Mavens of funk mutation
September 21, 2017 8:52 AM   Subscribe

An article from internet magazine Paper that champions bassist Tina Weymouth as the most valuable but still under-recognized member of the Talking Heads was Tweeted by Brian Eno, who knows a thing or two about the subject at hand.

Journalist Carrie Courogen links to a David Bowman piece labeling Weymouth “the Lady Macbeth of rock” as a prime example of writers who ignore the musician’s talent to characterize her as a “humorless shrew.” Bowman’s Salon article, written for the 2005 release of a Talking Heads box set is more nuanced the Courogen lets on, noting, for example, that a history of the band that leaves out “the Shaggs-adelic record Weymouth made with her sisters, The Tom Tom Club," can’t really be regarded as complete. It’s all right on time for a newly-released video for "As Above, So Below" from the 36-year old album.
posted by layceepee (66 comments total) 25 users marked this as a favorite
 
I'm particularly fond of the bass line to "Cities"
posted by thelonius at 8:57 AM on September 21, 2017 [2 favorites]


Tina Weymouth was my hero when I was a kid. That's all
posted by mumimor at 9:00 AM on September 21, 2017 [2 favorites]


I'm a huge fan of both Talking Heads and Brian Eno, but my understanding was that Eno caused some tensions by promoting the band as basically him and David Byrne, with Weymouth, Frantz, and Harrison like a backup band. I think I read that for one album they decided to make ballots on how much each member thought all the others contributed (for financial purposes?), but then Eno skewed the results by making his ballot out only for him and Byrne.
posted by Schmucko at 9:05 AM on September 21, 2017 [1 favorite]


I think Tina Weymouth is talented and indeed underrated, but "the most valuable member" of Talking Heads is several bridges too far.

AV Club named the everyone-but-Byrne album one of the least essential of the 90s. Their cruel but, I think, accurate take was, "The uninspired results more or less confirmed [Weymouth, Frantz, and Harrison] as what they least wanted to be: Byrne's talented backing band."
posted by Chrysostom at 9:15 AM on September 21, 2017 [2 favorites]


With all due respect to the Shaggs, anyone who would compare Tom Tom Club to the Shaggs is a complete asshole. And there is no "the" in Tom Tom Club.
posted by Sys Rq at 9:19 AM on September 21, 2017 [12 favorites]


Kim Deal, now there's an under-recognised band member.
posted by humboldt32 at 9:21 AM on September 21, 2017 [15 favorites]


I think Tina Weymouth is talented and indeed underrated, but "the most valuable member" of Talking Heads is several bridges too far.

No, no it's not. I have nothing to back up this assertion, so I will repeat it. No, no it's not.
posted by From Bklyn at 9:25 AM on September 21, 2017


Kim Deal, now there's an under-recognised band member.

You really think so? As far as I can tell, Pixies and Breeders fans slobber all over her all the time.
posted by thelonius at 9:28 AM on September 21, 2017


The thing about Weymouth's playing is her unique phrasing. If someone else played the psycho-killer bass line it wouldn't be the same song. I think she was always appreciated amongst the fans (such as me), and Tom Tom Club was the best Talking Heads solo album from that time.
posted by bhnyc at 9:29 AM on September 21, 2017 [10 favorites]


I think of Talking Heads as a special blend. To characterize any one member as "most valuable" would be like picking out one bean in a bag of coffee.
posted by storybored at 9:30 AM on September 21, 2017 [5 favorites]


No Talking Just Head was admittedly a pretty terrible album, but Byrne's solo work, freed as he was from the shackles of his allegedly less-talented bandmates, hasn't exactly been an unbroken series of masterpieces.

> With all due respect to the Shaggs, anyone who would compare Tom Tom Club to the Shaggs is a complete asshole.

Yeah, what the everloving fuck? Their first album is an absolute killer and better than any Talking Heads studio album after Speaking In Tongues.
posted by The Card Cheat at 9:42 AM on September 21, 2017 [2 favorites]


The Everyone But Byrne is the only Talking Heads I can stomach. So, different people have different opinions!

