No Filler Music Podcast - Ep 23: Talking Heads 77

Episode Date: November 13, 2018

We take a look at the Talking Heads debut album Talking Heads: 77. Opening for The Ramones in 1975 at CBGBs, the Talking Heads came straight out of the New York punk scene with a sound that needed a new classification, quickly pioneering the term "new wave" with their mix of punk, art rock, and funk. For more info, check out our show notes: https://www.nofillerpodcast.com/episode/music-review-talking-heads-77 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Order Uber Eats now. For alcohol, you must be legal drinking age. Please enjoy responsibly. Product availability varies by region. See app for details. What is your own personal response on behalf of the Talking Heads, two new wave in punk rock music? I think there's a few areas in music where things are happening now,

where anything can have. happen and that's one of the areas there's a whole lot of areas in music where nothing's happening and nothing looks likely to happen no filler the music podcast dedicated to sharing the often overlooked hidden gyms that fill the space between the singles on our favorite records my name is Quentin. I've got my brother Travis with me as per yus. And today we are covering Talking Heads debut album. Is it just called 77? Is it called Talking Heads 77? It's called Talking Head 77. Okay, cool. Guess when it came out? I'm going to guess 1977. You got it, 1977. Thanks for playing along, Treve. So you're taking the reins on this one, dude.

I know you're a huge fan of these guys. I still haven't given them a proper listen. Well, I think that after this episode, you're going to be a convert. So didn't you listen, didn't I recommend that you listen to their third album, Fear of Music on a flight home? And you liked it, right? Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I like what I hear. You know, I still just haven't like, you know, It hasn't gotten to the point where I'm like, man, I just got to listen to everything that they've ever done. Yeah. I mean, okay, so basically I do this with a lot of bands. I go back to the origin and I start from album one, right? And we're going to obviously get into this more.

But what drew me to them beyond just how eccentric David Byrne is as a musician, songwriter and lyricist, But the music, the instrumentation of both him and the other members of the band, they just, they have a really, like, tight, but, like, also, like, minimal approach to their guitar playing and everything, but, like, it's just so. I love the guitar work. Yeah, yeah. It's just very. It's cool.

Yeah. So, and we'll get in all that. So let's, let's do our weekly segment, what you heard first. We're just going to talk about what we've been listening to lately. So Q, let's start with you. What do you got? So my good friend Larry was in town this past week. So on Tuesday, I got to go see a concert with Larry.

He said, hey, man, I'm going to see the show. You know, you're welcome to join me. I happen to have the evening off. So I tagged along. I hadn't heard of either of these bands. And Larry was actually there to see one of the opening bands. They're called Ice Age. So, man, they're good, dude.

They're classified as punk rock. They're a Danish group from Copenhagen. They've been around since 2008, and basically Larry said that he's seen them pretty much every chance he can since their origin. So he's seen them like seven or eight times. They opened for a band called Black Lips, another band I had never heard of. Anyways, Ice Age just came out with a new album earlier this year.

They're actually on Matador Records. Is Interpol on Matador? Yeah, I was going to say that's Interpol's record label, or at least it was. Yeah, so their album is called Beyondless, and I'm going to share track three. It's called Under the Sun. That's great, man. I like it. So you said these guys are called Ice Age?

Ice Age, all one word. I really like, I think it's a really unique, like his lyrics are really unique and his timing, you know. Now, what was the name of that song? That was called Under the Sun. It's on their latest studio album, Beyondless. So just a warning for anyone who wants to check. these guys out. This is another one of those bands that is constantly evolving. So you go back a few records and you're going to hear something a little different. The way Larry puts it, they're now

kind of approaching their songwriting with a little bit, like a bit more melodic. And the farther back you go, they get a little more grungy. Again, there's those elements of punk. There's, there's actually like some of the songs that they played were even like a little bit on the on the heavier like the metal side as far as like the drumming and the guitar yeah strumming patterns and all that um really really powerful presence to their their live performance and larry actually the way he put it you know again larry's seen him like seven times or so seven times wow said it kind of seemed like they were kind of phoning it in um and And it was so I saw them at the showbox in downtown and it was there was a very light crowd.

