CD Reviews

Talking Heads

Once in a Lifetime: The Best of Talking Heads

(Sire)

There was always something otherworldly about Talking Heads. Maybe it was their music -- that combination of punk and funk and Motown and African polyrhythms. Or maybe it was lead singer David Byrne's lyrical obsession with combining the profound and the banal. "We are vain and we are blind," he sang on the band's 1977 hit "Psycho Killer." "I hate people when they're not polite/Psycho killer, qu'est que c'est?"

But then again, Talking Heads always seemed slightly out of sync with everything going on around them. When the rest of the New York City punk scene was digging on Iggy Pop and white noise, the Heads were doing Al Green covers. When everybody else was writing songs about Deep Meaningful Shit, Byrne was waxing rhapsodic about an orderly life. "My building has every convenience/It's gonna make life easy for me," he sang in "Don't Worry About the Government" -- a song whose very title ran hard against the prevailing anti-establishment tone of the times.

Deep down, though, Talking Heads was a deeply subversive band. Nowhere is that more in evidence than in their new three CD/one DVD box set, Once in a Lifetime: The Best of Talking Heads.

The box set covers the same ground that the earlier two-disc Sand in the Vaseline retrospective did, with a few notable additions. All of the Heads' hits are on here, and a lot of lesser gems. I was happy to see that "Houses in Motion," one of my favorite tracks from Speaking in Tongues, was included, as was "Mr. Jones" from Naked, the story of an American dictator in a banana republic. It's fascinating to hear the evolution of the band over three CDs. From the early art-scene sensibilities of songs like "Love Buildings on Fire" and "Psycho Killer" and the Brian Eno-produced Afro-funk of Remain in Light to the Americana of True Stories and the later worldbeat of "(Nothing But) Flowers," Once in a Lifetime is a comprehensive overview. Very few of the best Talking Heads songs are left out -- though the exclusion of any of the live tracks from the band's live film Stop Making Sense is puzzling, as they featured the band at its most energetic.

What makes this an invaluable item, though, is the DVD, which features all of the band's music videos interspersed with mildly irritating clips of average people talking about odd experiences. If you watched MTV in the 1980s, then you saw the video for "Once in a Lifetime" -- featuring Byrne against a white background twitching like a shock treatment patient and sweating like a pig -- at least a million times. You can see it again here, along with other MTV staples like "Burning Down the House" and "Wild Wild Life." But more interesting are the rarer videos -- like Toni Basil's breakdance-and-social-commentary clip for "Crosseyed and Painless" and Jim Jarmusch's atmospheric "The Lady Don't Mind." My favorite is one of the last videos the band did, "(Nothing But) Flowers," featuring Johnny Marr of the Smiths and the late Kirsty McColl. Directed by legendary (and also deceased) graphic designer Tibor Kalman, it shows the band playing as the lyrics to the song scroll above, below and on them.

The DVD underscores the band's formalist approach to making music -- three of the four members were students at the Rhode Island School of Design, and the band's image was inextricably tied to the art world through its videos and use of Robert Rauschenberg paintings for album covers. Byrne himself is a noted multimedia artist and photographer.

Talking Heads broke up in 1991, but the echoes of their influence are still resonating through pop culture, particularly in the electroclash revival. Once in a Lifetime is a perfect introduction to the band and its work. Put on the big suit and feel the funk, baby.

--Joshua Ellis



column@zenarchery.com



Paul Westerberg

Come Feel Me Tremble

(Vagrant)

Grandpaboy

Dead Man Shake

(Anti)

Paul Westerberg's last album, the double set Mono/Stereo, was a bipolar act of brilliance. On Stereo, he proved that playing with yourself late at night -- in this sense, recording damn near everything on the disc by himself in his basement studio -- can cause you to face your own self-importance and mortality. With Mono, really the work of his alter ego Grandpaboy, Westerberg showed that he could rock without the Stinson boys or Cameron Crowe, producing a gritty and coughing blast of Keith Richards goodies that even Big Star couldn't touch. After the dismal Eventually and the indulgent Suicaine Gratification, the double disc was finally a sign of hope that Westerberg could once again justify his reputation.

