Today I'm wrapping up Talking Heads with the part soundtrack, part studio album, True Stories. Conceived by David Byrne as a film, which starred not only the band, but a young John Goodman, among other cast members.
Upon its release, the musical film would flop. Though critics would praise its vignettes style storytelling, it simply didn't produce the box office return needed to be a success. Since then, it's become far more popular on home video releases, even reaching cult classic status.
As for the album, it began a rapid decline for the band. While it sold what most would consider reasonably well, reaching gold status, it far underperformed expectations. It did, however, produce their biggest Billboard hit, Wild Wild Life, which peaked at number twenty-five.
Things start out with Love For Sale, which is a decent song, but even at four and a half minutes felt like it was much longer than it needed to be. This is followed by the overly produced Puzzlin' Evidence. It's with the latter that I started to feel like I was listening to a B-52's album, which wasn't necessarily a compliment.
Over production seemed like the name of the game for the entire first side of the record. But more so out in left field was the inclusion of the St. Thomas Aquinas Elementary School Choir on Hey Now. What was happening? Where were the quirky songs that made the band what they were?
When side two comes around, it kicks off with the track I bought the album for, Wild Wild Life. It's probably my favorite from Talking Heads. Things also finally start to finally sound like a Heads record with the hit being followed by Radio Head. Fortunately, things stay relatively in familiar territory from there, and the second side is far superior to the first. In fact, I'll go ahead and call the entire second half good.
With that said, this is definitely not my favorite album from the band. Somewhere along the line, they seem to have lost their way, and as a result the music suffered for it. I don't know if they were trying too hard to be part of mainstream rock, or if internal issues were ripping them apart creatively. Whatever it was, for sure there was a steady decline.
As I noted yesterday, when Talking Heads released their critically acclaimed concert video, Stop Making Sense, fans of the band had no reason to suspect that 1984 would be the last year they'd tour together. Though they remained intact, and released 1985's Little Creatures, 1986's True Stories, and 1988's Naked, rifts had long since grown between members.
This all began as early as 1978, when Brynes essentially took creative control of the band, alienated Chris Frantz, Tina Weymouth, and Jerry Harrison, and then began bringing in other musicians between 1983 and 1984. Things got so bad that Weymouth and Frantz would launch their own band, Tom Tom Club as a creative outlet, while Harrison explored his own solo career.
By 1991, Byrne announced he was leaving the band in an interview with The Times, leaving his bandmates to find out via reading about it. There was no discussion, no follow-up, leaving the members furious with him. Byrne would then sue the three when he learned they were touring as The Heads in the mid-90's. This would be the final nail in the coffin between them all, and they wouldn't reunite or play together again until their 2022 induction into the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame.
Watching the induction is a little tough because you can clearly see the rift between Bryne and his prior bandmates. They seemingly stand away from him as he gives his speech, and when they're all giving their own, he's off in the distance by himself. Honestly, I'm surprised that they played together that night.
Though it's been stated they have since reconciled their personal issues with each other and even appeared together again in 2023 for a brief interview. However, they've ruled out any future reunions or tours. But, as Sean Connery said, never say never.
As for me, having already listened to 1988's Naked, I'm off to find something "new" to listen to.
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