Yeesh. Where do I even begin with the Talking Heads? You could write pages and pages about frontman David Byrne alone (well...I could write pages and pages), a man so genuinely strange that he probably can't even see the autism spectrum from his vantage point. Byrne's devoid-of-personality style personality was so unintentionally and unavoidably intense that he overshadowed the rest of the "ensemble cast" band. The rest of the band comprised of Chris Frantz (drummer) and Tina Weymouth (bass, girl). There, I've successfully distilled EVERYTHING I know about those two into nice little parenthetical half-statements. Oh yeah, wait, they're also married. And Frantz looks like Bill Clinton now. There's also Jerry Harrison (guitar, weird nose).
Byrne, Frantz and Weymouth all met at the Rhode Island School of Design, which I can only presume to be a very pretentious New England college of arts and farts. Mostly farts. So what you're getting here is art-school punk in the truest definition of the term. Early influences such as David Bowie and the Velvet Underground certainly help contribute to the artsy-fartsiness of the Talking Heads' overall oeuvre, but don't mistake "artsy-fartsy" for "up their own asses" in this case. Talking Heads knew exactly what they were setting out to accomplish, for the most part, and were more often than not pretty damn modest. Jerry Harrison was added later prior to the release of the debut album, presumably because the woman-to-man ratio of the band was too high. But I kid! Harrison didn't go to the Rhode Island School of Design, oh no. He had to settle for Harvard instead.
So the scene is set for you: Educated, smartypants, art punk sensibilities coming from normal-looking, wimpy college kids. In September of 1977 they released their debut album, aptly titled Talking Heads: 77. The name is bland, the cover is bland, on the surface it's one of the most underwhelming and least bombastic debuts in music history. And once you drop that needle on the record and the first few notes of "Uh Oh, Love Comes to Town" hits your ears, you'll notice that it, too, is wimpy. "So what the fuck? You told me this was supposed to be punk! This sounds like shit my slut mother would like!" Whooooaaa, take it easy there, Guy Fieri. Just keep on listening to the record and...
...oh shoot, yeah, it doesn't really get less wimpy, does it? There's a very good chance that your first run-through on Talking Heads: 77 will not only barely leave an impression, but will leave you bewildered as to its significance in the history of new wave and post-punk. "Uh Oh, Love Comes to Town" turns out to be a pleasant little ditty with cute little steel drum interludes. "Tentative Decisions" is a nice little song with a simple little bassline with a pretty little snare drum during the chorus. "Don't Worry About the Government" has some adorable little acoustic strumming. "New Feeling", "Who Is It?", and "No Compassion" feature some angular guitar stylings, but it's nothing too out there. Nothing that Guy Fieri's slut mother would be offended by. And hey, all these songs are catchy too! Some of them sound similar, but each song has honest-to-God melodies and hooks. Byrne's meek little voice leaves a lot to be desired at first, and no one ever said the guy has range, but there's a lot of character there behind his calculated, mechanical vocal expression (and believe me, it gets even more calculated and mechanical after a few albums). The guy is one of the most original vocalists in modern rock history, often imitated and never duplicated. I'm looking at you, Adrian Belew.
The lyrics, though. Oh man, the lyrics! Prose over poetry, usually, with excellent results. If there ever was a voice to go with the lyrics these kids cooked up, Byrne's introverted and paranoid delivery is absolutely perfect. PERFECT. And here lies the real genius behind the Talking Heads: a perfect stew of elements to create an atmosphere of subtle anxiety and panic like no other band can. Sometimes the lyrics are so neurotic that you can just sense Byrne is about to snap ("It's not cool to have so many problems/But don't expect me to explain your indecisions/Go talk to your analyst, isn't that what they're paid for?"). Sometimes they're so banal that it seems like something sinister is lurking not far behind ("I'm writing 'bout the book I read/I have to sing about the book I read"). My favorite sleight-of-hand lyrical twist comes from "Don't Worry About the Government", where each verse begins by introducing an idea ripe for poetic musings (clouds, trees, the nation of America) and then the listener learns that Byrne just cares about his home. And not even the abstract multiple-meaning definition of "home" either, he's literally singing about the building that he lives in. The wind carries the clouds past his building. The pine cones fall from the trees next to the highway that will take him to his building. It's all day-to-day minutiae with no room for abstract thoughts. Irony like this wasn't cool at all yet in 1977.
Don't think this post is all about boner-spooge Talking Heads-fellatin' Guy Fieri's mom-style accolades. This record is certainly not without its flaws. Personally, I find this to be a rare example of an album where Side 2 is way better than Side 1. Everything from "No Compassion" until the end is stellar (plus you get the fantastic "Psycho Killer"), but I tend to hem and haw about my feelings of Side 1. The light-hearted attitude treads into disposable pop a bit to the point where most of the tracks on Side 1 are interchangeable. Another downside is that Byrne's singing chops are overall less refined on the debut, and there are some particularly cringe-inducing moments on tracks like "New Feeling" and "Happy Day" where he tries to hit some high notes with debatable success.
All boiled down though, this record from beginning to end is a good blueprint to show that punk music doesn't need an in-your-face punk attitude. You can still be sneery and sarcastic in the undertones, and the Talking Heads were among the pioneers of reviving rock and roll during an era that desperately needed it (think the downfall of overwrought, gluttonous prog rock). Alternative rock and indie rock wouldn't exist without albums like Talking Heads: 77.
Overall, you can't go wrong starting your Talking Heads collection with Talking Heads: 77. Simplistic and tame, but enjoyable nonetheless. Fans like to admonish casual listeners of the critical notion that this record will get praised for its simplicity while the later True Stories album will be shunned for precisely the same reason, but the major difference between the two is that the quirky Talking Heads personality pervades here nicely. Not so much in True Stories, in my opinion. Guy Fieri's whore of a mom would agree to that.
GOOD
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