This ain’t no fooling around: Why Talking Heads' Stop Making Sense deserves a whole new audience

Why a movie? Why do the musicians come out gradually? Where do the odd movements come from? Why a big suit?
By Graham Lindsay
Published 23rd Aug 2023, 04:45 BST
Updated 23rd Aug 2023, 14:44 BST
The back cover of the Stop Making Sense soundtrack album. Picture: Graham LindsayThe back cover of the Stop Making Sense soundtrack album. Picture: Graham Lindsay
The back cover of the Stop Making Sense soundtrack album. Picture: Graham Lindsay

Talking Heads’ seminal 1984 concert film Stop Making Sense is due to hit the big screen again next month and an expanded and improved version of the accompanying album is already on the shelves of your local record store.

On first release, the film redefined the genre of the concert movie and the soundtrack became the ubiquitous, er, soundtrack of late-night parties with the ferocious funkiness of Slippery People, Burning Down The House and Life During Wartime filling living-room dancefloors everywhere.

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Part performance art, part blazing musical tour de force, the 1983 gigs from which the movie was assembled marked the culmination of the band's rise from US student radio to global stardom.

From left: David Byrne, Tina Weymouth and Chris Frantz of Talking Heads at their Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction in 2002. Picture: Kathy Willens/APFrom left: David Byrne, Tina Weymouth and Chris Frantz of Talking Heads at their Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction in 2002. Picture: Kathy Willens/AP
From left: David Byrne, Tina Weymouth and Chris Frantz of Talking Heads at their Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction in 2002. Picture: Kathy Willens/AP

The original four - David Byrne, Jerry Harrison and husband-and-wife rhythm section Chris Frantz and Tina Weymouth - had beefed up the band for previous albums and tours with Funkadelic keyboard ace Bernie Worrell and percussionist Steve Scales amongst others. The resulting combo proved to be one of the most incendiary outfits to ever take the stage. One critic put it simply: “For 90 minutes, Talking Heads get down and burn.”

The film was the brainchild of and directed by the late Jonathan Demme, who went on to silver screen immortality with Silence Of The Lambs and Philadelphia.

Despite a one-night reunion for their Rock & Roll Hall of Fame induction, tensions have remained since the band broke up in 1991. However, the original members are uniting for a live Q&A about the movie at the Toronto International Film Festival on September 11th, which be will broadcast to selected IMAX theatres around the world. One last tour would surely be just too much to ask.

The 40 years since the concerts have not diminished the power of the music and simply placing the soundtrack LP on a turntable still provokes a buzz of anticipation.

Talking Heads on stage at the The Hollywood Pantages Theatre during the filming of Stop Making Sense. Picture:Cinecom Int'/Island Alive/Kobal/ShutterstockTalking Heads on stage at the The Hollywood Pantages Theatre during the filming of Stop Making Sense. Picture:Cinecom Int'/Island Alive/Kobal/Shutterstock
Talking Heads on stage at the The Hollywood Pantages Theatre during the filming of Stop Making Sense. Picture:Cinecom Int'/Island Alive/Kobal/Shutterstock

Thanks to the soundtrack and YouTube, kids born many years later are just as thrilled by Life During Wartime and Psycho Killer as those who experienced it first time around.

Anniversary treatments of albums and “improved” versions of movies are nothing new but, if there is a moment in musical history which deserves to be relived and, hopefully, find a whole new audience, it is this truly virtuoso piece of performance and film-making.

Oh, and don’t forget the big suit…

Graham Lindsay is Assistant Editor of The Scotsman