They were not playing to too many people. So that may have been it. Maybe they just weren't feeling it. But I was blown away. Again, that's that's a band called Ice Age and that song was called Under the Sun. All right. So Travis, what you've been heard in? Q, I know you've heard of a band called Unknown Mortal Orchestra.

I have indeed. Okay. I am a fan. So I was a big fan of their first album. And then I, you know, here and there, you know, I've liked stuff that they've done, but haven't been, you know, too impressed with other things that they've done. But, so they came out with an album in April of this year called Sex and Food. I haven't listened to any of it.

In October, a couple weeks back, they came out with another album called IC-01 Hanoi. So Hanoi, if I'm pronouncing that correctly, is the name of the capital of Vietnam, and that is where they recorded Sex and Food. This album is seven tracks, and it's essentially a jam session from these studio sessions basically

that they would do during the recording of sex and food. And it's instrumental. And the lead singer, Ruben Nielsen, his father is on the record. His dad plays saxophone on the record. There's a local musician named Min Nguyen, and he plays.

plays this flute, this bamboo flute on one of the tracks. But anyway, it's super like experimental, psychedelic rock meets experimental jazz. And it is incredible, man. It is such a great listen to, because it's, it's, you know, it's very similar to, you'll get the same vibes that you would when you listen to Bitches Brew, right? Which is, I think we talked about Bitches Brew on our first

Radiohead episode. But basically, it even, they're not even hiding it. They're saying that they were influenced by the work of Miles Davis. So, this album was described by

the consequence of sound, which is a pretty popular music blog, as the sonic distillation of the band's influences in jazz. as Crout Rock and the Avant Garde. So we talked about Crout Rock a couple, a few episodes back, right? When we talked about Cannes. So anyway, I'm just going to play the second track off of this record.

And there's no track names. It's basically, you know, Hanoi 1, Hanoi 2, Hanoi 3. Anyway, this was the second track, Hanoi 2. A whole album is like that. So was that a synthesizer or was that a saxophone with the, like going through an effect, like an effect pepals? No, that was his guitar. Yeah, he had a bunch of effects on it.

Yeah, it's kind of, I don't have the best quality on my end, you know, listen to this music through my, my, yeah. Yeah, the, uh, yeah, that's cool. He didn't play, uh, you didn't hear the saxophone or the flute on that track. Uh, it's just sort of, uh, scattered throughout. but there is actually one single that came out, which is Hanoi 6, track 6, obviously. And it's a little bit much more mellow and kind of more ambient almost. But that's like a 10-minute track that they came out with as the single. Anyway, it's such a great, like I'm glad that, you know, rock bands, rock artists,

musicians, would still think to do something like this, you know, and release it. Like, hey, let's just get together, you know, hey, I'll get my dad up here.

He plays saxophone. We'll get this guy who plays flute, this well-known Vietnam musician or Vietnamese musician. It's just, it's awesome, man, it's great. Like, my respect level for them went up quite a bit after hearing this

because the musicianship on this on this album is just pretty stellar. But anyway, Definitely worth the listen. It's just super, it's just one of those albums you can put on and just kind of zone out, you know. So anyway, cool, man. Let's talk about the Talking Hits.

So I've always wanted to cover these guys, but I think it made perfect sense to talk about them after our first Radiohead episode. Because Radiohead actually got their name from a Talking Head song called, called Radiohead. So there you go. That was on their album called True Stories, came out in 1986. But anyway, we are going back to the origin of Talking Heads for today's episode, and we're talking about their debut album Talking Head 77. It came out in 1977. So here's what's interesting about these guys. So three of the four band members, the founding members, met at the Rhode Island School of Design in the early, early 70s. And they basically, I've listened to some interviews where the guy kind of asks David,

you know, since he came from an art school. So why did you decide to pursue music instead of the more traditional, you know, forms of art, right? And this is like in New York in the 70s. this is where David and the band sort of started, right, as far as their music is concerned. And he said that he felt like he could make more of an impact, and it felt more real, more tangible to make music. And you could reach a wider audience. And he's right, obviously, right?

