Foundation Course

Expanded edition of second album reveals how David Byrne & co. tightened their sound and made a record built to last.

- By Jason Draper

From its wry title through to its deceptively fuss-free deployment, Talking Heads' second album wears its achievements lightly. Road-tightened from more than a year's worth of heavy gigging – including a stint in the UK supporting fellow CBGB OGs Ramones in the late spring of 1977 – the group knocked More Songs About Buildings And Food out in a matter of weeks across March and April the following year, in unfamiliar surroundings and with a brand-new playmate, both of which would go on to aid the Heads as they developed into a new-wave funk juggernaut. At the time of the album's recording, however, Compass Point Studios, in the Bahamas, was an untested facility, rented out to the band by Island Records' Chris Blackwell at a reduced rate, although producer Brian Eno, fresh from rewriting the rock rulebook with Bowie on the Low and “Heroes” albums, had firmly established himself as the future-shapers' future-shaper.

It was while in the UK that Eno and Talking Heads entered each others' orbits, the British “non-musician” sensing shared objectives while catching one of the band's May 1977 headline shows, and the New York City four-piece noting a kindred spirit the following day, when, during a visit to Eno's flat, their new comrade played them Fela Kuti's Afrodisiac album. As bassist Tina Weymouth recalls in the liner notes to this super-deluxe edition reissue of More Songs About Buildings And Food, a shared taste in literature sealed the deal, and in March '78, band and producer decamped to Nassau for sessions that would see Talking Heads take a significant step towards realising their full potential.