Sun's coming up like a big bald head poking up over the grocery store
January 21, 2018 7:08 AM Subscribe
Things got a bit weird-but-fun in 1984 when performance artist Laurie Anderson released her album Mister Heartbreak [40m]. Side A: Sharkey's Day [video], Langue d'Amour, Gravity's Angel
Side B: Kokoku, Excellent Birds [This Is The Picture (Excellent Birds) from Peter Gabriel's So] [video], Blue Lagoon, Sharkey's Night
Side B: Kokoku, Excellent Birds [This Is The Picture (Excellent Birds) from Peter Gabriel's So] [video], Blue Lagoon, Sharkey's Night
They really are some excellent birds.
I think this was the first Laurie Anderson album I picked up after Big Science, which I'd finally rediscovered at some point in my late teens after years of wondering what that weird transfixing song was that I'd heard on NPR one time (which turned out to O Superman, which has stayed with me).
And so I came to it basically knowing only Big Science, and not knowing really anything at all about Anderson (or William Burroughs for that matter), and I remember initially finding Mister Heartbreak kind of...disappointing? In the way of imagining one food and tasting another. There's such a relentless chilliness to Big Science, so spartan and dark, all synths and vocoders and arrangements full of spaces. And then here was this album that had conspicuously melodic melodies, and choruses, and a relatively lush production feel, and voices other than Laurie's or her vocoder homunculi, and I just didn't know what to make of it.
I since came to really like it, and her work in general, and to get more context on her work and career and the whole artistic/aesthetic/political scene in which she was working and living. It's interesting in how it departs from the sparseness of Big Science, and there's some interesting throughlines from Big Science to this and on to Strange Angels several years later. I don't know that anything other than Big Science will ever be the core of what I think of when I think Anderson in my mind's eye but I'm glad there's this broader spectrum of musical style from her.
posted by cortex at 7:48 AM on January 21, 2018 [7 favorites]
I think this was the first Laurie Anderson album I picked up after Big Science, which I'd finally rediscovered at some point in my late teens after years of wondering what that weird transfixing song was that I'd heard on NPR one time (which turned out to O Superman, which has stayed with me).
And so I came to it basically knowing only Big Science, and not knowing really anything at all about Anderson (or William Burroughs for that matter), and I remember initially finding Mister Heartbreak kind of...disappointing? In the way of imagining one food and tasting another. There's such a relentless chilliness to Big Science, so spartan and dark, all synths and vocoders and arrangements full of spaces. And then here was this album that had conspicuously melodic melodies, and choruses, and a relatively lush production feel, and voices other than Laurie's or her vocoder homunculi, and I just didn't know what to make of it.
I since came to really like it, and her work in general, and to get more context on her work and career and the whole artistic/aesthetic/political scene in which she was working and living. It's interesting in how it departs from the sparseness of Big Science, and there's some interesting throughlines from Big Science to this and on to Strange Angels several years later. I don't know that anything other than Big Science will ever be the core of what I think of when I think Anderson in my mind's eye but I'm glad there's this broader spectrum of musical style from her.
posted by cortex at 7:48 AM on January 21, 2018 [7 favorites]
When Mister Heartbreak was released, I remember not being sure how I felt about it. It was a departure from the cool, electronic detachment and dream-state storytelling of Big Science that I'd been blown away by when I saw her United States I-IV tour. Mister Heartbreak's songs were lusher, warmer, more melodic and more emotional (esp. "Langue d'Amour" and "Blue Lagoon").
When I saw her on the Mister Heartbreak tour, though, it all fell into place. The more I listened to the songs, the more they seemed an organic extension of the sound she'd established on her debut album. The wide-ranging cultural voraciousness that consumes The Tempest and Bill Burroughs and Pynchon. The melding of everyday phrases and highflown language. Some of the songs had, I believe, even started out life as shorter pieces within United States, but, in this context, lost the eerie sense of disorientation that much of that piece conveyed to me.
In short, one of my favorites of her albums. Thanks for reminding me to listen to it again.
posted by the sobsister at 7:51 AM on January 21, 2018 [6 favorites]
When I saw her on the Mister Heartbreak tour, though, it all fell into place. The more I listened to the songs, the more they seemed an organic extension of the sound she'd established on her debut album. The wide-ranging cultural voraciousness that consumes The Tempest and Bill Burroughs and Pynchon. The melding of everyday phrases and highflown language. Some of the songs had, I believe, even started out life as shorter pieces within United States, but, in this context, lost the eerie sense of disorientation that much of that piece conveyed to me.
In short, one of my favorites of her albums. Thanks for reminding me to listen to it again.
posted by the sobsister at 7:51 AM on January 21, 2018 [6 favorites]
My junior high school friend taped that album for me off her vinyl copy, and I remember playing it to shreds. I still get bits of "Excellent Birds" stuck in my head.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 8:08 AM on January 21, 2018 [2 favorites]
posted by The Underpants Monster at 8:08 AM on January 21, 2018 [2 favorites]
Laurie Anderson appeared at just the right time to catalyze a large proportion of my artistic interest (which I don't mean to say is broad or sophisticated, but such as it is...) Because of her, I read far more Pynchon than I would have otherwise, and Burroughs, and followed Mapplethorpe. She's connected in my mind with Philip Glass and everyone I ended up listening to by following threads from Liquid Days.
