Some bands break up and never reunite. And forty years later, the music of Talking Heads has only aged gracefully and wistfully and joyfully. Back in the late 1980s during his time as a music critic at The Baltimore Evening Sun, Nestor Aparicio had a chance to talk about music, David Byrne and the magic of Talking Heads with Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Jerry Harrison.
In a conversation from the late 1980s, Nestor Aparicio interviews Jerry Harrison of Talking Heads about his solo projects and the band’s current status. Jerry discusses upcoming performances, including a tour with Debbie Harry and the Tom Tom Club, where each group will have an hour to perform. He mentions his new single “Flying Under Radar” and plans to perform “Rev It Up,” “Man with a Gun,” and “Burning Down the House.” Jerry reflects on his role in Talking Heads, comparing it to Keith Richards’ in the Rolling Stones. He also talks about producing other bands and his preference for creating songs he’ve touched every element of. The conversation ends with Jerry expressing his desire for Talking Heads to continue making albums and touring, despite their current hiatus.
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
Talking Heads, solo projects, Tom Tom Club, Debbie Harry, tour schedule, setlist decisions, new album, Latin tour, audience combination, production teaching, songwriting, Keith Richards, Shrunken Heads, fan loyalty, music criticism
SPEAKERS
Nestor Aparicio, Jerry Harrison
Nestor Aparicio 00:00
Welcome home. We are wnst am 1570 Towson, Baltimore and Baltimore positive, presenting the music classic some of the almost famous chats I had as the one time music critic at the Baltimore Evening Sun back in the late 80s and early 90s, I spoke to so many Rock and Roll Hall of Famers, not knowing then there wasn’t even a Rock and Roll Hall of Fame then, but along the way, some of them have come along, and I have far greater appreciation for their music later on, and wish I had done a better job of interviewing them, but in many cases, these were 10 or 15 minute phone interviews that were designed to create a piece that I’m also sharing out of Baltimore positive from my days back in the Baltimore Sun. This is Jerry Harrison of the talking heads, and I such appreciation for the talking heads all these years later, I would do such a better job of chatting with Jerry Harrison if I chatted with him now, but this was in the midst of right when the talking heads were falling apart in the late 80s, and they were doing solo projects and the tom tom club and different things were happening. They were touring with Debbie Harry, who was also out, I believe, solo from Blondie at that point as well. So this is a little bit of a wide ranging conversation about his work, and David Burns work. And I apologize for my youthful ignorance, but this is a Rock and Roll Hall of Famer and I love, love, love the talking heads. Harry there speaking. Hey. This is Nestor from Baltimore. How are you? I’m fine. How are you, okay? Yes, of course. Good. Just wondering. You guys are geared up. When do you go out at this point?
Jerry Harrison 01:36
Actually, Christian and I have our first day on Sunday, Sunday. Where is this? It’s up in Lenox, Massachusetts, okay? And then we have another one with Debbie. Harry
Nestor Aparicio 01:48
was in New York. The whole New York thing start, or whatever,
Jerry Harrison 01:50
Baltimore, Washington’s a first place. Oh, my goodness, yeah. So how do you see this thing all piecing together? Well, I think it’s going to be a little bit chaotic to begin with for the road crew. But I think the spirit will be, this is four separate entities. It’s going to be, actually, Chris and team and I are joining forces and doing one performance between us. So I’ll be backing them up on the tom tom club, and they’ll be backing me up on my own tongues. And then we’re going to throw in a couple tongue
Nestor Aparicio 02:19
Yeah. I kind of wondered how the whole relationship with the tom tom Club was gonna hang out. What are you gonna do, though? Are you gonna do heads and head songs too? Yes, no, but
Jerry Harrison 02:29
we don’t have an hour. Every group is gonna have, each of the three gets an hour. So it’s
Nestor Aparicio 02:34
a is that an hour to break down and play, or just play play, and then
Jerry Harrison 02:38
they’ll be probably, you know, hopefully, like, a 20 minute, or half an hour change over another band. And so it’s going to but for Christ and teen and I, it’s been quite a challenge to figure out a set. I think there’s gonna be a minimum of talking squeeze in as many songs. We just have, you know, so many albums to choose from.
Nestor Aparicio 02:55
What kind of stuff have you decided now, or are you still, yeah, we’re pretty
Jerry Harrison 02:59
much decided. I mean, of course, I’m going to do rev it up, and I have the new single flying under radar, and I’m going to do man with a gun and, well, I could tell you every song. Do you want
Nestor Aparicio 03:12
that? Well, we’re talking heads on. I mean, I might not even write. I just want to know for my food,
Jerry Harrison 03:18
new life during wartime and burning down the house.
