Talking Heads
Entry updated 10 February 2025. Tagged: Music.
US rock band formed in New York in 1975 by vocalist and guitarist David Byrne (1952- ), guitarist and keyboardist Jerry Harrison (1949- ), bassist Tina Weymouth (1950- ) and drummer Chris Frantz (1951- ); active until 1991. Their tight funk-inflected pop-rock, with innovative use of what was at the time called "world music" (particularly African) elements, has proven enduringly influential. "Life During Wartime" from the album Fear of Music (1979) is set in a Future War in which several US Cities have already been destroyed; the narrator has abandoned the city to hide in a graveyard. "(Nothing But) Flowers" from Naked (1988), tells of a future in which nature has reclaimed land once given over to shopping malls and fast food chains. Byrne's solo album The Knee Plays (1985) includes the satirical sf song "In the Future", a list of statements about life as it will be lived, which deliberately contradict each other. [CWa]
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