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Burning down the house : Talking Heads and the New York scene that transformed rock

2025

Format:	Book
Author:	Gould, Jonathan, 1951- author.
Title:	Burning down the house : Talking Heads and the New York scene that transformed rock / Jonathan Gould.
Edition:	First edition.
Publisher, Date:	New York, NY : Mariner Books, [2025] ©2025
Description:	501 pages, 8 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations (chiefly color) ; 24 cm
Summary:	""Psycho Killer." "Take Me to the River." "Road to Nowhere." Few artists have had the lasting impact and relevance of Talking Heads. One of the foundational bands of downtown New York's 1970s music scene, Talking Heads have endured as a musical and cultural force for decades, their unique brand of transcendent, experimental rock a lingering influence on popular music-despite having disbanded over thirty years ago. Now on the 50th anniversary of the band's formation, acclaimed music biographer and contributor to The New Yorker Jonathan Gould offers the definitive story of Talking Heads-a band whose sound, fame, and legacy forever connected the avant-garde to rock music. From their art school origins, to the enigma of David Byrne, to the internal tensions that ultimately brought them down, Gould tells the story of a band that emerged back when rock music was still young and unwittingly redefined the era's expectations of what a rock band could sound, look, and act like. At a time when guitar solos, lead singer swagger, and sweaty stadium tours reigned supreme, Talking Heads were pretentious, awkward, infectious, distinctive-most comfortable on the ragged stages of the East Village where they could make art for themselves, above all else. More than just a biography of a band, Gould masterfully captures the singular time and place that incubated and nurtured this original music-downtown in the 1970s-that much romanticized, little understood moment in New York City history when art, music, and commerce uneasily collided to cement the post-Woodstock generation of rock stars, often with messy results. What emerges is an expansive portrait of a band and a scene that permanently shifted the horizons of popular music, iconoclasts that pushed the cultural fringe into the mainstream and then burned down the house"-- Provided by publisher.
Target Audience Note:	0 Lexile.
Subjects:	Talking Heads (Musical group) CBGB OMFUG (Nightclub) Rock musicians -- New York (State) -- New York -- Biography. New wave musicians -- New York (State) -- New York -- Biography. Rock music -- New York (State) -- New York -- 1971-1980 -- History and criticism. Rock music -- New York (State) -- New York -- 1981-1990 -- History and criticism. Punk rock music -- New York (State) -- New York -- History and criticism. New wave music -- New York (State) -- New York -- History and criticism. Art and music -- New York (State) -- New York -- History -- 20th century.
Genre:	Biographies.
Notes:	Includes bibliographical references and index. Booklist, 050125, p. 12 Publishers Weekly,060925 Library Journal, 060225, p. 1
LCCN:	2025012923
ISBN:	9780063022980
Other Number:	1453718750
System Availability:	1
# Local items:	1
Call Number:	782.421 Gould, J Burning
# Local items in:	1
# System items in:	1
Current Holds:	0

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Publishers Weekly Review

Music historian Gould (Otis Redding) scrupulously traces the rise and fall of rock band Talking Heads against the backdrop of the volatile 1970s and '80s New York City art world. Lead singer David Byrne, bassist Tina Weymouth, and drummer Chris Frantz connected in 1973 at the Rhode Island School of Design over a shared love of blues, jazz, and funk music. After moving to New York in 1975 and embarking on a two-year residency at the legendary downtown punk-rock venue CBGB (and adding guitarist Jerry Harrison to the lineup in 1977), they signed with Sire Records, finding their musical footing with a sound shaped by punk, Afro-Cuban, and jazz influences. In 1977, the band released its debut album, Talking Heads: 77, and followed it up with multiple successful albums and solo projects. By the late 1980s, however, the group had begun to collapse under the weight of Byrne's artistic restlessness, which--abetted by communication issues and disputes over song credits--led to their 1991 breakup. Gould delivers a colorful and expansive genealogy of the band and the scruffy downtown music scene they helped form, though his efforts to show how the band influenced New York City culture at large can lead him down distracting tangents, such as an account of Philippe Petit's tightwire walk between the Twin Towers (and the many copycat acts he inspired). Still, devoted Talking Heads fans will want to pick this up. (June)

Booklist Review

Gould (Otis Redding, 2017) begins at the moment in June 1975, when Talking Heads made their professional debut on the stage of CBGB, a seedy nightclub on Manhattan's Lower East Side. Their look was ordinary ("unremarkable haircuts" and "casual clothes"), and their performance that night not particularly memorable. What did stand out was odd singer-guitarist David Byrne and the disquieting songs that reflected his unusual demeanor ("his upper body jerking and jiggling like a shadow puppet"). From the start, the band knew what they wanted and didn't want: no drama, no fancy stage clothes, no rock star poses. When Talking Heads emerged on the New York underground scene, the city was in dire financial straits and undergoing deep urban decay, while, ironically, arts like music, poetry, and theater were thriving. This is a finely detailed history of the musical evolution of a band that defined an era. Gould not only critiques Talking Heads albums but discusses solo works and film documentaries, including the blockbuster concert film, Stop Making Sense (his description of Byrne's Big Suit captures the joy, creativity, and absurdity of the image). Gould also finds fascinating parallels between Byrne and John Lennon, both outsiders unique in pop music. A masterful achievement.