His latest double shot, Come Feel Me Tremble, a disc that accompanies the upcoming DVD documentary about the Mono/Stereo tour and the recording of the album, and the Grandpaboy project Dead Man Snake, are both steps toward the goal and stumbles back. Like most two-point attacks, Westerberg could have combined the albums to make one masterpiece. As it stands, both discs have flashes of brilliance (Dead Man's roadhouse riffer "Vampires & Failures" and Tremble's crackling "Hillbilly Junk") and utter failures (Westerberg's version of the Rat Pack classic "What Kind of Fool Am I?" and the silly drinking song "Knockin' 'Em Back"). And unlike Mono/Stereo, there isn't such a wide sonic valley between the two albums. Tremble delves into the sloppy struts of Dead Man (see the thumping chug of "Dirty Diesel"), and Westerberg doesn't hoard all of his sensitive musings for his proper album (the plodding blues track "No Matter What You Say"). Regardless, Westerberg is best when he settles into familiar territory, mixing up the swagger of Please to Meet Me with his newfound love of classic blues ("Get a Move On" and "My Daydream").

Sure, that means there are few surprises between the two discs. But that's the last thing longtime fans want. They just want Uncle Paul to plug in and rock. And with both discs, that's ultimately what Westerberg does.

--Jeff Inman



popularink@hotmail.com



The Everyothers

The Everyothers

(Hautlab)

When David Bowie and Iggy Pop set up shop in Berlin in late 1976, the duo had two goals: Dig Pop's career out of his landfill of a reputation, and do as many drugs as physically possible. They did both, not only ingesting most of the illegal substances that could be airlifted behind the Iron Curtain, but also producing The Idiot and Lust for Life, Pop's poetic and cerebral two-fisted second coming. It was a peak moment in rock history, Bowie and Pop merging the explosive power of proto-punk with the burgeoning electro grooves of bands like Can.

It also presented Owen McCarthy with one hell of a what-if -- namely what if Bowie had tried to help out the Stooges instead of his longtime bud. It probably would have sounded like The Everyothers -- a dirty and drunk hunk of glam-rock that's anything but glamorous. While the group's self-titled debut album struts like Rebel Rebels ready to fight, it also has the muscle to back those fists up, McCarthy and his fellow New Yorkers beefing up Ziggy Stardust's spacemen with plenty of liquid courage and steroids.

The proof: "Can't Get Around It." Starting with nothing more than a tingy acoustic guitar and McCarthy jabbering about his overall lack of blame, the song suddenly morphs into gritty orgy of rock decadence. Guitars snarl like a roadie trying to scare off ugly groupies. Drummer John Melville beats his kit like he's ready to start a brawl. And McCarthy sings as if enunciating is strictly for amateurs and the sober set, swirling his way through words but getting the point across crystal clear. By the time he starts throwing out "ha has" like a mating call to all the freaks in the room, the Everyothers have turned mayhem into gut-twisting art.

The rest of the album isn't that different. Songs like "Make Up Something" and "Like a Drug" swagger and shake like a hard-working stripper, finding perfect pop moments in all of those curves. "Dead Star" shows the band paid attention when the Spiders from Mars touched down, the group building a Bic-inducer out of faint lashes of distortion and McCarthy's drunken impersonation of Dr. Frank-N-Furter. And with "Surprise, Surprise," the band gets perfectly hunky-dory. McCarthy even admits straight up that the band is heading back while looking forward -- "Don't it feel good to be back where we started?" he bellows on opener "Whatever You Want." The simple answer: Hell yeah.

--J.I.

Saves the Day

In Reverie

(Dreamworks)

It's a risky venture when a band with a loyal fan base decides to leave its trademark sound behind for untested material. Regardless of the new direction, there will always be those who cry foul. But growth and change are the hallmarks of a real band and evidence of vitality.

On In Reverie, Save the Day's fourth full-length album (its first for Dreamworks), the band does its best to make a pure pop album. Gone for the most part are the punkish hooks and hard rocking riffs -- replaced with straightforward pop songs that echo with the charm of a pre-Maladroit Rivers Cuomo. But you wouldn't know this from the album's opener, "Anywhere with You." The song starts with driving post-punk riffs before haphazardly stumbling into an almost grungy refrain.

Aside from the equally edgy "Morning in the Moonlight," the rest of this album fluctuates between wistful and painful. Take, for instance, the lyrics from "Where Are You": "It feels like/elephants trampling my hollow chest/if I could move just one fingernail/I'd scratch your name on the back of my hand/So I would never forget you again." Or how about the album closer, "Tomorrow Too Late"?: "When was the last time I held you all through the night/Feels like a zillion years and I don't want to wait more." How's that for subtlety?

Needless to say, this album is no Pinkerton, but it's a laudable effort. Saves the Day handles the material well enough. And who knows? Maybe next time, they'll nail it.

--Hektor D. Esparza



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