Talking Heads: Remain In Light

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floid
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Talking Heads: Remain In Light

Post by floid » Mon Jan 15, 2007 4:43 pm

the tape you found in the cutout bin at the local scratchndent dept. store, that you pull out once a year and force yourself to listen in horrified amazement to this, this, what is this stuff that was so obviously way ahead of its time and yet hopelessly outdated before ever being released? repress urges to watch revenge of the nerds and do the robot.
shake your head and put it away for another year.
until one year you realize "this must be how most people feel when i pull out white light or the dolls..." and start wondering exactly how it is that one goes about acquiring taste, and, oh shit, it's stuck in your head, that atari solo, and now you're listening to it four times a day in shock and awe that anyone would ever want to do something this horrible, and your arms are being rendered in half a bit as you discover your inner white boy.
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Post by lukievan » Mon Jan 15, 2007 9:08 pm

reboot.

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Post by comfortstarr » Tue Jan 16, 2007 7:04 am

Yeah... um... I clicked on this thread because I got that CD (having once owned the record, now long gone) over x-mas. I've been listening to it quite a bit. What a great record songs-wise. I'm uncertain of the production. I guess I keep wishing it had a little more bass/low-end.

P.S. Lukievan, nice music. I miss bklyn. sooo much artistic energy, despite the young richy riches.

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Post by LifeGoesOff » Tue Jan 16, 2007 8:21 am

there is nothing wrong with that record....nothing. I've been loving it since high school.

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context

Post by lukievan » Tue Jan 16, 2007 8:42 am

I think it's really interseting how records that we initiially love for the music alone become dear to us for their production idiosyncrasies as well. You get used to the lack of low-end, or the muffled mix, or the phased-out drums, and it becomes part and parcel of what you love about the music. I mean, can you imagine some early Guided By Voices, like Bee Thousand, if it had been recorded by a 'real' engineer in a 'professional' studio? It just wouldn't have the same special place in my heart. That's an extreme example, but you can apply it everywhere you listen. Though I confess that sometimes I wish I could hear more hi-fi versions of some old Django Reinhardt recordings.

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Torn

Post by nopenopenope » Tue Jan 16, 2007 9:02 am

I am both a Talking Heads and Brian Eno fan... yet, I have a hard time getting into their work together. I agree - it is a homeless bastard child. I think you should check out "My Life In The Bush of Ghosts" by David Byrne and Brian Eno. That puts those two together and it's amazing. With the 'Heads they kind of feel like they work against each other. The Heads were about simple grooves and Eno is about complex textures (at least he with this album) and i felt like they canceled out.

To be a cop-out, i think the singles sound great but tracks like Born Under Punches and Seen and Not Seen make this album my least favorite 'Heads album.

:cry:

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Post by Cellotron » Tue Jan 16, 2007 9:18 am

Definitely an amazing album - on eof my favorites of all time. Witness: a few art-punk nerds from NYC do their white boy (and girl) version of Fela Kuti, enlst the ultimate way out guitar nerd of the decade for some of the coolest anti-guitar solos on vinyl, re-enlist the coolest nerd producer for what ends up being their best collaboration ever, and fills it out with some cool contributions of avant garde whalesong-trumpet, a teched-out-r&b diva, and NYC street percussion galore.

The live tour that followed with the band enhanced with Adrian Belew, Nona Hendryx, Busta Cherry and Steve Scales was to me the best one they did too.

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Re: Torn

Post by lg » Tue Jan 16, 2007 5:51 pm

JoshSites wrote:I am both a Talking Heads and Brian Eno fan... yet, I have a hard time getting into their work together. I agree - it is a homeless bastard child. I think you should check out "My Life In The Bush of Ghosts" by David Byrne and Brian Eno. That puts those two together and it's amazing. With the 'Heads they kind of feel like they work against each other. The Heads were about simple grooves and Eno is about complex textures (at least he with this album) and i felt like they canceled out.

