Grown Backwards

iTunes Review

Even before he departed his vaunted Talking Heads in the late '80s, David Byrne had already embarked upon a solo career that encompassed various stage projects (The Catherine Wheel, The Knee Plays, The Forest) and film soundtracks (True Stories, Last Emperor) . But this 2004 release finds Byrne bristling with a sense of ambitious eclecticism rare even by his own elevated standards, a sensibility that carries Byrne deeper into the classical realm than he's ever been. Austin, Texas' chamber outfit the Tosca Strings inform the melancholy, post-modernist opener "Glass, Concrete & Stone," the limber 'n' loopy rap fusion "Tiny Apocalypse," and "Un Di Felice, Eterea," aria adaptations from Verdi's La Traviata. That operatic fixation surfaces early on in a lovely, if unlikely duet with Rufus Wainwright on "Au Fond du Temple Saint," adapted from Bizet's The Pearl Fishers.