Nestor Aparicio 03:21
So where does the talking heads exist right now? As far as with David or without David, or
Jerry Harrison 03:27
they are in hibernation.
Nestor Aparicio 03:31
I saw David about four months ago or five months ago, when he came in with his Latin tour.
Jerry Harrison 03:36
It’s good stuff doing that.
Nestor Aparicio 03:38
He’s still he’s still out somewhere and going
Jerry Harrison 03:41
to Finland today. Oh, really, it was kind of over. And then he decided to do more, and I think he wants to do an album with that group of people, and that’s why we’re not doing a Talking Heads album
Nestor Aparicio 03:50
this year. So this won’t the talking heads won’t happen again until at least 92 ish or something like that.
Jerry Harrison 03:56
Well, one year at a time,
Nestor Aparicio 03:59
at least not for 9190 Okay, so you look forward to going back out on the road, or, yeah, I love
Jerry Harrison 04:05
8it. And, you know, I really excited about performing these new songs for my new album.
Nestor Aparicio 04:12
How did the whole caravan kind of thing happen with the three bands? Me, this is really a change, because people are going to get their money’s
Jerry Harrison 04:19
worth. Yes, that’s how we feel about really, what I think happened is Christine and I were sitting around with our manager. We had been writing songs for the next tom tom club. We thought it’d be nice to go on tour this summer. That summer is the most fun time to tour. And we said, well, you know, are there any maybe we are there any other bands out there that would be good to play with. And we looked around at the tours going out this summer, and there really was nothing that seemed like, you know, you sometimes you just, there are those packages words which seem like,
Nestor Aparicio 04:51
like going and petty
Jerry Harrison 04:53
when the talking hands, B 52 someone for the talking heads, you know, it was like one of those times that you got you I, at least, I. Felt this is, you know, people are kind of getting more for their money than even if they went to see each man separately. You know, it’s like, somehow, it’s like, one of those packages at work, you know, the bands like each other. I think that’s the first thing when you see things like that, that work. And this was just so our manager manages Debbie and manages the Ramones. So finally, there’s just nothing out there to do it. Let’s try and do it ourselves. So we got in touch with everybody else. And so what do you think? So, you
Nestor Aparicio 05:31
know, you know Debbie well, and you know, oh, you know the Ramones, because you open for them at one point, did
Jerry Harrison 05:35
you Yeah, we all know each other. It’s very full. I’m sorry my son had to come up. I
Nestor Aparicio 05:41
have a son that does the same thing, so he’ll just come up and I’ll be on the phone with like Billy Joel, Hey, Dad, how you doing? You know, so you guys do know each other and are quite friendly and stuff like that. Is there any chance you guys would be jamming with each other, getting crazy or anything
Jerry Harrison 05:56
like that? You know, I doubt it certainly when we play in Washington, because that’s the first trial run. Well, it’s not trial, but it’s the first show. That’s the kind of thing that develops on a tour. You know, it’s not the kind of thing that necessarily you plan in advance.
Nestor Aparicio 06:12
Okay. Well, as far as your solo stuff goes, you get only going to do like, three or four songs, five. Okay. I mean, is it the kind of thing where people come because you guys were talking heads. I mean, do you kind of see yourself still as being a talking head? And
Jerry Harrison 06:25
are you telling me? I don’t know. I know that when I did the casual Gods tour, that there was an element of a core audience that came that was talking heads fans, and there were a lot of people that had what like is that it, can you just hang on one second. I’m just doing a phone interview, and then I’ll be I’ll be done in the night. The road crew just arrived, something they did. I think the audience, there’s a lot of people also that were lucky, loved the song wrap it up that they were hearing on the radio, right? They just wanted to come see us. So I think it’s kind of a combination. I mean, there’s also some old, Modern Lovers, fans. Every once in
Nestor Aparicio 06:59
a while, I just think it’s I saw David, then I saw somebody waited for the absolute quietest moment of the night in this beautiful theater, and they just kind of killed the atmosphere when people do that kind of stuff. But the burden of success is the production angle in your future, as far as a, you know, later on. I mean, are you looking more towards that? Are you looking more towards doing more Jerry Harrison albums? I’m sorry, did you say more product production? Yeah, because you
Jerry Harrison 07:30
I like doing both, and I want to do as much of both as I can. But I’m, I would like to keep and really enjoy making the casual dance records. And I’m going to, you know, do another one as soon as I can, did
Nestor Aparicio 07:41
you get invited to do the newest boating album at home album? Or, No,
Jerry Harrison 07:46
I always teach every band that I work with to produce themselves. The next time it’s like, either I make it seem so un mysterious to them that they feel they can do it or something, or I teach them enough because the families basically produce themselves. Album after I did the Fine Young Cannibals went on, in many ways, producing themselves, and the bodines did too
Nestor Aparicio 08:05
well. Just seems like a lot of times record companies don’t want fans to do that.
