Remain in Love: Talking Heads, Tom Tom Club, Tina

For an art-school grad who was a founder and key member of two massively influential bands, Chris has chosen a very direct and homespun way to tell the story of his love, life, and career (in that order). But that doesn't mean it's not a great read. I've known Chris on Facebook for a decade, and this is his authentic voice. Like the golf shirts he wore in the early Talking Heads days, Chris' style is anti-pretentious, wikedly smart, and a lot of fun. As with similar rock star autobiographies, like Keith Richards' or Bruce Springsteen's, Chris Frantz's life story is front-loaded with a focus on his childhood and early days. As the years pass, the pace increases, and there are times you wish you could interrupt him and get more detail about CBGB or recording and touring Remain In Light, but at other times the speed is refreshing because the book never drags. If I were to look at the book thematically, it's about Chris Frantz's relationship with two people: His formative bandmate David Byrne, and his other original bandmate, love, and later life partner Tina Weymouth. You can feel the conflict between David and Tina throughout much of the book, with Chris often caught in the middle. But as the title of the book suggests, Chris always sided with Tina. That such a tight romantic couple were the core of the band caused lots of conflict, even when Jerry Harrison joined as the fourth member, and Chris makes no bones about his loyalty or biases. It can be a bit uncomfortable at times, when you imagine how David might feel if he read the book, but if Chris' portrayal of David is accurate, David will probably never read it, nor even acknowledge any questions about it that come up in future interviews. That said, Chris' negative memories and feelings about his longtime bandmate and onetime friend don't come off as bitterness so much as hurt, frustration, and disappointment. Chris isn't without self-criticism. He acknowledges mistakes, regrets, and even low periods in his life when he struggled with drug and alcohol abuse that threatened his relationship with Tina. But as the book revolves around her, you know it will have a happy ending. The voice that Chris Frantz has found here is that of a mature storyteller. It's basically one anecdote after another, mostly chronological but with occasional jumps forward or back. The name-dropping is entertaining, since pretty much everyone Chris is so thrilled or curious to meet is at his own level of celebrity (now), yet he tells about their encounters with self-deprecating humour. When it comes to sex, drugs, and rock and roll: the sex is monogamous, the drugs are pretty low-key, and the rock and roll is arty and often funky rather than raw and dirty. It's not a scandalous book. If you're a fan one one or both of his bands, or you just love reading how creative stars grow up and live their lives, it's worth cracking this one open. It's also getting great press.

Enjoyable read. Even though I have a few Talking Heads albums, I knew very little about the band, it's early days & how it got to break up. I'm now much-wiser.

This is an essential read for anyone who is a fan of American new wave/post-punk music. It is exceptionally well written and follows a mostly chronological order in telling the story of how Chris Frantz and Tina Weymouth met, fell in love, started a band, and ended up living a life in the arts. Every band seems to begin and end the same way. It dissolves into disputes over credit, money, jealousy and drugs. This is, sadly, one of the variations on that theme that you will find. The difference here is that it was dressed up in polo shirts and quirky beats. When Frantz deviates from the chronological telling of the story of Talking Heads, you end up wondering what might be missing from the rest of the story. The book sails along through their initial foray into CBGB and the New York music scene. You get to read the details of how they struggled and how they worked hard to make it. Frantz gives ample credit to everyone who helped and everyone they ran into. And then we go straight through the late 70s and into the early 80s in rapid fire succession. I would have liked to read more of how the middle catalog for Talking Heads was planned, recorded and toured. It seems like that era was a mere blip and over too quickly. When you think about how fast the Police and other contemporaries roared through album after album and tour after tour, you get a sense that the pace of all of this was what burned everyone out and exhausted the band. In the case of Talking Heads, nope. You'll get the straight story as to how David Byrne blew everything up. It does not sugarcoat anything. There are a handful of appearances by Jerry Harrison, and that's about it. Did they roll him around in a road case with wheels? We need an entire book about Happy Mondays, Shaun Ryder, and Bez being a nut. We need another book entirely to deal with their first tour of Europe with XTC. The real story, as told here, seems to be the nuts and bolts creation of the sound and style of the band that originated from Frantz and Weymouth. They wrote far more of the material than they were credited. They planned and demoed the songs. They created the visual presentations and talked to people about what they were about (being able to look others in the eye becomes a theme in the book). They put up with David's envy and indifference. And they paid for Remain in Light, which wouldn't have even happened if they had not done the legwork. Stick with the book until the end because there's a bombshell revelation. Most of what's here corrects the historical record. The myth that is punctured is that the rhythm section was just along for the ride. Wrong, they were the creative life blood. Overall, an excellent read.

The inside story

Una stupenda autobiografia ricca d’ironia, di succosi aneddoti sui Talking Heads, dagli esordi fino alla loro ultima esibizione in occasione della cerimonia d’induzione alla Rock’n’roll Hall Of Fame, sui Tom Tom Club e sui gruppi che hanno incontrato durante il loro interessantissimo cammino. Chris Frantz rende in modo magistrale l’atmosfera che si viveva a Manhattan durante gli anni Settanta e descrive in modo divertente e mai banale gli anni al CBGB’s, il suo primo, esilarante incontro con Mick Jagger, l’amicizia con Lou Reed, i tour con i Ramones (!!!) e il suo amore per Tina Weymouth. Riporta inoltre diversi episodi che ridimensionano la figura di Byrne. Una lettura piacevole e interessante che consiglio ad ogni amante di punk, new-wave e post-punk.