time ever.

my next poll, i expect it to break records.

about a year away. i think.

—True Stories and Naked are really a lot better than their reputations.

Did Naked have a bad rep? I remember it being praised in a "daring return to form!" kind of way.

Well, I wasn't there at the time, so all I've heard through the years was that it was not up to previous standards.

live recordings are so so so crucial

Good discussion: Talking Heads: Naked poll