Webster

The Constitution was made to guard the people against the dangers of good intentions." --American Statesman Daniel Webster (1782-1852)


Tuesday, December 10, 2013

Monday Music "Once in a lifetime" by Talking Heads

Well Here I go doing another "Monday Music" on a Tuesday,  But I can't call it "Tuesday Music"...it don't sing.  I will try to get better on the Monday posting of the Monday Music.  Well the 3rd thing happened, the bad things come in 3's, well there was the accident, then the water heater, then the 3rd thing hit....We installed the new water heater, pressurized the lines and *boom*, the water line behind my sons shower literally burst.  We had water coming into my kitchen via the ceiling before we got the water stopped.  that is either the 3rd thing, or if pattern holds true...Wednesday will be interesting.  On another note,  I decided to go with the band "Talking Heads".  I first heard of them on MTV, watching their video's along with all the other British new wave that was part of the 2nd British invasion or New Wave" that hit heavy on MTV.

    
"Once in a Lifetime" is a song by New Wave band Talking Heads, released as the first single from their fourth studio album Remain in Light. The song was written by David Byrne, Brian Eno, Chris Frantz, Jerry Harrison, and Tina Weymouth, and produced by Eno. It received critical acclaim, and was named one of the 100 most important American musical works of the 20th century by National Public Radio.
At the time of its original release, the song gained modest chart success, peaking at #14 on the UK Singles Chart and at #31 in the Dutch singles chart. While the song failed to chart on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 chart, various American 80s format radio stations have come to programming it in their playlists over the years. It was also an early MTV staple and was one of the most heavily played videos upon MTV's debut in August 1981.
A live version of the song taken from Talking Heads' concert film Stop Making Sense was released as a single in 1984, peaking at #91 on the Billboard Hot 100. The studio version is widely regarded as their signature song, along with "Burning Down the House".[citation needed]
Kermit the Frog performed the song on a 1996 episode of Muppets Tonight. The song is featured in the films Down and Out in Beverly Hills, Rock Star, and Hot Tub Time Machine, and in trailers for the films The Family Man, W., Wreck-It Ralph and Reagan.


    
Brian Eno introduced Fela Kuti's multiple rhythm music style to the band, and during production Eno used a different rhythm count for some members of the group than others, starting on the "3" instead of the "1." It gave the song what Eno called "a funny balance within it. It has really two centers of gravity: their "1" and my "1."" This rhythm imbalance was exaggerated in the studio, and is present throughout the song.[ Jerry Harrison developed the synthesizer line and added the Hammond organ climax, taken from Velvet Underground's "What Goes On". Eno sang nonsense verb sound blocks, which Byrne then converted into lyrics in the call and response style of American radio evangelists on the theme of moving through life with little awareness or questioning. Eno wasn't particularly fond of the song, and it was almost dropped from the album before Eno came up with the vocal melody for the chorus which "saved" the song.
As the song essentially consisted of a repetitive two-bar groove (with the pattern reversed between the verse and the chorus) Brian Eno decided to approach the production by allowing each of the band members to record overdubs of different rhythmic and musical ideas independently of each other, with each member being kept blind to what the others had recorded on tape. In the final mix Eno faded between these different independent ideas at different parts of the song. This is very much in keeping with his production technique of Oblique Strategies.

The verses of the song consist of David Byrne speaking rather than singing. With the lyrics "Letting the days go by, let the water hold me down," the song has an existential mood to it, although it is usually interpreted to be a song dealing with the midlife crisis and the inevitable sacrifice of youthful ideals and dreams for conventional success.[citation needed]

Music video

The music video features a bespectacled David Byrne dancing much like a marionette. Byrne is shown making sudden flings of his arm, tapping his head, and getting on his hands and knees to pat the floor, much like simple tricks which can be done with actual marionettes. In the background, clones of Byrne dance in perfect synchronization; in the foreground, a larger Byrne is getting further and further out of synchrony.
The video is exhibited in the New York Museum of Modern Art. Some of Byrne's mannerisms (such as physical spasms, unfocused eye movements, and sharp intakes of breath) were inspired by his choreographer, Toni Basil, showing him footage of epilepsy sufferers.[5]
The video also made an appearance on an episode of the 90s Beavis and Butthead.

    Here is the Kermit the Frog version:


1 comment:

  1. Huh, another one I missed... dunno where the hell I was... Deployed I think. Sorry to hear about #3, but at least you 'should' be good for a while!!!

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