#27 on the 2025 Bacon Top 31 — David Byrne

January 05, 2026 by Royal Stuart in 2025, Top 31

Who Is The Sky? by David Byrne

David Byrne released his first album, Talking Heads: 77, with is band of the same name in 1977. Talking Heads released four albums before Byrne released his first solo project in 1981 (his beautiful collaboration with Brian Eno, My Life in the Bush of Ghosts). The band released four additional records before officially splitting up in 1991, while Byrne continued to release solo albums and soundtracks for film and theater during and after the band’s short-but-fruitful existence. All told, then man has been a part of 30 records in the 48 years he’s been releasing music.

He is a true national treasure. (Despite having been born in Scotland, Byrne has triple citizenship between Great Britain, the US, and Ireland. He’s lived in NYC for decades.) He has gifted us with his art via recorded music and a myriad of media for nearly half a century. He’s stage-directed and choreographed dances throughout his musical career (if you’ve not seen the brilliant 1984 Jonathan Demme-directed Talking Heads concert film Stop Making Sense, I highly recommended you put it at the top of your list – you will not be disappointed). He’s been the creative force behind multiple Broadway shows (The Catherine Wheel with Twyla Tharp, his own American Utopia, and a Broadway collaboration with Fatboy Slim called Here Lies Love). He’s written multiple books, on music and many other topics. Since 1990 he’s run a record label focused on bringing international sounds to a global audience, called Luaka Bop. In 2003 he toured a non-music presentation at college campuses called “I ♥ PowerPoint” that I had the pleasure of seeing live at Kane Hall at the University of Washington. He gave a TED talk in 2010. While not a true EGOT, he’s won an Oscar, a Grammy, a Tony, a Golden Globe, and has been inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.

Byrne has a savant-like commitment¹ to making people feel connected, happy, and loved. I’ve had the pleasure of seeing Byrne perform on stage six times since 2001, and each was filled with pure joy. One of those concerts was at Benaroya Hall, where the Seattle Symphony performs, promoting his collaboration with St. Vincent (the album, called Love This Giant, featured at #15 in 2012).

To promote his tenth solo album, the fantastic Who Is The Sky?, created in collaboration with a musical ensemble called Ghost Train Orchestra, Byrne built a stage set that saw him and 14 other musicians and dancers all performing on top of and surrounded by giant LED screens. The scenes surrounding the performers alternated through locales as varied as the surface of the moon (while playing Talking Heads’ “Heaven”), a NYC rooftop (performing “Strange Overtones” from Byrne’s second collaboration with Brian Eno, 2008’s Everything That Happens Will Happen Today), and a 360° view of the interior of Byrne’s Brooklyn apartment (while playing Who Is The Sky?’s “My Apartment is My Friend,” of course). Each song throughout the nearly 2-hour set featured choreographed dances for the entire 15-person crew, with even the musicians mobilized thanks to special mounts and harnesses for their instruments. It was magical.

Byrne’s solo music over the last 20 years has tended towards more “safe” territory than the Talking Heads ever did. “Everybody Laughs,” featured in the video above, is a prime example. There are no surprises, but there’s also nothing to dislike. Add in Byrne’s electrified presence, and you can see why why we all keep coming back. He’s released another video from the album, a black-and-white animated singalong for the song “What is the Reason For it?,” which features Hayley Williams, the lead singer of rock band Paramore. And then there’s a video for non-album track “T Shirt,” which I first heard and saw as part of the Who Is They Sky? concert.

While it doesn’t compare to the live stage show, you can get a small sense of it by watching the crew’s Tiny Desk Concert from December. They managed to fit all 15 of them behind the desk, performing a few key songs from the show.

Byrne is 73 years old, and showing no signs of slowing down. While his albums alone don’t “wow,” everything else he brings to the world more than makes for it, keeping him near the top of “must see” lists everywhere. I can’t wait to see what he can do in the second half of his century of performing.

^{1. Despite having never been formally diagnosed, Bryne said in 2012 that he felt that music was his way of communicating when he could not do it face-to-face “because of [his] autism”.↩}

__________________________________________

Subscribe to the Top 31 playlists!

Full Albums
All albums in their entirety

Radio Station
The best song pulled from each album

View all previous years’ Top 31s

#23 on the 2018 Bacon Top 31 — The Good, the Bad & the Queen

January 09, 2019 by Royal Stuart

Merrie Land by The Good, the Bad & the Queen

Damon Albarn, despite all expectations to the contrary, has staying power. Having far outgrown the quibbles he and his first band, Blur, had with competing London rockers Oasis, Albarn has accomplished so much in his musical career that it’s astounding to think he’s only 50 years old, with so much more living — and, presumably, music — left to do.

