Talking Heads (On Track)

(Sonicbond Publishing, April 2025)

Few artists can legitimately claim to have created truly groundbreaking popular music, but Talking Heads is one of them. Like Elvis, the Beatles, Bob Dylan and Radiohead (who took their name from a Talking Heads song), Talking Heads recorded some of the most memorable rock and roll of the past seventy-five years. In his song-by-song discussion of their work, American musician and journalist David Starkey looks at how David Byrne, Chris Frantz, Jerry Harrison and Tina Weymouth emerged from New York’s mid-1970s punk scene and quickly distinguished themselves as innovative musicians.Led by the enigmatic and wildly original Byrne, Talking Heads’ list of classic songs includes ‘Psycho Killer’,’Take Me to the River’, ‘Once in a Lifetime’, ‘Burning Down the House’, ‘This Must Be the Place (Naive Melody)’, ‘Road to Nowhere’ and ‘(Nothing But) Flowers.’ Two of their eight albums, More Songs About Buildings And Food and Remain in Light, are listed among Rolling Stone’s 500 Greatest Albums. Drawing frequently on first-person accounts from members of the band, Starkey brings to life the composition and recording of each song, pointing out hidden patterns in Byrne’s lyrics and ensuring that each member of Talking Heads receives credit for their contribution to this unparalleled body of work.

*

“Not only is this book a celebration of the music of Talking Heads, every page is like a skilfully constructed collage of deep research, analysis and opinion. We need more books like this – books that get people picking up their favourite records and discovering new details they’d never appreciated before.” 

–Rodney Gordon, Host of the podcast This Must Be Talking Heads

*

“Talking Heads is another band I have a lot of time for, especially the Fear of Music, Remain in Light and Speaking in Tongues years. Always innovative, their 8 studio albums produced some enduring and groundbreaking music, perhaps captured best in the Stop Making Sense album and film – if you don’t already own a copy then you should put that right as soon as possible! This well researched book is a very engaging read, and includes plenty of comments from the band members themselves, as well as taking a deep dive into the individual songs in their canon. Very much recommended if you’re a fan of their unparalleled body of work and it motivated me to re-listen to their back catalogue, which, need I add, still sounds as current today as it did when it first appeared.”

—Afterword: Musings on the byways of popular culture, Feb. 10 2025

David Starkey’s On Track – Talking Heads is a good and readable trawl through the band’s recorded work.

–Martin Burns, Dutch Progressive Rock Page