But generally, I'd say that, yes, the women members of "iconic" bands are chronically under acclaimed.
posted by crush at 9:44 AM on September 21, 2017 [1 favorite]


Tom Tom Club's show from a few years ago is one of my favorite concerts ever and Weymouth has always been great.
posted by octothorpe at 9:44 AM on September 21, 2017


Considering just how often Tom Tom Club has been sampled on hip-hop records, an argument can be made that Tom Tom Club is a far more influential band with a greater legacy than the Talking Heads could ever hope to have.
posted by 1970s Antihero at 9:45 AM on September 21, 2017 [7 favorites]


Kim Deal, now there's an under-recognised band member.

Kelley disagrees!
posted by Sys Rq at 9:46 AM on September 21, 2017 [1 favorite]


One can acknowledge Tina Weymouth as an excellent musician while noting that the music she makes on her own/with Chris Franz can sometimes leave something to be desired. Tom Tom Club has a much lower hit-to-miss ratio than Talking Heads did. Those first two albums are damn good, though, and even their later stuff has its high points. No Talking, Just Head might have been a moderately successful album had it not been so wedded to the history and mythology of Talking Heads as a unit.* There are plenty of musicians who do amazing work as part of a band unit, but when left to their own devices fail to reach the same artistic level as their group work. One can also make the same claim about David Byrne, as well. Though I think his solo hit-to-miss ratio is higher than Tom Tom Club's.**

* That said, I pin most of the blame for how crappy No Talking, Just Head is on the choice to work with a bunch of outside artists on the songwriting, half of which were phoning it in, and half of which were a complete mismatch to the musical styles of Weymouth, Franz, and Harrison. It's no surprise that the best song on that album is the one with the least outside influence, "Punk Lolita," which may as well be a Tom Tom Club song. In fact, it was even included on the Tom Tom Club live album.

**Jerry Harrison's solo work has a much lower hit-to-miss ratio than either David Byrne solo or Tom Tom Club. I find his solo albums to be rather uninteresting, to be honest. It's telling that he's focused on production after Walk on Water. I think he knows where his strengths lie.

posted by SansPoint at 9:47 AM on September 21, 2017


The Card Cheat: "No Talking Just Head was admittedly a pretty terrible album, but Byrne's solo work, freed as he was from the shackles of his allegedly less-talented bandmates, hasn't exactly been an unbroken series of masterpieces.

I think most of it has been pretty great, or at least interesting. Not all of it, of course.

Their first album is an absolute killer and better than any Talking Heads studio album after Speaking In Tongues.

I know that's the prevailing opinion, but personally, I fucking hate Genius of Love and everything else I've heard from Tom Tom Club. I am content to be the outlier here.
posted by Chrysostom at 9:47 AM on September 21, 2017


Also, I think that Byrne's solo output puts a lie to the idea that the Talking Heads were just his backup band. He's put out some decent stuff but nothing that you could call essential.
posted by octothorpe at 9:49 AM on September 21, 2017 [3 favorites]


Kim Deal, now there's an under-recognised band member.
Considering the abuse directed at Black Francis over the reunion without Deal a few years back, no way she's under-recognized.
posted by lmfsilva at 9:49 AM on September 21, 2017 [1 favorite]


Not to take anything away from the gist of this post, but I'm nearly certain that that is not actually Brian Eno's Twitter account.
posted by rundhc at 9:51 AM on September 21, 2017 [1 favorite]


Not to take anything away from the gist of this post, but I'm nearly certain that that is not actually Brian Eno's Twitter account.