But weirdly, it was my dad who (somehow!) found Meredith Monk and used to say "Seatbelt. Seatbelt." at random times while driving. His normal thing was Eastern European folk-dance music; he'd mostly avoided the earworms that got me.
My favorite Anderson line (from memory):
posted by spacewrench at 8:10 AM on January 21, 2018 [15 favorites]
But weirdly, it was my dad who (somehow!) found Meredith Monk and used to say "Seatbelt. Seatbelt." at random times while driving. His normal thing was Eastern European folk-dance music; he'd mostly avoided the earworms that got me.
My favorite Anderson line (from memory):
When my father died, we put him in the ground.I hope someone says that about me.
When my father died, it was like a library
burned down.
posted by spacewrench at 8:10 AM on January 21, 2018 [15 favorites]
Every single time I hear Blue Lagoon a huge wave of goosebumps sweeps over my body after its "Call me Ishmael" line. That started over 30 years ago while listening to Mister Heartbreak and Big Science cassettes-from-LPs for long hours on a tractor in Iowa corn fields and it just happened again.
posted by ClingClang at 8:53 AM on January 21, 2018 [8 favorites]
posted by ClingClang at 8:53 AM on January 21, 2018 [8 favorites]
Mister Heartbreak was much anticipated in my corner of the world all those years ago. And it delivered. This was Anderson expanding her sound big time, not just working with Mr. Burroughs but also Peter Gabriel (as noted), Adrian Belew, David Van Tiegham, Anton Fier, Bill Laswell, Phoebe Snow, Nile Rogers ...
Unfortunately, I overdosed on it all at some point, put the album aside and didn't listen to it for decades. But then a few years back, I picked it up, wondering if I should trade it in, dropped the needle on the title track ... and wow! Like the recurrence of an old dream, strange and beautiful, and not a little menacing. I wouldn't say the rest of the album is entirely up to it (Blue Lagoon aside), but what a luscious journey anyway! And a reminder of just how sloppy a job the culture has done of remembering what was actually good about the music of 1980s.
posted by philip-random at 9:45 AM on January 21, 2018 [1 favorite]
Unfortunately, I overdosed on it all at some point, put the album aside and didn't listen to it for decades. But then a few years back, I picked it up, wondering if I should trade it in, dropped the needle on the title track ... and wow! Like the recurrence of an old dream, strange and beautiful, and not a little menacing. I wouldn't say the rest of the album is entirely up to it (Blue Lagoon aside), but what a luscious journey anyway! And a reminder of just how sloppy a job the culture has done of remembering what was actually good about the music of 1980s.
posted by philip-random at 9:45 AM on January 21, 2018 [1 favorite]
I remember initially finding Mister Heartbreak kind of...disappointing? In the way of imagining one food and tasting another.
Mister Heartbreak, indeed!
posted by hippybear at 10:30 AM on January 21, 2018 [1 favorite]
Mister Heartbreak, indeed!
posted by hippybear at 10:30 AM on January 21, 2018 [1 favorite]
Seeing Laurie Anderson and band perform during the Mister Heartbreak period was certainly one of the best shows ever. Great supporting musicians to boot: Dave Van Tiegham and Adrian Belew, and I want to say Steve Scales?
(Tangential: can someone explain why spotify's catalog doesn't include Mister Heartbreak though pretty much all the rest of LA's albums are there?)
posted by Insert Clever Name Here at 10:59 AM on January 21, 2018
(Tangential: can someone explain why spotify's catalog doesn't include Mister Heartbreak though pretty much all the rest of LA's albums are there?)
posted by Insert Clever Name Here at 10:59 AM on January 21, 2018
Previously - "Good Morning, Mr. Orwell" was a one hour show broadcast on New Year's Day, 1984. Video for "This Is The Picture" was one of the first segments of the program.
posted by Rash at 2:40 PM on January 21, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by Rash at 2:40 PM on January 21, 2018 [1 favorite]
A friend of mine’s dad was a camera operator on Home of the Brave, and my parents and I were invited to some kind of related party. I was shy but still convinced to tell Ms. Anderson how much I loved her work. I was 7. 1980s New York, folks, I don’t even know.
