David Byrne’s one regret about ‘American Utopia’
David Byrne is a creative genius in every sense of the word. Watching the creative wizardry unfold throughout the Stop Making Sense tour documentary, as the set in slowed added to, and a swathe of ultra-talented musicians joined him on stage to play several Talking Heads classics, showcasing his stance on ultimate artistry.
Equally impressive is the recent American Utopia film, directed by Spike Lee, which captured a live Broadway performance supporting his album of the same name. However, Byrne himself feels a deep regret about the album itself. As several members of the public pointed out, female collaborators were startlingly absent from the record.
In 2018, Byrne took to social media to write, “I recently posted a piece and a playlist about the various folks who collaborated on my new album. There have been some responses, and some of them have out the lack of women among this group. I’d like to thank those of you who wrote to call attention to this – this matters a lot to me.”
Referring to the image in the original post, Byrne added, “The image in the post clearly reveals this problem in a way that mere words do not. This lack of representation is something that is problematic and widespread in our industry. I regret not hiring and collaborating with women for this album – it’s ridiculous.”
Byrne admitted that he felt that he certainly never intentionally excluded women from collaborating with him in the past. He said, “It’s not who I am, and it certainly doesn’t match how I’ve worked in the past. It doesn’t represent my current live show, which has a slew of diverse creators and collaborators, making this even more negligent on my part.”
American Utopia was Byrne’s first proper solo album since Grown Backwards was released in 2004. The album is part of the wider multimedia project entitled Reasons to Be Cheerful, which is Byrne’s attempt to spread positivity in an ever-increasingly cynical world. However, by not collaborating with women on the album, Byrne seemingly missed the mark by a long stretch.
“I am happy that we live in a time that this conversation is happening,” Byrne concluded, noting the recent calling out of the lack of representation of women in the entertainment industry. “It’s hard to realise that no matter how much effort you spend nudging the world in what you hope is the right direction, sometimes you are part of the problem,” he added. “I never thought of myself as being ‘one of those guys’, but I guess, to some extent, I am. Your responses serve as a corrective. Thank you.”