If that's true (and it may well be) mea culpa and my apologies. I saw it re-Tweeted by Chris Frantz, who has similar expertise, but it's not an admission against his own interests in the way a Brian Eno tweet would be.
posted by layceepee at 9:54 AM on September 21, 2017


Kim Pine, now there's an underrecognized contributor to a band...
posted by praemunire at 9:54 AM on September 21, 2017 [6 favorites]


Also, Tom Tom Club was one of the most overtly feminist bands of its time, which probably accounts for some of the backlash from male rock critics.
posted by 1970s Antihero at 9:56 AM on September 21, 2017 [4 favorites]


I predict that 'Genius of Love' will far outlive anything by the Talking Heads.
posted by vacapinta at 9:59 AM on September 21, 2017


The bass line in Found a Job -- linked in the Paper article -- really is one of the most delightful things I know.
posted by neroli at 10:01 AM on September 21, 2017 [4 favorites]


vacapinta: "I predict that 'Genius of Love' will far outlive anything by the Talking Heads."

Let's meet up in 2050, loser buys beer.
posted by Chrysostom at 10:20 AM on September 21, 2017 [2 favorites]


Talking Heads blew my mind when I first heard them.

Tom Tom Club blew my mind when I first heard them.

Albums from both bands still get regular play on my stereo, they're both of a time and timeless, every replay feels utterly of the present. Very little of the music I listened to as a teenager has accomplished that.

So anyway. I quickly lose patience with "Who's better" arguments about artists who have mutually created lasting work. They were both really great, they both created great music together and separately, they've both worked on clinkers. Treating their post-breakup albums to scorecard rankings is kind of stupid.
posted by ardgedee at 10:22 AM on September 21, 2017 [5 favorites]


From the Paper article: Byrne made her audition three times to keep her spot in the band — something no other member was asked to do. In the 2015 documentary Girls in Bands, she recalled Byrne telling her that he thought "a woman's role shouldn't really be in the big world because it was a dangerous place for women."

Whenever something wasn't working, Byrne blamed Weymouth. "Anytime David felt insecure, I was his whipping boy. Every time he couldn't come up with something, he'd beat me up about it. The whole time, it was so painful for me," she recounted to Bowman.

I tend to dismiss the use of the passive voice ("under-recognized" by whom?), but its claims are abundantly supported.

Her class is patent. I recall a quote about the band being her "second childhood". As a fan, I watched them all with fascination. Interviews and articles made me aware of the tensions that led to their demise as a group, but while they were together, in videos and in concert, a mutual appreciation was at least presented.

Which makes David Byrne's comments painful to read and her class spared me the vomit-tasting revulsion I'm experiencing now.

A woman's place...? Holy *&%*^, how could I have ever been so delighted by This Must Be The Place knowing he had said something like that? Or the line about the world moving on a woman's hips?
posted by lazycomputerkids at 10:24 AM on September 21, 2017 [1 favorite]


One of the things I love about rock bands breaking up is how much is lost when the singer moves onto something else without their secret weapon.

Elvis Costello without Bruce Thomas? Elton John without Dee Murray? David Byrne without Tina Weymouth? Nile Rogers without Bernard Edwards? And yes, Black Francis without Kim! etc. Yeah, they have all done good stuff post-awesome bass player, but they were never *truly great* again. A smart bass player who understands the song (and the singer) is the one who can bump a good song into something remarkable without anyone noticing. It's a magic combo.

Also, the Hofner Club bass. Total coolness.
posted by quarterframer at 10:25 AM on September 21, 2017 [11 favorites]


Eh, from my perspective they were all starting to feel worn out by the mid-eighties, so comparing their output past the break up isn't all that significant. I dug Byrne's Catherine Wheel album and My Life in the Bush of Ghosts with Eno, thought Tom Tom Club's eponymous album was also really good, while Close to the Bone and Harrison's The Red and the Black were fine, but not all that exciting. (Other than The Red and the Black album cover which created a neat little visual effect when you slowly moved it back and forth.)

Talking Heads together were better than the solo efforts in terms of consistency and breadth of their albums and those first four albums haven't lost much over the years. Unlike Fleetwood Mac though, the increasing tensions between the band members didn't seem to add much creative spark to any of their efforts. Hell, even Eno seemed a lot less interesting post-Talking Heads, though I haven't heard his most recent albums.

