Spike Lee documents the former Talking Heads frontman's brilliant, timely 2019 Broadway show, based on his recent album and tour of the same name.
Ex-Talking Head David Byrne and actor/composer Ryuichi Sakamoto (who co-starred in the film) each get a side of this beautiful score to Bernardo Bertolucci's Academy Award-winning film, and each took home Oscars and Grammys for their efforts.
A pioneering work for countless styles connected to electronics, ambience, and Third World music, My Life in the Bush of Ghosts expands on the fourth-world concepts of Hassell/Eno work with a whirlwind 45 minutes of worldbeat/funk-rock (with the combined talents of several percussionists and bassists, including Bill Laswell, Tim Wright, David van Tieghem, and Talking Heads' Chris Frantz) that's also heavy on the samples - from radio talk-show hosts, Lebanese mountain singers, preachers, exorcism ceremonies, Muslim chanting, and Egyptian pop, among others. It's also light years away from the respectful, preservationist angles of previous generations' field recorders and folk song gatherers…
A concept album based around the lives of Imelda Marcos and her nanny Estrella Cumpas, David Byrne and Fatboy Slim's (Norman Cook) Here Lies Love is primarily a great pop record featuring a bevy of name female vocalists. Grand conceptual themes aside, Byrne, Slim, and Slim cohort Tom Gandey (aka Cagedbaby) have delivered a kooky, fun, theatrical, and – more often than not – deliriously listenable collection of '70s and '80s club pop.
David Byrne took a spare, direct approach on his third song-based solo album, which lent his work an intimacy but did little to restore his commercial prospects, despite a first single, "Angels," that was a ringer for the Talking Heads song "Once in a Lifetime." In fact, the limited instrumentation and focus on Byrne's voice tended to create difficulties with his typically quirky lyrics – with the words in close-up, one wanted them to make some kind of sense…
David Byrne, like fellow New York transplant David Bowie, has reached a well-deserved apex in his career. After eight post-Talking Heads solo outings, the eccentric composer, songwriter, artist, and world music entrepreneur has transcended the inconsistencies of his previous efforts and created a genuinely moving and wickedly fun record. Like Bowie's Heathen and Reality, Grown Backwards is a mature work by an icon who has come to terms with his past, present, and future, and there's a joy in the simple act of creativity here that gives even the heaviest of subject matter an effervescent charm…
On his first full-fledged solo album, Byrne indulges his fascination with Latin and South American musical styles, employing a variety of native musicians but mixing up the sounds to suit his own distinctly non-purist vision and singing over the tracks the same kind of witty, oddball lyrics found on Talking Heads albums…
Uh-Oh was only David Byrne's second pop-oriented solo album and his first to be released after the formal end of Talking Heads. Though informed by his various investigations into world music, the album was a natural successor to the Talking Heads records, relying on involved percussion tracks topped by Byrne's quirky singing and lyrics…
This feature-length documentary profiles David Byrne - famous lead vocalist of the former band Talking Heads, today a solo artist, event organizer and publisher. A clever combination of onstage energy and intimate testimony, the film shows him rehearsing, talking about his work and appearing in concert with his band and dance group.
The Catherine Wheel is David Byrne's musical score commissioned by Twyla Tharp for her dance project. The Catherine Wheel premiered September 22, 1981, at the Winter Garden Theatre in New York City.