Kirkus Review

A warts-and-all biography of the New Wave legends. Gould (Can't Buy Me Love, 2007) begins his biography of art-rock legends Talking Heads with an account of the band's first show at legendary New York club CBGB, writing that the performance didn't call "attention to their musical virtuosity, for the simple reason that they had none." Maybe not, but a few pages later, he allows that the band's "combination of talent, originality, discipline, self-awareness, and steely artistic ambition would form the basis of a major musical career." Gould writes about their formation, when drummer Chris Frantz asked singer David Byrne if he wanted to start a band. "I guess so," was Byrne's halfhearted answer. He chronicles the band's early successes, which started with their debut album,Talking Heads: 77, and first hit song, "Psycho Killer," and continued through seven more studio albums. The portrait of the band that emerges is one marked by acrimony, with Frantz, bassist Tina Weymouth, and keyboardist Jerry Harrison never quite sure what Byrne was going to do; Gould partially attributes Byrne's caprice and lacking communication skills to his apparent Asperger's syndrome. (Weymouth, at one point, attributed it to Byrne being "a bully and a coward.") That the band would break up in 1991, after 16 years, does not come as a surprise; Gould writes about the band's dissolution with a sense of inevitable sadness that isn't leavened by their awkward, occasional reunions. The book is necessarily hampered by the fact that none of the Heads was willing to talk to Gould, which might be why he indulges in a series of odd tangents, writing about New York's political history and, bizarrely, a series of stunts involving the city's skyscrapers. Nonetheless, it's well written and informative--not the last word on the Talking Heads, but a respectable try. Fans of the band will find much to appreciate here. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Summary

"Definitive...Not just for Talking Heads fans--it's a masterful dive into downtown New York in the 70s, and the changing face of rock music."--Town & Country

"Riveting"--New York Post

"A masterful achievement." --Booklist (starred review)

On the 50th anniversary of Talking Heads, acclaimed music biographer Jonathan Gould presents the long-overdue, definitive story of this singular band, capturing the gritty energy of 1970s New York City and showing how a group of art students brought fringe culture to rock's mainstream, forever changing the look and sound of popular music.

"Psycho Killer." "Take Me to the River." "Road to Nowhere." Few musical artists have had the lasting impact and relevance of Talking Heads. One of the foundational bands of New York's downtown 1970s music scene, Talking Heads have endured as a musical and cultural force for decades. Their unique brand of transcendent, experimental rock remains a lingering influence on popular music--despite their having disbanded over thirty years ago.

Now New Yorker contributor Jonathan Gould offers an authoritative, deeply researched account of a band whose sound, fame, and legacy forever connected rock music to the cultural avant-garde. From their art school origins to the enigmatic charisma of David Byrne and the internal tensions that ultimately broke them apart, Gould tells the story of a group that emerged when rock music was still young and went on to redefine the prevailing expectations of how a band could sound, look, and act. At a time when guitar solos, lead-singer swagger, and sweaty stadium tours reigned supreme, Talking Heads were precocious, awkward, quirky, and utterly distinctive when they first appeared on the ragged stages of the East Village. Yet they would soon mature into one of the most accomplished and uncompromising recording and performing acts of their era.

More than just a biography of a band, Gould masterfully captures the singular time and place that incubated and nurtured this original music: downtown New York in the 1970s, that much romanticized, little understood milieu where art, music, and commerce collided in the urban dystopia of Lower Manhattan. What emerges is an expansive portrait of a unique cultural moment and an iconoclastic band that shifted the paradigm of popular music by burning down the house of mainstream rock.

Table of Contents

1	A City in My Mind	1
2	Artists Only	10
3	The Harvard of Art Schools	23
4	An Anthropologist in Arbutus	30
5	Risd & Mica	41
6	The Admiral's Daughter	51
7	The Amazing Artistics	63
8	Cbgb & Omfug	73
9	Chrystie Street	86
10	A Conservative Impulse	96
11	Born to Run	109
12	Punk is Coming	121
13	They're so Cute	134
14	London Calling	146
15	A Young Jesuit Monk	156
16	Summer of Sam	166
17	Don't Call it Punk	176
18	The Big Country	187
19	Compass Point	196
20	Take Me to the River	204
21	Feet on the Ground	215
22	Fear of Everything	226
23	This Ain't No Party	233
24	Two Fourteen-Year-Old Boys	243
25	Melody Attack	253
26	Once in a Lifetime	265
27	Expanded Heads	274
28	Bush of Ghosts	282
29	Geniuses of Love	293
30	The Name of This Band	303
31	Girlfriend is Better	311
32	Speaking in Tongues	323
33	Preppy Funk Triumphant	332
34	A Movie Waiting to be Filmed	342
35	Close to Perfection	355
36	And They Were	365
37	An Anthropologist in Virgil	373
38	Pleading for Mercy	385
39	Naked in Paris	395
40	Don't Mention Harmony	404
41	Independence Day	417
42	Hall of Fame	427
	Acknowledgments	446
	Bibliography	450
	Notes	464
	Index	484

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