I picked up my own copy of Big Science in college and it was as awesome as I remembered from grade school.
posted by chesty_a_arthur at 4:28 PM on January 21, 2018
I picked up my own copy of Big Science in college and it was as awesome as I remembered from grade school.
posted by chesty_a_arthur at 4:28 PM on January 21, 2018
The entire film Home of the Brave is on Youtube, for now.
posted by Ursula Hitler at 4:45 PM on January 21, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by Ursula Hitler at 4:45 PM on January 21, 2018 [1 favorite]
Ah, this was undergrad, and my now husband and I hanging out and falling in love. To this day, if one of us says "sun's coming up" (or "sun's going down") the other will answer "like a big bald head."
posted by mon-ma-tron at 5:11 PM on January 21, 2018 [3 favorites]
posted by mon-ma-tron at 5:11 PM on January 21, 2018 [3 favorites]
I remember meeting her once briefly outside the Brooklyn Academy of Music, recognizing her and saying how much I'd enjoyed "You're the Guy I Want to Spend Money On", a John Giorno package with tracks of William S Burroughs and her, and she replied, "You'll like my next record; I did some work with Bill on it." I did. I still do.
posted by lipservant at 5:27 PM on January 21, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by lipservant at 5:27 PM on January 21, 2018 [1 favorite]
Laurie Anderson Interview: Advice to the Young
posted by philip-random at 5:43 PM on January 21, 2018 [2 favorites]
posted by philip-random at 5:43 PM on January 21, 2018 [2 favorites]
Vivid memory of "Gravity's Angel" as I lie in a dark bedroom on a summer night, smell the warm night air entering, and what can be glimpsed in the small space of a firefly moving around the room. I miss fireflies.
posted by away for regrooving at 1:28 AM on January 22, 2018
posted by away for regrooving at 1:28 AM on January 22, 2018
I STILL say, "like a big, bald head" and am so sad when no-one gets the reference. The title of this post alone has made my day. *happy sigh*
posted by dendritejungle at 7:03 AM on January 22, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by dendritejungle at 7:03 AM on January 22, 2018 [1 favorite]
Laurie Anderson... There was a time, a long, long time ago, when I used to post here on a daily basis; I fell away when I got tired of trying to be so doggone smart all the time. But no place I've frequented but Metafilter would have posted about Laurie Anderson now - or, even, back then.
"O Superman" was complete brainquake when I first heard it on XPN; just into college, feeling undeservedly worldly, and wham - a complete kick in the balls to my smugness. I became obsessed, backed into United States I-IV, and that was so far from my experience I may as well have been on an alien planet. I ended up doing my final paper in Modern Art that semester as a comparison/contrast between her and William Wegman. Apparently 30 pages of Anderson versus 4 pages of Wegman was not a fair comparison...
When "Mr. Heartbreak" was released, it felt like a sell out. And, to be fair, it still does to me. She was a performance artist who suddenly became a recording artist. But it was pretty much a passing thing. She went on working on installation pieces, and even the computer... game(?) "Puppet Hotel" (2), before returning pretty permanently to her narrative style in the mid-nineties. She did release a movie, "Heart of a Dog," in 2015, which was very highly reviewed. It seems to be the real culmination of what she was trying to do back in "United States I-V," but with film instead of crude projections.
posted by Perigee at 9:49 AM on January 22, 2018 [3 favorites]
"O Superman" was complete brainquake when I first heard it on XPN; just into college, feeling undeservedly worldly, and wham - a complete kick in the balls to my smugness. I became obsessed, backed into United States I-IV, and that was so far from my experience I may as well have been on an alien planet. I ended up doing my final paper in Modern Art that semester as a comparison/contrast between her and William Wegman. Apparently 30 pages of Anderson versus 4 pages of Wegman was not a fair comparison...
When "Mr. Heartbreak" was released, it felt like a sell out. And, to be fair, it still does to me. She was a performance artist who suddenly became a recording artist. But it was pretty much a passing thing. She went on working on installation pieces, and even the computer... game(?) "Puppet Hotel" (2), before returning pretty permanently to her narrative style in the mid-nineties. She did release a movie, "Heart of a Dog," in 2015, which was very highly reviewed. It seems to be the real culmination of what she was trying to do back in "United States I-V," but with film instead of crude projections.
posted by Perigee at 9:49 AM on January 22, 2018 [3 favorites]
A cool girl in 7th grade (or was it 8th?) brought the flimsy plastic printed single of O Superman (an insert in some art magazine her parents had a subscription to, if I remember right) to school - and I've been under Laurie's spell ever since.
posted by progosk at 3:41 PM on January 22, 2018
posted by progosk at 3:41 PM on January 22, 2018
When "Mr. Heartbreak" was released, it felt like a sell out.
That's how I felt too, after her weird 1986 appearance on Saturday Night Live; but "Mr.Heartbreak" is great.
posted by Rash at 8:47 PM on January 22, 2018
That's how I felt too, after her weird 1986 appearance on Saturday Night Live; but "Mr.Heartbreak" is great.
posted by Rash at 8:47 PM on January 22, 2018
I went to see The Nerve Bible Tour and so I have a t-shirt which has Laurie Anderson's bookmarks printed across the back, which was a new idea to a lot of people in 1995.
posted by hippybear at 9:10 PM on January 23, 2018
posted by hippybear at 9:10 PM on January 23, 2018
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posted by Mister Bijou at 7:44 AM on January 21, 2018 [2 favorites]