The Best of Talking Heads (Remastered)

iTunes Review

New York’s Talking Heads were the first of the new wave/punk bands to make geekiness utterly cool. On stage, singer David Byrne looked like a science major who may have ingested an experimental concoction, resulting in body movements not unlike that of an epileptic seizure in progress. Yet somehow, the art-punk, oddball track “Psycho Killer” permeated the American pop psyche in 1977, and led the band on a trajectory that peaked shortly before they went their separate ways in 1991. Over the years, the band moved from a jerky, nervous, punk-inspired sensibility to something smoother, with funkier, global, polyrhythmic beats (Brian Eno’s production early on certainly played a hand), and, finally, to pure pop. While single-disc anthologies are difficult to cull, this collection is a pretty solid stab at choice cuts from each Talking Heads album. Best of all, it starts off with the group’s elusive first single, the brilliant and still amazing “Love -> Building on Fire.”  Early fans may feel the band’s first works are not represented deeply enough (where is “Warning Signs?” “Don’t Worry About the Government?”) but fans of their later work may have the same complaint (“Swamp” and “Stay Up Late” seem conspicuously absent). But, hey, this ain’t no box set.