Talking Heads, Remain In Light (1980)
As I originally owned this on cassette, I tend to listen to it as a 2-sided vinyl/cassette experience, with two distinct halves.
Side one is three longer tracks, an upbeat whirlwind of funk, world music, and dance pop. Of these, "Crosseyed and Painless" is the standout, great rhythms and building backup vocals and even a little rap from Byrne.
Side two kicks off with "Once in a Lifetime," almost certainly the single finest Heads track, sheer perfection that hasn't aged a day in nearly 40 years. But then the album shifts into a slower, scarier direction, seemingly dominated more by Eno's aesthetics than Byrne's. "Houses in Motion," at least in the chorus, harkens back to side one, with some sly midtempo funk, but the verses are spooky and somber, providing a launch into the run of weirdness that closes out the album -- "Seen and Not Seen," with its spoken-word tale of deliberately altering one's facial features layered on top of burbling electronics and haunting atmospherics; the moody, midnight-drenched "Listening Wind," and finally the plodding, almost frightening "The Overload," perhaps the song most in debt to Eno's ambient music explorations (and the final word from Eno with the band, as this was his third and final production appearance with the Heads).
Throughout, the album is a complex, layered sonic marvel, equally compelling in a dark room with a pair of headphones or at high volumes through kick-ass speakers.
Here's the legendary "Once In A Lifetime" video:
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