Director Jonathan Demme’s Stop Making Sense (1984) is often called the best concert film ever made. The band Talking Heads was, at that moment in time, taking rock ‘n’ roll into uncharted polyrhythmic territories – combined with frontman David Byrne’s sense of theatricality and unrestrained quirkiness, and augmented by four guest musicians, there was nothing on the road in the same league.
Stop Making Sense captured a moment in time. And more than 40 years later, with the band itself only a memory (they went their separate ways in 1991) it remains a glorious testament to creativity and successful experimentation. It’s also loads of fun.
Jerry Harrison, Talking Heads’ keyboard and guitar player, will be at Clearwater’s Capitol Theatre Jan. 21 to screen the recent 4K restoration (from A4) of Stop Making Sense (tickets at this link).
Along with Byrne, bassist Tina Weymouth and drummer Chris Frantz, Harrison owns the film – the ex-members of Talking Heads paid for the restoration themselves and briefly re-united (without performing, which they’ve only done once since the breakup) at media events and on national television.
Harrison will introduce the film, talk about it, and then take questions from the audience.
The Catalyst got to him first.
St. Pete Catalyst: Stop Making Sense is a different kind of concert film. Putting aside the music for a moment, how involved was the band in the actual filmmaking and editing?
Jerry Harrison: I’d start with the fact that the show was exactly the way it looks. That was what we did every night. We didn’t change anything for the film. And Jonathan recognized that there was a sort of narrative, of building the stage and the musicians coming on one by one, that gave it this sort of storyline that didn’t require anything else. And of course he chose Jordan Cronenweth, this fantastic director of photography, so it’s beautifully shot. And a lot of close ups.
He tells this story of a lot of interactions between people on the stage, you might say almost like musical conversations, dancing and things like that.
So the raw material was all the same. The shooting of the film was all up to Jonathan and Jordan.
But were you in the editing room, saying to Jonathan “Use this shot instead,” or “Make me look cool”?
David and I were in L.A. for most of the post-production. We shot it in December of ’83. We went down to Australia and New Zealand in January of ’84 – the last shows we ever played there – and then we came back. We’d comment on things, but we more or less left them alone.
Lisa Day was using this editing machine that Hal Ashby had invented, using these linked-together Betamax video recorders. Which allowed her to look at all the shots roughly simultaneously. You couldn’t edit that much film at the same time. She did kind of a rough edit using the videos – doing most of the shot selection.
We would say “I remember during this song, something interesting happened – let’s see if we have a camera on it.” So we used our knowledge of the show to help inform the editing process, but we weren’t there with her like 24/7, watching each edit. I don’t think Jonathan was either.
Why are you traveling around with the film, and talking about it in different cities?
When we got back together for the re-release with A4, I went out with all four of us, and I found I was the only one who could really talk about the restoration or a lot of the technical things with the film. I was like “Christ, I can do this on my own,” and people seem to really enjoy it.
I have to say that when the questions are really intelligent and good questions, it’s really fun. And when they’re really obvious and I’ve heard ‘em a thousand times – like when they focus on “When are you getting back together again?” it’s like, OK, how many times do I have to answer this?
When Talking Heads is written about historically, many times you’re described as an “art school band” because David, Tina and Chris came from the Rhode Island School of Design. To me, that’s almost dismissive of who you were and what you were doing. You’re musicians: “Art school band” sounds like “A bunch of my nerdy friends and I started playing music in the coffee shop.” Did that ever dog at you?
Well, the Rolling Stones … wasn’t Keith in art school? [Laughing] I think Clapton was, and a lot of those people – “I don’t want to go to regular college, so …” Y’know, I think it gives people a sense that we looked at music with a certain philosophy that came from the digital arts. You just look at music a little bit differently. And I think that’s OK.
You know, that’s our starting point. Obviously it became so many more things, but our album covers looked great, we made interesting videos, this film looks great, so I think it’s not at all a disservice to us to talk about that influence.
But you became a great dance band.
Yes, that’s absolutely right. And the other thing, for one reason or another – and I think this movie in particular – people always come away from it smiling and happy. And I found this from touring with Adrian Belew and doing the songs from Remain in Light and stuff, these songs, this time period … when people reflect, they just come out smiling and happy. Part of it is that they start dancing, and lose themselves in the dancing a little bit.
David worked on his own choreography, but all the other people onstage were dancing; the music was just too much fun, and so exciting that you wanted to dance. I think it inspires the audience to dance, because everyone’s sort of dancing in their own way. It’s not like a Madonna show, or a Janet Jackson show or whatever, where it’s heavily choreographed. It’s just people inspired by the music, at that moment, and dancing along.
Do you remember specifically when the shift started – when David started to become THE GUY? A lot of bands go through this with the frontman, but could you see it coming?
I think the biggest shift happened when he directed the movie True Stories. And then he was put on the cover of Time magazine. Suddenly, he had his own office, and so therefore he had all these people that never said no.
And in a band, it’s sort of like your brothers and sisters, one of you will always say no. He may hate it, but they have that right. I always said that being in a band is like being in a secret society – someone can blackball an idea. And it’s frustrating for people who have ideas that are being squelched.
Anyway, I think that was the most important thing. I do think that when (Brian) Eno and David went off and made My Life in the Bush of Ghosts, that started to create a little private club, outside the band, so to speak.
That wasn’t enough for us to say that we were breaking up, or anything like that. It was like, you could see a process taking place.
OK, the inevitable question: What’s your relationship now?
I would say that everyone recognized that when we made Stop Making Sense, we did get along. There were certain frictions but we still got along. We were still a band.
And we’re really proud of it, all of us. And so we all embraced that.
I think that David has been more honest about how he was a little bit pushy about some things. Things like that. That he could’ve been a bit more diplomatic. But I think there’s still friction between Chris and Tina, and David.
You know, I had dealt with the Modern Lovers breaking up, which was really difficult for me. So when I joined the Talking Heads (I knew) bands have a lifetime; it’s not forever. And so, be ready when it will eventually, inevitably start to pull apart.
Even though I might have thought that something was basically stupid, or that amazing opportunities were missed, it’s like “It’s going to happen, so be ready for it. And don’t get yourself too worked up about it.”
Because there’s not much you can do about it. It’s what happens with bands. The lead singer’s going to get more attention, and the songwriter is going to get more money.
Would there be any point to Talking Heads playing together again?
Personally, I think that us playing at The Sphere (in Las Vegas) would be very, very relevant and great. Because I think that we’re a visual band, and nobody would expect us to try and duplicate Stop Making Sense, or anything like that.
It would be “What are they going to do there?” so it would be really exciting to see. As well as it would be a little bit easier version of touring!