Search - Talking Heads :: Talking Heads: Little Creatures

Decent, but lacking an edge.

Michael Stack | North Chelmsford, MA USA | 02/22/2006

(3 out of 5 stars)

"After their debut album, the Talking Heads began building music of excess-- extra musicians, layered instrumental arrangement, polyrhythms, and so on, driven on by David Byrne's sort of all-accepting view of music and in part fueled by Brian Eno's production wizardry. After an album that was more electronic then organic ("Speaking in Tongues"), the Talking Heads did a complete about face with "Little Creatures", presenting an album of essentially stripped down pop music.



Now granted, stripped down pop is not a bad thing-- it's just that the band appears to have surrendered their edge along with their heavy production. While the music manages to reclaim a bit of that timeless quality that made the first four Talking Heads albums so great, the music is lacking. From my perspective, I suspect it's because it's a lot more restrained-- the instrumental arrangements are a lot less edgy and Byrne's vocals fall in a comfortable middle range tenor rather than his usual higher, tense vocal.



Truthfully, none of it is BAD-- it's all pretty enough pop music ("Perfect World"), and the reflections on children on sweet and often quite clever-- albeit goofy ("Creatures of Love", "Stay Up Late"), and certainly there's no question that opener "And She Was" was destined to be a hit-- it's a great piece with a fantastic hook and a great vocal harmony on the chorus. It's just that most of the pieces are pretty much undistinguished ("Walk it Down"), and the Talking Heads were never about undistinguished songs.



The dualdisc reissue remasters the album in both stereo (CD side) and 5.1 (DVD), and it sounds great, the sonic upgrade is fantastic. Both sides also include bonus tracks-- two "early versions" and an extended remix b-side on the CD side and a pair of music videos on the DVD side.



Trutfully, had a band other than Talking Heads put this out, I'd probably rate this higher, but the bar was set pretty high by "Fear of Music" and "Remain in Light"."

Maybe you wonder where you are...

Jason Stein | San Diego, CA United States | 03/10/2006

(4 out of 5 stars)

""Little Creature" is perhaps the Talking Heads most pop sounding album. The songs are shorter, the music is simpler and the hooks are in every song. But, there's something missing. I don't particularly care for "Give Me Back My Name" or "Creatures Of Love" and "Walk It Down" is questionable. The best tracks are "Road To Nowhere", "And She Was", "Stay Up Late" and "Television Man" with "The Lady Don't Mind" and "Perfect World" coming in second. The digital remastering is excellent and on the cd side the bonus tracks are actually interesting like the early version of "Road To Nowhere". The early version of "And She Was" is pretty much the same as the final product. The extended version of "Television Man" is just what it says and nothing special.



Unfortunately, this album doesn't lend itself to 5.1 surround. There's nothing instrumentally to fill in the void. It's much better in stereo on the cd side I think. The photos are okay and the videos for "And She Was" and "Road To Nowhere" are also okay. No lyrics are included and as with the other albums you get Jerry Harrison's take on remastering the album.



All in all, a good, but not great album."

Difficulties with DualDisc

Ross A. Seymour | La Crosse, WI United States | 03/01/2007

(1 out of 5 stars)

"The one star is for the technology, not the content or sound. Boy, did I have problems with this disc (as to a lesser extent I did with the other DualDiscs). Of the five CD players in my house, this disc worked on only one of them, a newer Sony multidisc player. It did not play correctly on either my computer cd-roms, including the usually reliable Plextor (only six months old). Only my work computer allowed me to play and rip the cd correctly. I then ripped the music to a new cd-r and it plays just fine everywhere. Keep trying. It shouldn't be this way, but it is. The quality of the remastering does make up for the frustration though."