Talking Heads

Talking Heads - The Name Of This Band Is Talking Heads (Live 2 CD Set Remastered) - 2004 - Rhino

The Name of This Band Is Talking Heads is a double live album by Talking Heads, originally released in 1982. The first album featured the original quartet in recordings from 1977 and 1979, and the second album the expanded ten-piece lineup that toured in 1980 and 1981. The album contains live versions of songs that appear on Talking Heads: 77, More Songs About Buildings and Food, Fear of Music, and Remain in Light. The cassette edition of the album included "Cities" as a bonus track not included on the vinyl edition – this track has been included on the subsequent CD release. The title of the album is a reference both to the group's preference for having no expressed definite article within the band name (as opposed to "The Talking Heads") and to David Byrne's minimalist introductions to songs. The album opens with one such introduction: "The name of this song is New Feeling. That's what it's about." An expanded version of the record, on CD in the United States for the first time, was released in 2004 by Sire/Warner Bros./Rhino. It duplicated the pattern of the original with the first disc featuring the quartet alone, and the second disc a ten-member band. Additional tracks from 1978 are among the eight extra songs on the first disc, and correct running order for the set from the larger band on the second disc. The introduction to the song "Crosseyed And Painless" was edited out on the CD version, however.The remastered & expanded edition of the album currently sits at number fifteen on the Metacritic list of all time best-reviewed albums. – Wiki

Although most people probably think the only Talking Heads live release is Stop Making Sense, the fact is that there's an earlier, better live album called The Name of This Band Is Talking Heads. Originally released in 1982 on LP and cassette, the album chronicles the growth of the band, both stylistically and personnel-wise. The first LP is the original quartet version of the band, recorded between 1977 and 1979, performing excellent versions of tunes (mostly) off 77 and More Songs About Buildings and Food. Also included were the previously unavailable "A Clean Break" and "Love Goes to a Building on Fire," as well as early versions of "Memories Can't Wait" and "Air." The second LP comes from the Remain in Light tour, recorded in 1980 and 1981. In order to present something close to the music on that album, the original quartet lineup was greatly expanded. Added were two percussionists (Steven Stanley, Jose Rossy), two backup singers (Nona Hendryx, Dollette McDonald), Busta Cherry Jones on bass, Bernie Worrell (!) on keys, and a young Adrian Belew on lead guitar. The excitement of this material is palpable, and the muscular band rips into these tunes with more power than the originals in most cases. "Drugs" gets revamped for live performance, and "Houses in Motion kicks into high gear with a great art-funk coda. Belew is absolutely on fire throughout, especially on "The Great Curve" and "Crosseyed and Painless," where his deranged feedback soloing has never sounded better. At this point in their career, Talking Headswere still basically an underground band; it was "Burning Down the House" that really thrust them into the mainstream, and Stop Making Sense documents their arrival as a more or less mainstream act. The Name of This Band Is Talking Heads captures a hungry band on its way up, performing with a fire that was never matched on later tours. Unfortunately, The Name of This Band Is Talking Heads remained unavailable on compact disc for years, which is a shame since it's arguably one of their finest releases. © Sean Westergaard © 2015 AllMusic, a division of All Media Network, LLC. | All Rights Reserved http://www.allmusic.com/album/the-name-of-this-band-is-talking-heads-mw0000199932

This two-disc set marked the CD debut of Talking Head’s 1982 live double album. While the original tracks are retained (and the discs follow the original's breakdown of 1977-1979 and 1980-1981), an extra 16 tracks are added to the set, including 13 that were never before released in any format. “The Name of This Band Is Talking Heads” is arguably one of the best live albums of all time and is an important, groundbreaking album by a unique band on their way up. Read more about this album @ http://www.discogs.com/Talking-Heads-The-Name-Of-This-Band-Is-Talking-Heads/release/438300 VHR by A.O.O.F.C [1 Rar file containg two CD’s: File size = 331 Mb: All tracks @ 320 Kbps]

TRACKS

CD ONE

"New Feeling" – 3:09 for WCOZ broadcast, Northern Studio, Maynard MA, November 17, 1977
"A Clean Break (Let's Work)" – 5:05
"Don't Worry About The Government" – 3:03
"Pulled Up" – 4:04
"Psycho Killer" (Byrne, Tina Weymouth, Chris Frantz) – 5:31
"Who Is It?" – 1:44
"The Book I Read" – 4:22
"The Big Country" – 5:09 for WXRT broadcast, The Park West, Chicago, August 23, 1978
"I'm Not in Love" – 4:57 for KSAN broadcast, The Boarding House, San Francisco, September 16, 1978
"The Girls Want to Be with the Girls" – 3:44 at The Agora, Cleveland, December 18, 1978
"Electricity (Drugs)" – 3:28
"Found a Job" – 5:35
"Mind" – 4:56 for WBCN broadcast, Berklee Performance Center, Boston, August 24, 1979
"Artists Only" (Byrne, Wayne Zieve) – 3:49 at The Capitol Theater, Passaic NJ, November 17, 1979
"Stay Hungry" (Byrne, Frantz) – 4:05
"Air" – 4:01
"Love → Building on Fire" – 3:47
"Memories (Can't Wait)" (Byrne, Jerry Harrison) – 3:44
"Heaven" (Byrne, Harrison) – 4:31

