80s music Friday: Talking Heads out-takes and rarities

Back in the mid-80s, just about my favorite band was the Talking Heads, especially their "funky" period which started around Fear of Music, reached its most ambitious heights with Remain In Light and climaxed with the Stop Making Sense tour, which was sadly their last. Screw The Police the band that needs to sell out and re-unite is the Heads. Sadly, that seems about as likely as a The Smiths reunion, given the amount of love lost (lots) between David Byrne and his band-mates.

Although David Byrne was obviously the main creative force, the fact that most of David Byrne's solo work is about as interesting as watching paint dry (albeit very well produced and interesting paint) it tells me that the rest of the Talking Heads (rhythm section and married couple Chris Frantz and Tina Weymouth--good top five list: best bands ever that contained married couples* and multi-instrumentalist Jerry Harrison must have added some value, if only by annoying David Byrne enough that spurred on his creativity.

Last year Rhino released remastered versions of all the Talking Heads studio albums, lovingly remixed by Jerry Harrison. He did an amazing job, as hopefully these high-bit-rate mp3s will attest. Each album also contained a generous helping of bonus tracks, nearly all of which are worth listening to.