The first album Talking Heads’ bassist Tina Weymouth bought
(Credits: Far Out / YouTube Still)
Pioneers of the New Wave that rose from punk, Talking Heads are regularly described as one of the most critically acclaimed bands of the 1980s, peaking commercially with the release of their 1985 album Little Creatures. Throughout their career, the New York quartet collaborated with a variety of creative people, including a three-album run with producer Brian Eno and filmmaker Jonathan Demme, with whom they released Stop Making Sense, an independently financed concert film that was the Eras Tour of its day.
It’s hard to precisely pinpoint the influences that make up the New York quartet’s music as they crisscrossed through a veritable feast of genres, among them post-punk, avant-funk, art-pop and dance-rock. But bassist Tina Weymouth has revealed that The Beatles‘ Meet The Beatles! was one of the first records she ever bought.
“I had to give a party for my classmates,” Weymouth recalls, “and so I said, ‘Mummy, I have no music to play – they really like pop music.’ So she gave me 50 bucks to go and get all these albums. I bought three or four Beatles and three Beach Boys and probably a Peter, Paul And Mary. I was trying to learn to play guitar and sing at the time.”
Released by EMI subsidiary Capitol Records in the US, the album proudly proclaimed that it was “the First Album by England’s Phenomenal Pop Combo!” Except, technically, it wasn’t, as Vee-Jay Records had released their Introducing… The Beatles compilation just ten days before. Meet The Beatles! is generally considered the more ‘canon’ Beatles release, however, as Vee-Jay’s distribution license expired in October 1964. In contrast, Capitol were releasing music by The Beatles up until the end of 1967. The Beatles then took over in 1968, distributing through their own imprint Apple.
Many fans of the band have considered the group’s output as split down the middle. Of course, they had their triumphant rise to pop dominance, which included countless singles and compilation albums — this is one sid of the group. But the other side of the group is focused on creating studio albums and serene soundscapes. It means for most, the first real Beatles album is Please, Please Me.
Meet The Beatles! contains some of the band’s biggest early hits, including ‘I Want To Hold Your Hand’ and ‘I Saw Her Standing There’. Whilst it’s tricky to trace a direct line between this compilation and the majority of Talking Heads’ back catalogue, it’s hard to argue with better choices from the time of albums more suited to learning to play guitar and sing at the same time.
Soul music of the 1960s and ’70s was another key influence on Weymouth’s playing, particularly the funky grooves laid down by Sly and the Family Stone and James Brown. She’s also drawn inspiration from Bob Dylan and fellow new wave contemporaries Blondie and Ramones.
Meeting her bandmates David Byrne and Chris Frantz (who she later married) as a student at the Rhode Island School of Design, Weymouth only started playing bass when Byrne and Frantz were unable to find a bass player for Talking Heads. Since then, Weymouth’s legacy as an integral part of one of New York’s finest acts is undeniable.
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