CD TWO

"Psycho Killer" (Byrne, Weymouth, Frantz) – 5:33 at Sun Plaza Concert Hall, Tokyo, Japan, February 27, 1981
"Warning Sign" (Byrne, Frantz) – 5:40
"Stay Hungry" (Byrne, Frantz) – 3:56
"Cities" – 5:00 at Emerald City, Cherry Hill, NJ, November 8, 1980-November 9, 1980
"I Zimbra" (Byrne, Brian Eno, Hugo Ball) – 3:30
"Drugs (Electricity)" (Byrne, Eno) – 4:41
"Once in a Lifetime" (Byrne, Eno, Frantz, Harrison, Weymouth) – 5:57 at Sun Plaza Concert Hall, Tokyo, Japan, February 27, 1981
"Animals" – 4:05
"Houses in Motion" (Byrne, Eno, Frantz, Harrison, Weymouth) – 6:54 at Emerald City, Cherry Hill, NJ, November 8, 1980-November 9, 1980
"Born Under Punches (The Heat Goes On)" (Byrne, Eno, Frantz, Harrison, Weymouth) – 8:24 at Sun Plaza Concert Hall, Tokyo, Japan, February 27, 1981
"Crosseyed and Painless" (Byrne, Eno, Frantz, Harrison, Weymouth) – 5:58 at Emerald City, Cherry Hill, NJ, November 8, 1980-November 9, 1980; truncated version from original release
"Life During Wartime" (Byrne, Frantz, Harrison, Weymouth) – 4:54 at Central Park, New York City, August 27, 1980
"Take Me to the River" (Al Green, Mabon Hodges) – 6:33
"The Great Curve" (Byrne, Eno, Frantz, Harrison, Weymouth) – 6:42

All songs written by David Byrne except as noted

MUSICIANS

David Byrne – guitar, vocals
Adrian Belew – guitar, backing vocals
Jerry Harrison – guitar, piano, keyboards, backing vocals
Tina Weymouth – bass, percussion, backing vocals
Busta "Cherry" Jones – bass, guitar
Bernie Worrell – keyboards, backing vocals
Chris Frantz – drums
Dolette McDonald – percussion, backing vocals
Jose Rossy – percussion
Steve Scales – conga
Nona Hendryx – backing vocals

BIO

At the start of their career, Talking Heads were all nervous energy, detached emotion, and subdued minimalism. When they released their last album about 12 years later, the band had recorded everything from art-funk to polyrhythmic worldbeat explorations and simple, melodic guitar pop. Between their first album in 1977 and their last in 1988, Talking Heads became one of the most critically acclaimed bands of the '80s, while managing to earn several pop hits. While some of their music can seem too self-consciously experimental, clever, and intellectual for its own good, at their best Talking Heads represent everything good about art-school punks. And they were literally art-school punks. Guitarist/vocalistDavid Byrne, drummer Chris Frantz, and bassist Tina Weymouth met at the Rhode Island School of Design in the early '70s; they decided to move to New York in 1974 to concentrate on making music. The next year, the band won a spot opening for the Ramones at the seminal New York punk club CBGB. In 1976, keyboardist Jerry Harrison, a former member of Jonathan Richman's Modern Lovers, was added to the lineup. By 1977, the band had signed to Sire Records and released its first album, Talking Heads: 77. It received a considerable amount of acclaim for its stripped-down rock & roll, particularly Byrne's geeky, overly intellectual lyrics and uncomfortable, jerky vocals. For their next album, 1978's More Songs About Buildings and Food, the band worked with producer Brian Eno, recording a set of carefully constructed, arty pop songs, distinguished by extensive experimenting with combined acoustic and electronic instruments, as well as touches of surprisingly credible funk. On their next album, the Eno-produced Fear of Music, Talking Heads began to rely heavily on their rhythm section, adding flourishes of African-styled polyrhythms. This approach came to a full fruition with 1980's Remain in Light, which was again produced by Eno. Talking Heads added several sidemen, including a horn section, leaving them free to explore their dense amalgam of African percussion, funk bass and keyboards, pop songs, and electronics. After a long tour, the band concentrated on solo projects for a couple of years. By the time of 1983's Speaking in Tongues, the band had severed its ties with Eno; the result was an album that still relied on the rhythmic innovations of Remain in Light, except within a more rigid pop-song structure. After its release,Talking Heads embarked on another extensive tour, which was captured on the Jonathan Demme-directed concert film Stop Making Sense. After releasing the straightforward pop albumLittle Creatures in 1985, Byrne directed his first movie, True Stories, the following year; the band's next album featured songs from the film. Two years later, Talking Heads releasedNaked, which marked a return to their worldbeat explorations, although it sometimes suffered from Byrne's lyrical pretensions. After its release, Talking Heads were put on "hiatus"; Byrnepursued some solo projects, as did Harrison, and Frantz andWeymouth continued with their side project, Tom Tom Club. In 1991, the band issued an announcement that they had broken up. Shortly thereafter, Harrison's production took off with successful albums by Live and Crash Test Dummies. In 1996, the original lineup minus Byrne reunited for the album No Talking Just Head; Byrne sued Frantz, Weymouth, andHarrison for attempting to record and perform as Talking Heads, so the trio went by the Heads. In 1999, all four worked together to promote a 15th-anniversary edition of Stop Making Sense, and they also performed at the 2002 induction ceremony for their entrance into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Through the 2010s, Byrne released a number of solo and collaborative projects. Tom Tom Club continued to tour, while Harrison produced albums for the likes of No Doubt, the Von Bondies, and Hockey. © Stephen Thomas Erlewine © 2015 AllMusic, a division of All Media Network, LLC. | All Rights Reserved http://www.allmusic.com/artist/talking-heads-mn0000131650/biography