Author:Chris Frantz
Best known as the drummer with Talking Heads, this memoir by Chris Frantz is really as much about love as it is about music. After an unremarkable childhood in a military family, he meets both David Byrne and future wife Tina Weymouth at art college and eventually Talking Heads are formed, He’s obviously devoted to Tina – they’ve been together for over forty years – but paints Byrne in a less than flattering light, accusing him of not sharing writing credits and arbitrarily declaring the band to be over when it suited him – I don’t think a reunion is on the cards! Frantz has vivid detailed recollections of the fellow artists they met on the New York club scene of the mid-late seventies, particularly at CBGB’s – Patti Smith, Debbie Harry, Tom Verlaine, etc. However, the bulk of this book unsurprisingly is devoted to the recording and touring career of Talking Heads, including detailed and lengthy travelogues of US and European treks – the most interesting is their first foray into the UK and Europe supporting The Ramones. As the band becomes more successful, it increasingly becomes a vehicle for Byrne, to the frustration of the other members, and Frantz and Weymouth gradually drift into other projects, most notably Tom Tom Club. Best known here for their one off hit Wordy Rappinghood, it’s actually one of their other pieces, Genius of Love, that is now one of the most sampled songs ever – indeed this band earned a gold disc well before Talking Heads did! Frantz comes over as an amiable sort of guy, utterly devoted to his wife, and this book is a goldmine for not just Talking Heads fans but for anyone with an interest in the New York music scene of the seventies and eighties,
Length of Read:Medium
Might appeal to people who enjoyed…
Debbie Harry’s ‘Face It’, Patti Smith’s ‘Just Kids’.
One thing you’ve learned
Any band that produced remarkable albums such as Fear of Music, Remain in Light and Speaking In Tongues must have been doing something right!
I read it on holiday. I thought it was great but let down by the endless jibes at David Byrne’s expense. Almost every chapter ends with “… and doesn’t that make David Byrne look like a total arse, eh, readers?”
Frantz accepted quite early on that DB is on the spectrum. He knows it, you know it, we all know it…
Here’s an interview with some of the Byrne baiting details.
https://www.theguardian.com/music/2020/jul/21/chris-frantz-talking-heads-david-byrne
I remember Byrne being quite self deprecating about his awkwardness in concert. I did fine nd their music more interesting and muscular with hose additional players.
Funny after all the dissing, if Byrne said let’s reform, they’d be on it in a shot.
Based on the bits I have read, Byrne comes across as an arse, but artistic temperament and all that. Like it or not he was the main talent and driving force in the band, unfortunate if he belittled other members contributions, but I don’t think we have heard his side of the story.
I’m looking forward to reading this book. New York in the 70s and 80s must have been such an exciting place. I’m not surprised that Genius Of Love has been so successful. In the early days of hip hop, it seemed like every other song sampled Genius Of Love or Good Times.
I want to read the book because I love both Talking Heada and Tom Tom Club but I dont want to read snide remarks about David Byrne. He might have a spiky personality but have seen him live twice outside of Talking Heads and they were two of the best gigs I ever saw.
I also saw Tom Tom Club and their live show was nothing special so keeping their thoughts to themselves might have been a better option.
Will probably still read it though.
I enjoyed 99% of it, but the 1% snide remarkes got on my tits. Frantz could have made one or two and we’d have got the idea.
I wonder if it is manufactured controversy, but I guess they were really pissed off that when David Byrne declared Talking Heads finished their careers were finished with it.
From what I’ve read the complaints about the behaviour of Byrne are justified. It’s been well known for a long time that he had Tina re-audition for the band, for example. I don’t know why anyone would object to such revelations. It’s all part of the ongoing soap opera of rock bands that is part and parcel of what makes the world of pop endlessly engaging. Preferable to tedious details surrounding technical matters of equipment and such. It shouldn’t take away from the music or brilliance of the artists either.
I’m only about a third of the way through the audiobook and only yesterday I learned that while DB suggested Tina audition after being in the band for a while, he dropped the idea as soon as Chris Frantz entered the room. I always believed differently.
Still pretty bad though, to suggest it, what with her bass being such a key element. Clearly there are far worse behaved people in music despite his misdemeanours but a difficult person.
And it’s clear that Franz is very proud of Talking Heads, despite DB being a tricky character.
Something which irked me slightly is the inside jacket mentions working with Shirley Manson but the text of the book does not. Franz & Weymouth produced her pre-Garbage band, Angelfish.
I can’t unlike records or gigs that I previously really enjoyed. It turns out that some music I love was made by pretty unpleasant people. Had I known the full story at the time it might have made a difference, but probably not.
“tedious details surrounding technical matters of equipment” – they’re the best bits!
I am very dull, though.
I haven’t read it for years, but I read and enjoyed ‘Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa: The Adventures of “Talking Heads” in the 20th Century’ by David Bowman.
There are so many tales of drug taking that I assume to have managed so many detailed recollections, Mr Frantz kept a diary. Otherwise I’m starting to think a lot of it is fabricated. It’s good fun though and it’s interesting to hear about people like Tony Bongiovi, Ed Stasium and Frank Gallagher who were previously just names on well pawed album sleeves or inlays.
There’s an interesting interview with Chris Frantz on Sound Opinion (on their website and on the podcast) where he mentions that he didn’t keep a diary, but as Tina also was the defacto manager/booking agent for Talking Heads (I didn’t know that…) he had access to all her gig lists and contracts, and these triggered many memories.
And – although the blurb and book promo focuses on the Byrne/Ego thing, Frantz is full of praise for Byrne’s ideas, creativity and input. He just mentions that others contributed a bit, too.
I like much of Talking Heads, albeit the earlier and spikier stuff more. Tom Tom Club did, at best, one superb song and one ok. The Heads, a Frantz, Weymouth and Jerry Harrison post Byrne flicker were pure shite. That says as much as I need to know.
The element that muddies the water slightly is the unknown contribution of Jerry Harrison. His post Talking Heads albums are excellent and I’ve always wondered how much he influenced the others and vice versa.
The Red and the Black is fantastic… and fantastically Headsy.
“I’m watching TV a Saturday night
What do I see
But a middleweight boxing fight
A right spar here, a left hook there
Two in one combination
A standard fare
One fighter he tries the Ali shuffle
Guess I’ll change the channel
‘Cause it’s just another scuffle”
(“No More Re-Runs” – Jerry Harrison)
You’re right there, Moosey. It is pretty Headsy.
Ah, the perennial “Band vs. solo artist” conundrum… even when one member is the unarguable driving force of a band, as David Byrne surely was with Talking Heads, it can’t possibly be understated how important it is for them to have genuine peers – people who they’ve grown up with, struggled with, shared hundreds of nights in crappy vans and dressing rooms with – to be able to say to them, “that’s shit, you can do better…”, and though it would be an exaggeration to say that the best Byrne album isn’t as good as the worst TH album, it’s a close thing…
… all of which is to say that Frantz & Weymouth (and Harrison) clearly had/have talent and made a considerable contribution to TH, and it’s a shame that over time Byrne became less and less open to sharing a stage, or even credit, with his bandmates.
I never liked them because of his yellow tee shirt and carefully manicured twitchy New Yorker act on the Psycho Killer OGWT clip. I had pictures of Tina on the wall though.