Most bands only have a limited amount of innovation they'll bring to music, some can continue on based on other things, but Talking Heads were not one of those groups, they thrived on development of new ideas, and when those ran low they stopped making sense.
posted by gusottertrout at 10:26 AM on September 21, 2017 [2 favorites]


quarterframer: I'm only going to quibble on your claim that Bruce Thomas was Elvis Costello's secret weapon. It's clearly Steve Nieve, and Nieve is still working with Mr. Costello.
posted by SansPoint at 10:53 AM on September 21, 2017 [3 favorites]


I have a whole whack of records by incredible musicians who are not great songwriters. Paul Shaffer, Ike Willis, Dee Dee Ramone...but while Tom Tom Club is fairly undeniable in my world, there are gaps in my appreciation.

However, I saw the Escape From New York Tour with Blondie, The Ramones, and Tom Tom Club and it was a good show. Wish I still had the shirt.

I still have an affinity for Jerry Harrison's "Casual Gods" album.
posted by rhizome at 10:58 AM on September 21, 2017


I'm only going to quibble on your claim that Bruce Thomas was Elvis Costello's secret weapon

I will fight you
posted by thelonius at 11:03 AM on September 21, 2017 [1 favorite]


> even Eno seemed a lot less interesting post-Talking Heads...

I'm not even sure it's glib to say that becoming uninteresting seems to have been Eno's late-career objective.
posted by ardgedee at 11:06 AM on September 21, 2017 [4 favorites]


thelonius: I'm sorry, but I just saw Elvis Costello & The Imposters this past summer and I gained a whole new appreciation for Steve Nieve. The guy is _amazing_.
posted by SansPoint at 11:07 AM on September 21, 2017 [1 favorite]


rhizome: "I still have an affinity for Jerry Harrison's "Casual Gods" album."

It's not bad!
posted by Chrysostom at 11:07 AM on September 21, 2017 [4 favorites]


Steve Nieve is amazing. And the guy from Cracker or whoever is a good bass player. But can you really say there is nothing missing?
posted by thelonius at 11:09 AM on September 21, 2017


thelonius: If there's anything missing in Elvis's post-Attractions material, it ain't Thomas's bass playing. And the new guy in The Imposters plays Thomas's parts just fine live.
posted by SansPoint at 11:15 AM on September 21, 2017


GOOD DAY, SIR
posted by thelonius at 11:17 AM on September 21, 2017 [3 favorites]


I saw Stop Making Sense recently, for about the twentieth time. I think one reason Tom Tom Club gets short shrift is that Chris Franz' toasting in "Genius of Love" is so cringe-inducing. It's always been when I time my bathroom break, and I actually really like that song.
posted by hydrophonic at 11:24 AM on September 21, 2017 [6 favorites]


Can we talk about how bad the Selena Gomez song that samples Tina's bassline from "Psycho Killer" is?
posted by pxe2000 at 11:33 AM on September 21, 2017


When I was young and not used to it yet, it always really bugged how no matter what else they did, women still had to try to look sexy all the time. Even in punk and other genres that were supposed to be questioning mainstream values, women first and foremost had to be hot. I saw them on that tour she did pregnant. She must have been at least 8 months along, playing with her bass slung off to the side, and it didn't seem to slow her down a bit.

And I'm really glad I avoided reading personal stuff about musicians, because I liked David Byrne's work, and knowing he was a dick would have made it hard.

(Also, I saw Elvis Costello and the Imposters Saturday, and I think a) it's ridiculous how they can still keep up as well as they do, and b) Elvis is always better when he plays with Steve Nieve.)
posted by ernielundquist at 11:44 AM on September 21, 2017 [2 favorites]


It's always been when I time my bathroom break

I thought that was universal?

While fully respecting that the hook is amazing, I've always found "Genius of Love" supremely irritating.
posted by praemunire at 12:03 PM on September 21, 2017 [2 favorites]


You really think so? As far as I can tell, Pixies and Breeders fans slobber all over her all the time.

I meant, by her other bandmates.
posted by humboldt32 at 12:07 PM on September 21, 2017 [1 favorite]


I've always found "Genius of Love" supremely irritating.