Was there a particular medium that he was interested in before he got into music? I don't know. That's a good question. I didn't really get into any of that. I'm curious. I think it sounds like that's just kind of the direction they went. He probably just did, you know, traditional painting and stuff like that, right? Yeah, yeah.

But anyway, so it was David Byrne. The drummer was Chris France, and the bass player is Tina Weymouth, or Weymouth. So Tina and Chris were actually dating. at the time. And basically, well, actually, David and Chris started a band in 1973

called The Artistics, which is, you know. I like that name. Yeah. Especially since they were, they met in art school. So the Artistics, right? Yeah.

That's pretty good. But anyway, you know, they needed a bass player and Chris was like, hey, my girlfriend plays bass. And so she kind of auditioned. for the band, but, you know, she was probably going to get in, right? Because she was the girlfriend of the drummer. But anyway, so they had their three-piece band,

and they played their first gig as the Talking Heads in 1975, opening for the Ramones at CBGB. Nice. And that's a big deal, because CBGB, obviously, is this world-famous punk venue from New York, right? And so because they opened for the Ramones at CBGB, they were lumped in with punk, right? That's what they were referred to as early on. And so there's-

So are there any recordings from that era from 75? Yeah, there's live footage. Yeah, there's live footage out there of them, you know, of them playing probably at CBGB, too. But it's not that, but they weren't making punk music. They were doing the same kind of music that they, that they've always done. Yeah. But because of where they, you know, of the venue that they played at and the band that they opened for, and just that scene in general, they were basically kind of lumped in with Ramones,

Blondie, television even, right? All of those bands were playing the CBGB and the punk, the New York punk club scene, right? but obviously talking heads were different so they they weren't signed right back at 75 they didn't have a manager or anything and this record label executive said that he kind of heard them playing as he was outside CBGB and was sort of drawn in by by the song he was so captivated by it and so you know He went in, he talked to them, they signed, and he wanted to sort of do something about the punk label because he didn't think it fit with them. And punk sort of had negative connotations to it. So he, I don't know if this is true, but the way he made it seem like in this interview that I listened to was that this record label producer,

sort of came up with the term new wave and applied it to talking heads. So, I mean, it is a fact that talking heads are one of the early, early pioneers of new wave. This was basically... Yeah, and I guess in like 75, 76, 77, yeah, that's pretty damn early for that label. This was right when it started. Yeah, the punk rock was happening. New wave is what transitioned out of that. So talking heads is a new wave band.

But they also kind of go by, I mean, now they've, their sound has evolved so much throughout the years that they have, you know, a lot of, a lot of labels and genres thrown on them. But at the time, they were considered art punk and new wave. So whatever art punk. Art punk. Art punk. Yeah. So what's, you know, what's interesting is that like when you listen to. David Byrne sing.

He has this very interesting way of, you know, there was a, there's a quote from the Rolling Stones review of this album back in the day. So there's a quote from talking about David Burns' voice here. There's a quote from this guy, Stephen Demand. Morris who reviewed this album back in November of 77 for Rolling Stone. So right after it came out and he said that the fact that David Burns sings in a stiff, reedy quote unquote bad voice grasping for higher notes like a drowning man lunging for air only heightens the drama.

the drama of these songs, basically. And you'll see what he means by that. Because, you know, first of all, all right, so now we'll leave it there. Yeah, let's listen to a song. Okay, so this is the first pickoff of this album. And this is track number two. It's called New Feeling. So didn't you play a talking head song for an outro once before?