Blur released their first album, Leisure, in 1991. Including that seminal album, Albarn has been a principle part of the production for eight Blur albums, six Gorrilaz albums, six various collaboration albums, one solo album and now, with Merrie Land, two albums with the collective known as The Good, the Bad & the Queen. That’s 23 albums in 27 years, an astounding feat for anyone. His 23rd album, here at #23; I swear I didn’t plan that.

The Good, the Bad & the Queen is by all measures a proverbial “supergroup”, featuring the aforementioned Albarn as the principle lyricist/vocalist, and a band made up of: The Clash’s bassist, Paul Simonon; The Verve’s guitarist, Simon Tong; and “perhaps the greatest drummer who has ever lived” (according to Brian Eno), Tony Allen. (Allen was the drummer and musical director for Fela Kuti’s band Africa from 1968-1979, whose work was the main influence for the Talking Heads’ album Remain in Light that was covered so beautifully by Angelique Kidjo and appeared at #30 just a week ago. So if you follow the bouncing ball: Tony Allen created Afrobeat with Fela Kuti, which in turn influenced the Talking Heads which was then covered by Kidjo and now the originator appears here in an entirely different context. I just blew my own mind.)

Merrie Land is the supergroup’s second album, but is markedly different from their 2007 debut, which was produced by Danger Mouse and was created under very different political circumstances. Albarn has stated that the new album, which was produced this time around by Tony Visconti (who — get this — won a grammy for his production of Angélique Kidjo’s 2007 album Djin Djin), is rooted in his personal goodbyes to the pre-Brexit Great Britain. Listen closely to the dark lyrics, and you can figure out exactly where Albarn’s loyalties lie.

Albarn takes the visuals of the music to new heights, with the album cover featuring an image from a 1945 horror film called Dead of Night where a ventriloquist is taken over by his dummy. Going further into the ventriloquist arena, Albarn dons dummy makeup and stars in a lip-syncing video for each song from the new album:

That’s a level of dedication to creative output that most musicians don’t or won’t tackle, but Albarn gives out like candy, and it’s much appreciated. If you’ve ever been a fan of Albarn in any of his many incarnations, then you should check out Merrie Land right now.

__________________________________________

24. Room 25 by Noname
25. WARM by Jeff Tweedy
26. God's Favorite Customer by Father John Misty
27. Vessel by Frankie Cosmos
28. For Ever by Jungle
29. Twerp Verse by Speedy Ortiz
30. Remain in Light by Angélique Kidjo
31. This One’s for the Dancer & This One’s for the Dancer’s Bouquet by Moonface

Subscribe to the 2018 Bacon Top 31 Apple Music playlist
2009-2017 Top 31s

#30 on the 2018 Bacon Top 31 — Angélique Kidjo

January 02, 2019 by Royal Stuart

Remain in Light by Angélique Kidjo

Those who know about these things may find it debatable as to where rock ’n’ roll began, but they all agree that the roots of rock ’n’ roll are a combination of African musical tradition with European instrumentation. White musicians have appropriated African rhythms into their music since before the dawn of rock ’n’ roll in the mid-1900s. And a few of those musicians have done so to their own great benefit, namely the Talking Heads in the late 70s / early 80s (and David Byrne beyond), Paul Simon and Peter Gabriel in the 80s and 90s, and all the way up to Vampire Weekend in the late 2000s / early 10s.

Enter Angélique Kidjo, a three-time grammy-winning Beninese (via-Paris and finally New York City) singer / songwriter. After a long and fruitful career of writing her own music (starting in 1981 with her debut Pretty) Kidjo has taken her music in a new direction, latching onto the seminal Talking Heads album Remain in Light and recording a track-for-track remake, pulling what was a rock ’n’ roll album back over to the African roots it always hinted at. If you didn’t recognize the David Byrne lyrics in these songs, you would most definitely be fooled into thinking these songs began with Kidjo in Africa.

According to Pitchfork, Kidjo first heard “Once in a Lifetime,” the big hit from Remain in Light, at a college party after escaping Benin for Paris in 1983. The song lodged itself in her brain, but only 35 years later did she seek out its source (even after having been championed by David Byrne in the 90s). She heard the full album and was moved by its continued political relevance, 30+ years after its debut. So she spun it for herself, and created this masterpiece.

It’s exciting to hear these songs in a brand new way. Remain in Light is one of my favorite all-time albums, and Kidjo’s renditions breathe new life into it. While this was my first exposure to Kidjo, I feel that’s a result of me not paying attention. For instance, here’s Kidjo with Ezra Koenig on stage at Austin City Limits during her 2014 PBS special, performing Vampire Weekend’s “I Think Ur a Contra”. Brilliant. Give this album a listen, whether you’re familiar with the original or not. You will not be disappointed.

__________________________________________

31. This One’s for the Dancer & This One’s for the Dancer’s Bouquet by Moonface

Subscribe to the 2018 Bacon Top 31 Apple Music playlist
2009-2017 Top 31s