Customer Reviews

Catherine Wheel

5 star:		(14)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

"The Catherine Wheel" will always be one of my favorite albums. Back in the mid 80's, when my college friend and I needed to decide on some good stereo music late at night, we'd look at each other, say "It!", and play "The Catherine Wheel." This collection of Talking-Heads-ish pieces will characterize your internal and external environment in the period during which you familiarize yourself with it. Hearing it years later will evoke many of the feelings and mental images that you experienced while listening to it. Usually, it takes at least whole year's worth of pop radio to achive this effect in me, but David Byrne did it in one CD. I've secretly been wishing that David Byrne would one day return temporarily to this style of his music: layered acoustic percussion and rhythm elements, freaky electric, not necessarily electronic, sounds and samples, and sparse melodies held together by Byrne's yelling-singing voice.

I bought this cassette back in junior high school when I was truly obsessed with TALKING HEADS - they had just made the brave leap forward with the ENO-helmed REMAIN IN LIGHT, which remains in my TOP 10 of all time albums - but THIS original score for Twyla Tharp's dance production is in many ways even more mind-blowing, ground-breaking, and seminal - here Byrne is given free reign to do his thang and explore the very limits of music, percussion, vocals, and song structure, or lack thereof...truly truly SPELL-BINDING stuff! But here's the rub: my original long OOP cassette version that WB released (BLUE cover, not RED) contains the COMPLETE score, with many tracks/sections NOT found on the sadly abbreviated CD - I guess they couldn't fit all of its BRILLIANCE on one CD, so they chose to edit - now that it's legendary, why not re-issue an expanded, double-CD with the entire score for posterity?! And why not include some of the 12" MIXES of BIG BUSINESS, etc released on 12" only singles at the time?! Trust me, once you buy this and start listening, you will come back to it over & over again - this is over two decades and I still come back to it every few months - WAY AHEAD OF ITS TIME, NEVER GROWS OLD! Sadly, Byrne would never top this...I find all of this later TALKING HEADS (post-Speaking In Tongues) and solo projects dry, brittle, flat, and dull - that tired "world music" white man's burden trap. Oh well. At least we have THIS to cherish.

The Catherine Wheel is simply a masterpiece of modern electronic music. Here we find David Byrne, unfettered by the limitations of the pop song format that constrained his work with Talking Heads, stretching his wings as a modern composer. The Catherine Wheel combines the best lessons of Byrne's synth-funk and found-vocal Eno collaborations ("The Red House") with quirky and soaring sound scapes ("Light Bath," "Dinosaur"), verbal ellipses and his trademark (and under appreciated!) rhythmic-lead guitar work. There is no wasted music on this one: every track has something wonderful to offer. Because The Catherine Wheel was written as a dance score, a number of tracks lack the formal structures of pop songs. But these are not gratuitous noodlings nor mere sketches of songs that might have been. Rather, each piece has an integrity and musical interest to it. And, on a larger scale, the layers of rhythm and instrumental texture throughout draw the ear and the mind into a complete and coherent musical vision. The Catherine Wheel reveals one of America's great musical minds in full flower.

Like I have, I am sure that many Heads fans have wondered what happened between Stop Making Sense and Little Creatures. The leap seemed huge, bridging the gap from rythem based rock to the new era synth-pop sound of later Heads work. Both sounds work just fine for me, and I still consider Little Creatures to be among the best albums of the last 20 years.

While pre-dating both of the aformentioned ablums chronologically, Byrne's solo soundtrack work on "The Catherine Wheel" sounds very much like the foundational work for Little Creatures. It's as if Byrne knew, 5 years out, where he wanted to take the Heads - he just had to bring the rest of the band up to speed.

This is a fun album, lots of little fills and long, worldless background sutff - all great for a long drive.

So, if you're a Heads fan that has been looking for that ellusive missing link - I think this is it.

Prepare for a gigantic, 9 course (or so) feast for the soul. There is so much here. Beginning and ending with "Light Bath", Byrne seems to want to take the listener on a journey into, through, and then out of, his soul. Nothing is held back, lyrically or musically. From the eerie to the sublime to the transcendant, this CD succeeds on every level. And the musicianship! Understated, intense guitar work ("Big Blue Plymouth"), awe inspiring sonic treatments throughout (esp. "His Wife Refused", "Eggs in a Briar Patch" & "Big Business"), and tremendous layered rhythm(s) (e.g. "Ade" ). Talking Heads fans: PAY HEED! If you were not aware of this one, joy unto you! Anyone else with a thimblefull of musical imagination will find a treasure trove of musical delights here. Somebody (please) point me in the direction of something comparable on the contemporary music scene.