Yeah, I did. Actually, hold on. Let me find out what that was. I don't know, man. But I remember you saying that one of the things about David Burns is that he is very insecure about his voice. And that's why he does more of the talking, you know, singing song you talk. Yeah, I could see that. But it works. No, yeah. I think if you watch the early interviews, he is a super, shy

um super kind of he kind of comes off as one of those socially awkward uh you know not not comfortable at all being interviewed um yeah but uh yeah so you can maybe see that

come out in his voice a little bit but but then he goes into these moments where he's like his voice is cracking and he's sort of getting really kind of loud and like almost uh like singing off key but that's kind of what that guy from rolling stones was talking about where like you know he'll he'll gra like he'll like he strains his voice to to reach these higher notes

but it's done uh on purpose to like he's well aware of yeah to accentuate the the yeah feeling that he's going for for that in that in that moment but um but yeah uh so anyway so you think about going to CBGBs to see the Ramones and you in these guys play a set and you hear them first right I mean it's dude I would I would be blown away man did the Ramones it's not like the Ramones are like hard hard punk you know they were also more um I hate hate it I hate saying it but you know playful I mean you know yeah it wasn't it wasn't it wasn't it wasn't it was It wasn't the kind of like, it's not like the deaf tones. Well, no.

Or the sex pistols. Yeah, the sex pistols. Exactly. So I could see talking heads, you know, I could see them opening for the Ramones and not seeming too out of place. Sure. Yeah. But, you know, when you compare them to, like, if you see them, if you see talking heads on stage and then Ramones come on afterwards, like what made them, you know, news. wave quote unquote or what made them stand out from punk bands from from that time period is that

you know they wore polos you know and like button up shirts and they look like the you know like they came straight out of like the college not not necessarily Ivy League but i mean they were more put together it kind of reminds you of like the look the look that that the vampire weekend had early okay early vampire weekend right which was another college band right right Vampire Weekend, I think, was sort of known for, they started playing a lot of college. Yeah, basically. Yeah, I don't remember what college, but, yeah. Right.

But anyway. And then what I, again, so me being like, hey, you know what, I should, I should dive into talking heads. I don't know, maybe a couple years ago when I got into them. I started on this album. This is track two. And, yeah, like I said, I was really drawn to the guitar playing. and like it's it's very clean there's almost no gain on that guitar which again yeah if they are coming out of the new york punk scene that is why they stood out so much you know their guitars were very like

jangly you know and like angular and i made them stand up but you know amongst all the all the power chords that were being played you know at the cagiebies so anyway so let's let's move along here this next song, I'm going to play, I'm just going to play it the whole thing, because it has a lot of different parts to it. And it's, I love the way that this song is, is a piece together. And the different, uh, ends and outs of it, you'll hear what I'm talking about. So here we go. This is track number six. It's called no compassion.

Well, you could definitely, uh, feel those emotions. that he's going for with that, his style of singing. I got to say, though, man, I feel like this has got to be one of those bands where his, uh, his voices is very polarizing, you know, you probably either love talking heads or hate talking heads because of David Byrne. I feel like we say that about every single band that we cover on this podcast, dude. I don't think that's true, brother. We said it about Tom York a couple weeks back.

We said it about Interpol. I think we've said it about some other people, too. I'm just saying, like, that could be true for probably every single band, dude. But yeah, you're right. You're probably right. Because the thing about David Byrne is that it's not really a singing voice, right? No. But that's part of it.

Yeah, and a lot of times his lyrics, or the way he sings at least, is very, not, not, really spoken word, but like, actually they are sometimes, depending on the album. But, yeah, so, again, though, like, the guitar playing is excellent, right? The drumming is, like, super tight, right? Yeah, I love the drums. I like that drumbeat a lot. And, yeah, just that, the guitar is so, is such a bite to it during that one part. but yeah I just love

I love his lyrics man his lyrics are great so anyway let's let's play that song that I was intending on playing earlier because I think it does sort of show kind of one of their more well-known songs how he how he uses his vocals

and also illustrates just how much they've changed over the years this song is probably one of their more well-known songs. It's called Once in a Lifetime. And it was on their 1980 album, Remain in Light, which is a... So only three years later. Three years later.