To be a cop-out, i think the singles sound great but tracks like Born Under Punches and Seen and Not Seen make this album my least favorite 'Heads album.

:cry:
i dunno. i've loved 'My Life In the Bush of Ghosts' ever since it came out, and i still think 'Remain In Light' is one fuckin' amazing record. True, I've certainly listened to 'Bush of Ghosts' more over the years, but it's hard to describe the impact 'Remain In Light' had on my sensibilities when i first heard it. It seemed to me to be a culmination of where both the band and Eno were going at the time.

As for Eno's work with the band, I really like the records they did together. Certainly more so than what came after and arguably more than TH '77.

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Re: Torn

Post by DryCounty » Wed Jan 17, 2007 5:23 am

JoshSites wrote:I am both a Talking Heads and Brian Eno fan... yet, I have a hard time getting into their work together. I agree - it is a homeless bastard child. I think you should check out "My Life In The Bush of Ghosts" by David Byrne and Brian Eno. That puts those two together and it's amazing. With the 'Heads they kind of feel like they work against each other. The Heads were about simple grooves and Eno is about complex textures (at least he with this album) and i felt like they canceled out.

:cry:
I think the appeal for me was the juxtaposition of Eno going against the 'Heads and vic versa. Neither of them cancel each other out, either. Witness the amazing "the Overload"... I think tracks like "the great curve" tend to get hyperactive, but never too much. I also like the fact that this album has such a variety of songs. With the pre-industrial repetition of 'the overload' to the top-40 hit "once in a lifetime'.

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Post by I'm Painting Again » Wed Jan 17, 2007 8:02 pm

I can't stop listening to the name of the band is talking heads..that is an awesome record..

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time warp

Post by lukievan » Mon Jun 01, 2015 6:03 pm

Wow, it's not often that you do a search for 'Fela' on the tapeop board, find an old post re: 'Remain In Light' only to realize that you already commented on the post, 8 years ago, and then find that a follow up comment includes a personal compliment on your own music that you never saw. Belated thanks Comfortstarr!
comfortstarr wrote:Yeah... um... I clicked on this thread because I got that CD (having once owned the record, now long gone) over x-mas. I've been listening to it quite a bit. What a great record songs-wise. I'm uncertain of the production. I guess I keep wishing it had a little more bass/low-end.

P.S. Lukievan, nice music. I miss bklyn. sooo much artistic energy, despite the young richy riches.

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Post by Snarl 12/8 » Mon Jun 01, 2015 11:32 pm

Every once in a while, I watch this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0wp2qhoop9U <-- Talking Heads, Live in Rome.

Or listen to it while I clean the kitchen or something.

It might have very little to do with the actual discussion in this thread.

I'm sure I'm an idiot for loving Adrian Belew's solos so much.
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Re: Torn

Post by A.David.MacKinnon » Tue Jun 02, 2015 4:40 am

DryCounty wrote: the top-40 hit "once in a lifetime'.
It astonishes me and gives me faith in humanity that Once In A Lifetime was a top 40 hit. It's such a fundamentally weird song. Such a heavy groove but a totally weird feel, strange oblique lyrics, bloop-y out of time tape loop. It's sounds so black and so white at the same time. I can't imagine it being a hit today.

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Post by vvv » Tue Jun 02, 2015 12:37 pm

Snarl 12/8 wrote:
I'm sure I'm an idiot for loving Adrian Belew's solos so much.
"Same as it ever was..." (The loving the solos part. 8))

I also love the line, "this is not my beautiful house", etc.; as well, "The world moves onna woman's hips" from The Great Curve.
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Post by Magnetic Services » Tue Jun 02, 2015 2:05 pm

David Byrne's book "How Music Works" is packed with deets about Remain in Light and all his other albums of course. The story of coming up with ideas and making the "Bush of Ghosts" record was really interesting.

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