Wordy Rappinghood is absolutely their best popular song.
posted by rhizome at 12:08 PM on September 21, 2017 [2 favorites]


"However, I saw the Escape From New York Tour with Blondie, The Ramones, and Tom Tom Club and it was a good show. Wish I still had the shirt."

Me, too! Wasn't that a great show? I saw it at a small amphitheatre in Santa Fe.
posted by Ivan Fyodorovich at 12:12 PM on September 21, 2017 [1 favorite]


When I was young and not used to it yet, it always really bugged how no matter what else they did, women still had to try to look sexy all the time. Even in punk and other genres that were supposed to be questioning mainstream values, women first and foremost had to be hot.

My recollection is that this certainly isn't universal. I'll even trot out the old Kathleen Hanna horse. And ironically, Weymouth is particularly guilty of what you charge, despite the pregnant stint. In fact, I adore her so much, I must have said a dozen times "Tina, why are you dressed like that?".
posted by humboldt32 at 12:20 PM on September 21, 2017 [1 favorite]


> Wordy Rappinghood is absolutely their best popular song.

Agreed, and I never get tired of watching the Funkateers dance routine set to it.
posted by The Card Cheat at 12:40 PM on September 21, 2017


Their cruel but, I think, accurate take was, "The uninspired results more or less confirmed [Weymouth, Frantz, and Harrison] as what they least wanted to be: Byrne's talented backing band."

I have not heard the above-reviewed album, and Tom Tom Club was great, but the above reminded of the Doors' post-Morrison albums. It's easy to make fun of Jim Morrison--he's the patron saint of every overly self-involved male college undergrad after their first tab of acid and modern poetry class--and he probably wouldn't have been much of a much without his bandmates, but I had a hard time remembering each song on Other Voices right after they played.
posted by Halloween Jack at 1:37 PM on September 21, 2017 [3 favorites]


I got the impression from the Bowman book that the author had a personality conflict with Tina that comes across in the writing. But she also gets some credit as a creative force in the band, and as the art director for some of their best visuals. It's actually pretty hard to imagine Talking Heads without her distinctive style of bass playing, it was pretty obvious from the beginning of the first album.

'Lorelei' is my preferred Tom Tom Club track, I think I like it because it's a good disco song with some spacey dub production touches that make it stand out. ('Worlds in Collision' is the best Harrison track.)
posted by ovvl at 1:49 PM on September 21, 2017 [2 favorites]


She might be dressed like that because, you know, she wanted to be and not because she gave a shit that you were looking at her.

of course, she might have been dressed like that cause she had to work with a misogynist and could not win.

either way, shut the fuck up about how women look and dress.
posted by crush at 2:03 PM on September 21, 2017 [1 favorite]


Treating their post-breakup albums to scorecard rankings is kind of stupid.

Yeah, almost like it's some dumb, patriarchal stack ranking game.
posted by saulgoodman at 2:07 PM on September 21, 2017


Tina & David had a sibling relationship with plenty of friction and griping. Here's a funny quote circa My Life in the Bush of Ghosts, via Rolling Stone:

At one point, Weymouth muttered her disgruntlement to a reporter from the British magazine The Face. "They're like two fourteen-year-old boys making an impression on each other," she grumbled. "By the time they finished working together for three months, they were dressing like one another…. I can see them when they're 80 years old and all alone. There'll be David Bowie, David Byrne and Brian Eno, and they'll just talk to each other."
posted by ovvl at 3:36 PM on September 21, 2017 [5 favorites]


tina is a really good bass player - i thought so at the time and since i started playing bass, i really think so now

without david's songwriting, they didn't have much - but she was the best musician in that band with chris right behind (and locked in) - they'd have been just another sloppy artpunk band without her ability to define the groove

those who underestimate her don't understand rock music very well
posted by pyramid termite at 5:51 PM on September 21, 2017 [3 favorites]


and genius of love is a funk bomb - don't believe me, believe all the guys who sampled it
posted by pyramid termite at 5:53 PM on September 21, 2017