And we may have to do this album at some point down the road, because this album is super experimental and just really, really interesting. It's got, you know, basically, you know, they went over to a... David was super influenced by Afrobeat, not Afrobeat, but, you know, funk, poly rhythms like African. Yeah, I guess so, Afro, Afro world beat, funk, dance, rock. So anyway, this song is called Once in a Lifetime, and you've probably heard it on a movie or a commercial. here we go. And how can you not love that song?

I know, right. Yeah, Talking heads have, they have some great, some great, really catchy melodies that they've written over the years, you know? Yeah. Just with those hooks like that

that are just like instantly, you know, classic and memorable. But anyway, so yeah, that's, you know, if you weren't aware, that is who talking heads are, right? Yeah, and hey, let's mention too, dude. They had a pretty

pretty well-known single on Talking Head 77, Psycho Killer. Yeah, and funny enough, that's, that's, well, at least according to Spotify, that's their most played song on Spotify. So it's funny how that happens sometimes, right? Yeah, so. Lots of memorable moments in that one. Yeah.

And again, with his voice, right, like in the chorus, you know, let's just fucking play it. I mean, I could just see him like having it back away from the mic during that part. Yeah, sure. You know? But yeah, if you're interested, there is a really well-known live video from, I think it's the, you could watch the entire concert that they did circling back to the album that once in a lifetime appears on called Remain in Light. there is a really awesome live video on YouTube of a concert that they did in yeah it's a live

it's a live in Rome but yeah that was again that's what that's when they were basically at the height of their their game they just came out with remaining light it was huge successful and just like the energy and the, like, it's just crazy, man, insane. Anyway, maybe we'll put that in the show notes. We'll put that video on the show notes on our website, no-filler podcast.com. All right, so I got one more song for us here. This song is called The Book I Read. Oh.

You think Jimmy, not Jimmy. You think Brit Daniel was given a nod to Talking Hads with the song The Book I Write? It's very possible. Yeah, man. But yeah, I did choose that on purpose because of the song that we did a side track on a few months back called The Book I Write. But anyway, this is called The Book I Read by Talking Hands. That was great, man. Yep.

Dude, I got a, I'm curious to know how different, like, how different was Talking Hits for that time. I mean, that's the thing. I mean, they literally were the, like, the forefathers of New Wave. That's how different they were, you know? But you still can't even put, I mean, it's not like all New Wave bands have, you know, no one sounds like talking hits. Right, right. But I mean, they. I feel like most of that is because of David Burns.

because of his voice. Yes, absolutely. But, like, they were, but, you know, it's obviously more than that too, right? It's not just his voice, but, like, the way he plays guitar. Also, I guess it's worth noting because I didn't really mention this earlier. But, you know, there were four members in Talking Heads, or at least when this album came out. I talked about the three founding members, but they added a keyboard to also play guitar on some tracks. his name is Jerry Harrison.

So he joined when they recorded this album. So Harrison actually was in this band called The Modern Lovers, which is going to be our outro track. But we'll get to that later. So anyway, yeah, the fact that they came out of the New York punk scene and were so different than the punk bands in that scene, that they, you know, were called New Wave and, like, ushered us into New Wave. You know, that's how important they are, right?

But, yeah. Yeah, I mean, not to mention just, you know, David Byrne is one of the most, you know, he's a legend. He really is. Yeah, he's gone on to, you know, a lot of you, a lot of you in our age group, your first, your first encounter, if you will, with David Byrne, may have been. the album that he did with St. Vincent in 2012 called Love This Giant. If you're a St. Vincent fan,

you probably know exactly who David Byrne is. He's the guy with the gray hair on the album cover standing next to St. Vincent, obviously. But yeah, he sings on that album. So anyway, just, you know. Hey, dude, that could be our sidetrack, man. Yeah, you're right. That's actually not a bad idea.