Next to "Remain in Light", Catherine Wheel represents David Bryne's most comprehensive & cohesive work. This album is made up of approximately 20 songs and most songs blend into the other. Initially a close listening is a "must" (from start to finish). This CD will become a staple in your CD player. The music is perfect background music for work & play. I have had many years of enjoyment and finding it on Amazon is a treat. Orginally the vinyl album was missing some of the songs while the cassette tape contained the full score. This CD is a remaster of the cassette version and the quality of the performance and recording are nothing less than David Bryne's best work.

If you're mostly into the Taking Heads' more comercial hits then this probably isn't for you but if you lose yourself in the groove of the more obscure instumental diversions on Little Creatures then this is absolutely a must own cd. While there are some odd tracks that don't work so well (to be expected from a 72 min long soundtrack) mostly, this cd is made up of the undiluted good stuff, the raw pure music that comes along all too rarely. I thought about giving this 4 stars because of the low points but considering that you could delete 15 minutes of it and still be left with a long album containing nothing but some of the finest funkiest grooves ever - it has to be 5 stars.

Another reviewer called this the "lost Talking Heads album," which I think is accurate and also hints at a faint yearning, among many of Byrne's most ardent fans (of which I am one), to hear more of the sound that got them hooked in the first place. For Byrne, Talking Heads has become an albatross, and he seems resentful of his fans' unwillingness to accept his exploration of other avenues.

Well, okay; fair enough. But Byrne's persona within the context of Talking Heads is arguably one of the most intriguing in rock music, and it's only natural for followers to crave access to more. The Talking Heads catalogue has never been friendly to the completist mentality, as there's not a wealth of unreleased material surfacing -- not even with the recent "Once in a Lifetime" and "Brick" box sets. However, what Byrne seems to be doing with his solo career, or wanting to do, is to demystify himself, and he's tried doing this through a variety of measures: with his "unplugged" stint; with his "personal" work on his self-titled album and recent 'Grown Backwards'; with his down-to-earth collaborations with artists such as Richard Thompson; and with the folksy conversational style he's adopted in his solo concerts. But the overarching impression still is of a man awkwardly inhabiting a physical body within the physical world, and these attempts to convey a reaching of comfort within these two spaces seem largely calculated. Additionally, it remains unclear as to whether the vitality and energy the man once radiated is being suppressed or has simply dissipated.

One thing that hasn't changed about Byrne is that he's still what detractors would call a dilettant or a tourist, and what friendlier followers would call versatile. Objectively, it's fair to say that he's always had his hands in many pies, working in and adopting as many mediums as his talents will allow. One of the most compelling results of this dilettantism/versatility was his collaboration with choreographer Twyla Tharp for the Broadway ballet "The Catherine Wheel." They don't do stuff like this on Broadway anymore. Current Broadway, safe and posh, is to early '80s Broadway what current Hollywood is to 1970s Hollywood, before Michael Cimino killed it for everyone. Listening to "The Catherine Wheel" evokes this and, among many other things, the excitement of a gifted and vital artist (Byrne) in great demand. Byrne dove into this as though it were the important task that it was, taking complete command of his assignment without a shred of unease. "His Wife Refused," "Big Blue Plymouth (Eyes Wide Open), "What a Day That Was," and "Big Business" are practically Talking Heads songs and rank among the best of the Heads' work, while "Ade," "The Red House," "Black Flag," and others, create soundscapes that are at once exotic, exciting, and comforting. This album, next to (and slightly surpassing) 'Rei Momo,' remains Byrne's best and most assured solo album.

I can't add very much to these reviews, just a warning. Don't listen to this while driving down the coast of GA where there aren't too many gas stations. You'll get so much into the music that you'll forget what you're doing and run out of gas.

This album is a bit overlong, but still fascinating. The segue from "Light Bath" into "His Wife Refused" is probably one of my favorite moments in music. David Byrne seems to have this incredible way of placing you into a weird little landscape with every track.
Listen to the knockout last 5 tracks in a row - another of my favorite moments in music. Have you ever heard anyone bridge from one song to the next by saying "Aaa, aa"?
Listen to this one while painting an abstract.