You want under-appreciated when it comes to the Talking Heads? How about the percussionists, backup singers, and dancers from Stop Making Sense? I grew up on an almost-all-Talking-Heads diet, and I was embarassed to realize last year that I had never looked those folks up. Turns out they were extensively involved with P-Funk.
Ednah Holt.
Lynn Mabry.
Steve Scales.
Alex Weir.
Bernie Worell.

and yes I totally need to learn more about Tina but now I'm going to put my fingers in my ears and yell LA LA LA I'M NOT LISTENING and skip reading the article about David being a dick to her because my childhood being parented by Christopher-Columbus-like musical figures has already been battered by the whole Graceland-is-really-a-Los-Lobos-album revelation and I am still frantically trying to convince myself that David Byrne is ok because even though his musical thoughts on gender seem to have all the compassion of Benedict Cumberbatch playing Sherlock, at this point David seems to mostly be lending his fame to boost the profile of a fantastic range of international musicians and it has meant so much to me to hear all of them I WANT TO BELIEVE
posted by gusandrews at 7:13 PM on September 21, 2017 [11 favorites]


those who underestimate her don't understand rock music very well

A lot of people don't appreciate bass, especially if it's relatively simple. I mean, they think there's just nothing to it, but in fact, it's way harder than it sounds to play parts like that effectively, where they groove and have life to them. I've even pointed out to people how much musical vigor and interest there is in busier parts like James Jamerson on, oh, "What's Going On", and they tell me they never paid attention to it.
posted by thelonius at 8:13 PM on September 21, 2017 [3 favorites]


Speaking of guest artists who appeared on Stop Making Sense, I kinda missed the non-appearance of guitarist Adrian Belew, who added a real zing to the band's sound on the footage of the previous Remain in Light-era tour. According to Bowman who wrote the band biography, it sounded like he blamed Tina for the falling-out with Belew when they started disagreeing about the mixes and credits on the first Tom Tom album. Which is just gossip, I think.
posted by ovvl at 7:47 AM on September 22, 2017 [1 favorite]


Wasn't Belew busy in King Crimson by the time of "Stop Making Sense" tour? I really don't think he ever intended to be a long-term member of TH tours, he just did the one.
posted by thelonius at 8:26 AM on September 22, 2017


thelonius: In 1984, Belew was touring with Laurie Anderson. You can see him in her concert film, Home of the Brave.
posted by SansPoint at 8:31 AM on September 22, 2017 [1 favorite]


thanks - I thought Three Of A Perfect Pair came out that year....anyway, Belew was never hurting for work, after that Remain In Light spot....
posted by thelonius at 8:32 AM on September 22, 2017


...or really, after he was in Frank Zappa's band, I guess that was his big break
posted by thelonius at 8:33 AM on September 22, 2017 [1 favorite]


thelonius: Definitely Zappa. Though, IIRC, what really broke him from Talking Heads and adjacent stuff was him being denied credits on the first Tom Tom Club album.
posted by SansPoint at 8:35 AM on September 22, 2017 [1 favorite]


Just dipping back in to gloat that I also saw The Adrian Belew Power Trio a few months back, and it was a much better show than it had any right to be. It was a small venue, we got right up front tickets cheaply and easily, and it was one of the best values for our entertainment dollar this year so far.

It looks like that tour is over now, but he does tour pretty regularly, so keep an eye out.
posted by ernielundquist at 9:40 AM on September 22, 2017 [2 favorites]


As it happens, just today I was pondering whether or not Mariah Carey's hijacking of "Genius of Love" in "Fantasy" is forgivable or not.

I came down on the side of it's perfectly fine up until the actual interpolation, at which point it becomes unforgivable.

The jury's still out on "Sugar" by Trick Daddy.
posted by zeusianfog at 1:22 PM on September 22, 2017


Can we talk about how bad the Selena Gomez song that samples Tina's bassline from "Psycho Killer" is?

It's actually one of the few pop songs of the past 20 years I like.
posted by davebush at 3:23 PM on September 22, 2017


« Older Never mind the bollocks   |   The Brutal Truth About Growing Up In The Top 1% Newer »


This thread has been archived and is closed to new comments