We'll pick a track. We'll pick a track from that album. And, you know, St. Vincent's great anyway. So that'll be good. Yeah, absolutely. All right. So that's that, man. Talking Hedge is just one of those bands where every single album,

you're going to hear something different. They're constantly exploring and experimenting. And I highly recommend their first four albums. And then obviously, speaking in tongues, their fifth album, is also, it's got one of their more well-known songs, This Must Be the Place, which is hugely influential to many, many bands. Arcade Fire, I think, has pointed to that song as, I think they did a cover, actually. or a live cover or something like that. But anyway, that's a hugely, hugely influential song on indie music from our generation. But anyway, so yeah, maybe we'll do another one down the line.

I mean, we could literally do their first four albums. I don't know if we want to keep doing that format of covering the same band over and over again. But, yeah, I mean, that's the thing. Their music is so varied and different that it would, I mean, we could definitely do it. So maybe we will. But anyway, yeah, dude, like you said, this one was quick and dirty. Although we are reaching the one hour mark. So, yeah.

All right. So as always, briefly here, like Travis mentioned earlier, we have a website. And it's a doozy. It's really easy on the eyes. I love it. Proud of you, Travis. Looks great. It's called No Fiddler Podcast.

There you can actually stream all of our episodes directly from there with our SoundCloud players. You can click on expanded show notes for each episode, including the sidetracks. And that'll take you to track listings and links to sources and we'll throw up some live videos and video interviews if there's any that applies. and you can also stream us on pretty much any other podcast app that's out there. We should be up there. Thanks as always for listening. And please let us know what you think. We want to know how we can improve this puppy of ours.

Dude, I feel like are we approaching 50 episodes? I've got to be getting here, brother. I mean, you wouldn't know it by the episode count. Yeah. Well, I guess you would if you're on. iTunes. You know, as we've mentioned before, probably, we don't number our sidetrack episodes, which are shorter episodes that we release in between our full-length episodes.

So it looks like we've only released 23 episodes, but we've actually released 46 episodes. So yeah, we're coming up on 50. And I was checking the other day on SoundCloud, and this doesn't sound like much. you know, in the grand scheme of things, but we, you know, we're almost hitting the 5,000 total place mark as well. And we've been doing this since, I guess we launched early 2018, so. Is that true? I thought it was a little bit in 2017 that we launched. I might be wrong.

No, we were recording in 2017, but we didn't launch the podcast until 2018. Oh, you're right. You're right. It was nine months ago. our first episode came out. So 5,000 plays and almost a year. Not bad. Not bad.

I'm cool with that. All right. Especially because we're really not trying that hard. No, we're not. As far as getting us out there. Yeah, we're not doing our due diligence as far as marketing this and getting it out there. But, you know. We don't have a PR team, so.

No, no. We could spend some effort on it, but whatever. That's whatever. Maybe we'll do it later. I don't know. So to keep on our, on track with our Radiohead Fest, so we will have our sidetrack for Talking Heads next week. And then the following week, we will do our episode on Kid A, Radiohead's second album.

And, or I'm sorry, that's their fourth album. that's the second album that we're covering. But that came out in the year 2000. And it's quite the departure from OK Computer. But yeah, I'm pumped. It's going to be good. Yeah, I'm excited. All right.

So to close us out, I have a song from another band from the 70s, from that kind of not exactly punk, but not exactly. exactly New Wave either. But these guys are called the modern lovers. And the keyboard player, Mr. Jerry Harrison, went on to join Talking Heads, as I mentioned earlier. So, this song is called Roadrunner, and that'll do it for us.

My name is Travis. And I'm Quentin. See y'all next time. One, two, three, four, five, six.