I wish "Road to Nowhere" and "(Nothing But) Flowers" got more airplay, as far as late-era Heads goes.
― Josh in Chicago, Friday, 15 June 2012 11:47 (twelve years ago) link
But I don't know anyone who would call "Solisbury Hill" their favorite Peter Gabriel song.
i might, actually
― bronytheus (some dude), Friday, 15 June 2012 11:52 (twelve years ago) link
Solisbury Hill is a good analogy.
― BC Forgbs (Ówen P.), Friday, 15 June 2012 12:25 (twelve years ago) link
"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.
― bronytheus (some dude), Friday, 15 June 2012 12:28 (twelve years ago) link
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"
― BC Forgbs (Ówen P.), Friday, 15 June 2012 12:32 (twelve years ago) link
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.
― bronytheus (some dude), Friday, 15 June 2012 12:53 (twelve years ago) link
MTV showed the video for "Place" in fairly light rotation, but I never heard it on the radio either.
― Biff Wellington (WmC), Friday, 15 June 2012 12:59 (twelve years ago) link
last.fm stats, last six months:
1. psycho killer2. once in a lifetime3. burning down the house(big drop)4. road to nowhere5. 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...
― cwkiii, Friday, 15 June 2012 13:06 (twelve years ago) link
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.
― cwkiii, Friday, 15 June 2012 13:09 (twelve years ago) link
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.
― Euler, Friday, 15 June 2012 13:13 (twelve years ago) link
"Solsbury Hill" might be my favorite Gabriel song too – but in its 1982 live incarnation (also released as a single iirc).
― a regina spektor is haunting europe (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Friday, 15 June 2012 13:16 (twelve years ago) link
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
― EveningStar (Sund4r), Friday, 15 June 2012 13:23 (twelve years ago) link
I was wrong. It's their #8 seller. Still.
― EveningStar (Sund4r), Friday, 15 June 2012 13:24 (twelve years ago) link
Statistics 1 Oral history 0
― BC Forgbs (Ówen P.), Friday, 15 June 2012 13:34 (twelve years ago) link
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.
― Josh in Chicago, Friday, 15 June 2012 14:56 (twelve years ago) link
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7J-900xpiI0
Anyway, a reminder of a lovely rendition:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cqg_ZGcuybs
― Josh in Chicago, Friday, 15 June 2012 14:58 (twelve years ago) link
(lamp dance)
― Josh in Chicago, Friday, 15 June 2012 14:59 (twelve years ago) link
Tina playing gee-tar too.
― a regina spektor is haunting europe (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Friday, 15 June 2012 15:01 (twelve years ago) link
The story goes that the song got its title because everyone swapped instruments for it in the studio, right?
― Josh in Chicago, Friday, 15 June 2012 15:02 (twelve years ago) link
that's what they say but in the credits the only swapping is Tina playing guitar and Byrne keyboards.
― a regina spektor is haunting europe (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Friday, 15 June 2012 15:04 (twelve years ago) link
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.
"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.
― Josh in Chicago, Friday, 15 June 2012 15:10 (twelve years ago) link
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.
― Josh in Chicago, Friday, 15 June 2012 15:11 (twelve years ago) link
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
― MarkoP, Friday, 15 June 2012 15:13 (twelve years ago) link
R.I.P. mywalloftapes.blogspot.com
― deadcandace (diamonddave85), Friday, 15 June 2012 23:09 (twelve years ago) link
why'd it go down?
― Guayaquil (eephus!), Friday, 15 June 2012 23:26 (twelve years ago) link
Who was that guy? I wanted to know the story.
― Josh in Chicago, Saturday, 16 June 2012 03:12 (twelve years ago) link
Oh no. So many great tapes. Dude said he was dying and was gonna post stuff until he got legal complains or something
― curmudgeon, Saturday, 16 June 2012 05:11 (twelve years ago) link
someone at yankee stadium has good music taste - a couple days ago, they played "Native Melody" right before the game started.
― calstars, Monday, 13 April 2015 12:05 (nine years ago) link
https://41.media.tumblr.com/d959a82fda7a8c0fd8487ebe687bb6e8/tumblr_nkhxq2JL8O1rqe2plo5_1280.png
― tylerw, Monday, 13 April 2015 14:26 (nine years ago) link
You may ask yourself: Why is this suit so large?
You may ask yourself: Does this store not have any mirrors?
― Ye Mad Puffin, Monday, 13 April 2015 20:26 (nine years ago) link
HEARD SOMEONE SAY TO ME "DAVID, I LOVE YOU"
woah
― da croupier, Monday, 13 April 2015 20:55 (nine years ago) link
gotta remember to yell that if i ever see him live and he does this song
you may say to yourself yourself. My God!...What have I done?
― The burrito of ennui (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 13 April 2015 20:57 (nine years ago) link
There's a picture of Byrne hanging out with Billy Gibbons in the new Rolling Stone.
― Love, Wilco (C. Grisso/McCain), Monday, 13 April 2015 23:55 (nine years ago) link
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B-_PC6TlIhs&list=PLhnmhDNF1JJgdRw46c-l-CY8dtfUU5PF8
― MaresNest, Sunday, 4 October 2015 09:35 (eight years ago) link
wonderful, thanks!
― Songs from a One Room House in an Uninteresting Location (bernard snowy), Sunday, 4 October 2015 14:29 (eight years ago) link
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.
― beamish13, Sunday, 4 October 2015 19:03 (eight years ago) link
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.
― Austin, Friday, 1 April 2016 00:13 (eight years ago) link
my next poll, i expect it to break records.
― Bee OK, Friday, 1 April 2016 00:17 (eight years ago) link
about a year away. i think.
― Bee OK, Friday, 1 April 2016 00:18 (eight years ago) link
—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.
― Montgomery Burns' Jazz (Tarfumes The Escape Goat), Friday, 1 April 2016 00:21 (eight years ago) link
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.
― Austin, Friday, 1 April 2016 01:18 (eight years ago) link
live recordings are so so so crucial
― bernard snowy, Friday, 1 April 2016 01:25 (eight years ago) link
Good discussion: Talking Heads: Naked poll
― The burrito of ennui (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Friday, 1 April 2016 01:36 (eight years ago) link
to summarize: one of those return-to-form albums labeled as such after critics had liked-not-loved the last but forgotten by the end of the year
― The burrito of ennui (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Friday, 1 April 2016 01:37 (eight years ago) link
haha -- no they're not
Austin, what about 77?
― Guayaquil (eephus!), Friday, 1 April 2016 01:39 (eight years ago) link
Yeah, I think the fact that WXRT in Chicago played the shit out of Naked's 2-3 standout tracks for years is why I thought it's reputation was better than it is. I haven't listened to it in years, not do I particularly feel compelled to.
And True Stories, ugh, what an uncomfortably forced pile of garbage. It was one of those records I listened to more than it deserved, trying in vain to convince myself that there had to be more to it than one-dimensional self-parody.
Little Creatures is still wonderful, though. I remember hearing "And She Was" in a record store on its release day and thinking, "man, I hope the new Talking Heads record I'm about to buy is as good as whatever this is."
― Montgomery Burns' Jazz (Tarfumes The Escape Goat), Friday, 1 April 2016 03:43 (eight years ago) link