[Trash-talk] mini-ramble-session : garbage - talking heads - and a little jimi thrown in cuz it just wouldn't be right any other way

[Alan Hoppe]

i once again got super duper amped on caffeine and then got all excited
about garbage being in the studio .. then thought about that comment butch
made comparing one of the new G tracks to the bopamatic groove factor of
talking heads .. and went into hyperdrive, rambling on endlessly. here are
my unedited and possibly annoying thoughts on all things talking
heads/garbage. or maybe just some things - i could go on forever until
someone knocked me down the stairs.

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the only band i've ever obsessed over and loves as much as garbage is
talking heads. and i knew that the band liked talking heads (they once said
their collective fav is 'fear of music') .. and there are some definate
sonic comparisons between how garbage and eno produced and created (eno did
3 of the talking heads albums) ... eno was sometimes cited as the 'fifth
member' of talking heads. when he entered the band's musical arena,
producing their second third and fourth albums, the band was probably at
their most exciting point of creativity in the studio.

anyway, for butch to make a comparison to talking heads made me totally flip
out. weeeeee.

but i hear stuff all the time in G songs that reminds me of little nuancy
things that TH did in the studio. esp stuff from 'fear of music' - the way
sounds are processed and how they effect my listening brain. take the end of
'mind' and then play this one part of 'shut your mouth' and it's like ..
dude.

and another thing - TH and G can be kind of compared in that they morphe
from one album to the next, not allowing themselves to be held back
artistically by churning out stuff that's what they think people will want
to hear. they just go for broke and go in whatever directions they want to.

one other thought occurs to me - i have always found reasons to compare
these two bands (mostly because i love them both, but really, they seem like
valid comparisons) :

the first album was kind of like 'fear of music' in its sonic lysergia and
dark landscapes and deep thoughts. their follow-up version 2.0 was like an
expanded elaboration where they got more over-the-top and kept polishing,
polishing .. make it as perfect as they could before finally putting a stop
to it and releasing it. that's how it feels .. which is kind of like talking
heads' 'remain in light'. over-the-top, amazing. perfect.

and beautifulgarbage would be like talking heads' 'little creatures / true
stories' phaze .. some loved it, some hated it, it was definately the
unashamedly pop stage of talking heads. and what's interesting is that these
albums go in the same order as the garbage ones.

so who knows what's next. after that TH did 'naked' and it was like their
swan song. their final album. but in that case it might've had more to do
with david byrne wanting to do other stuff. after all, all through TH
history, byrne was doing his own solo projects and bass player and drummer
of the band tina weymouth and chris frantz also did their 'tom tom club'
band project and albums. but with garbage they pretty much stay focused
exclusively on band efforts (with some non-band remixes and producing thrown
in, which excludes shirley m).

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my only other musical obsession that reached the G/TH level was jimi hendrix
.. and one time i heard duke erikson do a little guitar snippet of 'voodoo
child (slight return)' during the version 2.0 touring. i flipped. heyyyyy
maybe the band will do a talking-heads-like bopamatic-yet-dark cover-version
of a jimi song. but what??? 'the wind cries mary'? 'up from the skies'?
'crosstown traffic'? 'foxy lady'? i don't know if anything would work.

they said that jimi was way ahead of his time in terms of pushing the
production envelope of what was able to be achieved in the studio. he
ultimately got the opportunity to produce his own recordings (with eddie
kramer, who'd already been in the jimi loop) in his own studio, electric
lady. so i've alwasy sorta drawn comparisons between jimi and G too. jimi
was like 'dude, i need my own studio, i need to produce these sounds in my
head *myself* to get them right'.

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in my dream jimi saunters into smart studios and says 'i wanna get out of my
own studio and shake things up .. i've already written some stuff but was
wondering if you guys want to help me lay down some tracks'. then he goes
'heyyy what's that funky sound you guys have cranked up there? it sounds
like .. '

butch : don't say it!!
jimi and shirley start laughing.

xo
alan