Jerry Harrison 08:09
No, it must be my magic. It was working with you, with great Jerry, but now we think we can do it ourselves.
Nestor Aparicio 08:16
Yeah, exactly. We need to pay you. We don’t need to pay you for it anymore. So what is your sweetest success? I mean, what do you like doing the best? We have to have a preference.
Jerry Harrison 08:25
You know, I think that to have a song that you sang and wrote and did everything on because you were touched every element of it is perhaps the greatest. So we’re talking rev it up, yeah. But I mean, you know, I love being in talking heads. I always saw my role in talking heads as the kind of the Keith Richards role, which I’ve always thought was the coolest role in rock and roll, you know, to be kind of the musician there, but not like stuck with doing all the singing
Nestor Aparicio 08:53
without being strung out too. You
Jerry Harrison 08:55
know, I don’t know. I just, you know, I always, this is just my feeling about rock and roll. But I always found that people that I was, for instance, Keith Richards, much more attractive than it might be. You’re gonna go look for that top to that thing, great, okay, and then you’re gonna come back up. Great. I always find that, you know, I mean, if I had a choice between being Keith Richards and Mick Jagger that chose Keith Richards any Denny. So I was very content, you might say, in the role I had in talking hands. But when we decided to take these breaks, there was a lot of stuff I’d started to write that I could have seen how it would have, could have been a talking head song. But since we were not going to do that, do
Nestor Aparicio 09:37
you hold on to stuff like that? Say that I’m putting this off for the next time we get together.
Jerry Harrison 09:42
Generally, nowadays, when talking heads get together to do an album, we just do the album, we write it and we do it. So it’s not so much that people have like, because it’s like, well, what do you have sitting around for the talking hands? There’s never been that question. I mean, I think that’d be an interesting way to do an album. I would actually like to do. Okay, everyone write four songs and we’ll see you in six months. You
Nestor Aparicio 10:02
know, right? Then it might be real hodgepodge. You know. What about the shrunken heads? Or I heard something about this? Well, set me straight.
Jerry Harrison 10:12
That’s what, when we performed with for the Roy Orbison benefit for the homeless, Christina and I decided to call ourselves shrunken heads, because it’s basically just the three of us. But when we went out on this tour, we decided to retain the calling and Tom Tom club and Jerry, are
Nestor Aparicio 10:28
we going to be a shrunken heads album? Or No? Will be a tom tom club album? That kind of
Jerry Harrison 10:33
thing remains to be seen all. The other thing is that obviously Kristen Tina and I have decided that since talking heads are not doing an album this year, that we’re going to start doing some to start doing some work together, because it was kind of a feeling of everyone kind of working separately when we every two years, we came back to do an album, and so that was kind of like, okay, everyone do what they’re going to do now, we’ll come back together. But since that’s that sort of cycle has been broken.
Nestor Aparicio 10:57
Now you don’t get angry at David when he goes off and does this stuff, or I don’t ever
Jerry Harrison 11:00
get angry about people doing something that’s important to them. I think the talking heads should do an album this year and should do a tour. I think that we have loyal fans who supported us for over 10 years and want that, and they enjoy the solo work that David does or that I do, but there’s something special and we work together, and so I’m not happy that we’re denying our fans something that they want. To me, there was room for both.
Nestor Aparicio 11:25
So you expressed all this to David, and he was not biting man, right? Who was his logic behind not doing it, just that he wanted to go out with these people he had together. Yeah. Okay, well, I just want to get too deep into your own personal things, but I think your fans will say, Oh, you know, what are these people doing here? Okay, well, I appreciate your 10 to 15 minutes here this morning and go help. If enough, I hope, Oh, absolutely, yeah, I’m leading my notes column with you, and you guys are coming in on Thursday, and everything’s super cool. So how do you like the walk on water? I listened to it one time because I’m a music critic, and I get you won’t believe I was a music critic four years ago, and I stopped doing it. And the music I get now I get, I bet, eight times the amount of the volume of music I get, not to beg off I listen to it and I said, it sounds like the first I thought, I thought it had a lot of similarities. And I still think that you sound a lot like the talking heads without David’s voice for some reason, really, I just, and now David’s solo stuff doesn’t sound anything like the talking heads. But, you know, I just, I the vibe I get. I mean, I thought, rev it up when I heard it. I thought, that’s a talking head song, and, and when I heard the latest thing we have on this one, I said, it sounds like a talking head song. But I don’t know that’s that’s me listening, and that’s not me listening, you know, every day, all day long, or getting used to it, but you would just be amazed at the amount of albums like it. My my CD collection has has jumped 250 in the last three months. So my friends like it. Thanks, Derek, see you.
