Talking Heads: Talking Heads: 77 (2LP, remastered) [WARNER]

Why you'll love it

This 2LP set recuts the album from the original two-track analog master tapes, in a gatefold jacket, and adds a 12-track rarities disc with two previously unheard versions. It's the debut that introduced "Psycho Killer" and "Uh-Oh, Love Comes To Town."

This edition

• 2LP set
• All-analog cut from the master tapes
• Remastered
• 12-track rarities disc
• Gatefold jacket
• Pressed in the Czech Republic
• Stereo mix

About the album

Four art-school friends from Rhode Island walked into CBGB in 1975 and somehow made nervous sound like a groove. Two years later, on Sire, David Byrne, Chris Frantz, Tina Weymouth and Jerry Harrison made this debut at Sundragon Studios in New York, and the twitchy, funky, oddly cheerful sound of Talking Heads arrived fully formed.

"Uh-Oh, Love Comes To Town" opens with steel drums and a skip in its step, "The Book I Read" and "Don't Worry About The Government" are sweetly odd love letters, and "Psycho Killer" became the band's calling card, with its bass line from Weymouth and its French-language bridge. The second disc gathers "Love → Building On Fire," their first single, plus "I Wish You Wouldn't Say That," an acoustic "Psycho Killer" and alternate pop versions that show the songs still taking shape. Tony Bongiovi and Lance Quinn produced the original sessions with the band, keeping the sound lean, bright and a little jumpy.

Remain in Light and Stop Making Sense were still to come, but the blueprint is all here. Byrne would later wear a suit several sizes too big; on this record, the ideas already were.

Also at Kops: more Talking Heads on vinyl · browse Rock

Tracklist

Listen

On Sire / Rhino (cat# R1 726452), a reissue of the 1977 album.