Music Review: Talking Heads - Remain in Light(1980)

Talking Heads is one of the most important groups in Rock history. This is obvious to anyone that has listened to their first three albums: Talking Heads 77, More Songs About Buildings and Food, and Fear of Music. Egregiously lumped in with punk rockers at the time, Talking Heads were more literate,cerebral, and diverse  than most punkers(not to say there isn't great or diverse punk rock music, because there definitely is). But it is with Remain in Light that they made an album that transcends not only the previous limitations of the band itself, but of rock music itself. This has a lot to do with the fact that their producer Brian Eno (a great artist in his own right) was finally fully integrated into the studio band, making this more of an equal collaboration than the previous two produced by him. Eno's experimental presence is sonically evident all over the record, but no more so than the group itself, who also collaborated more equally than ever before, the ipso facto leader David Byrne letting go of his tight grip on the music composition. Adding to this democratic environment are African drumming polyrhythms (beloved by Eno and Byrne) and some of the most provocative psychological-surreal lyrics ever composed (by Byrne) for a rock record (inspired in part by African literature), along with a sample, loop based approach inspired by hip hop and electronic dance music and you have the band's masterpiece. Containing the band's most popular and possibly most definitive song "Once in a Lifetime", "Remain in Light" as a whole is one of the essential purchases for the serious rock music collector.