Hear Talking Heads’ isolated vocals for ‘Life During Wartime’
Talking Heads’ album, Fear Of Music, was the new-wave pioneers’ third record and proved there was no other group like them in their world. ‘Life During Wartime’ was a stand-out track from the release, and it sounds even more impressive when the vocals are isolated.
Although Talking Heads continued for several years following the release of ‘Life During Wartime’, the cracks were already starting to form due to David Byrne’s controlling approach to creativity. He controversially chose to take the sole credit for the track; however, this was later amended after the decision angered his bandmates.
In 1979, the world was in a period of flux. Reaganomics meant the world was on the brink of permanent change, which worried Byrne and fuelled his writing process for ‘Life During Wartime’. The singer’s comments about the track to NME make him look like an oracle, and tragically, they are more relevant now than ever.
Byrne said: “There will be chronic food shortages and gas shortages and people will live in hovels. Paradoxically, they’ll be surrounded by computers the size of wrist watches. Calculators will be cheap. It’ll be as easy to hook up your computer with a central television bank as it is to get the week’s groceries.”
He added: “I think we’ll be cushioned by amazing technological development and sitting on Salvation Army furniture. Everything else will be crumbling. Government surveillance becomes inevitable because there’s this dilemma when you have an increase in information storage. A lot of it is for your convenience – but as more information gets on file it’s bound to be misused.”
As the years have gone on, the world is edging closer to the one Byrne predicted all those decades ago. Although he might have been laughed at in some quarters in 1979 for his statement, Byrne has been proven to be correct as his dystopian prediction comes to life.
The eerieness of ‘Life During Wartime’ is even more prominent when you listen to the isolated vocals from the track, which frees the listener from any distractions away from Byrne’s word of warning. If I didn’t know better, and this was my first time hearing the Talking Heads classic, I’d assume it was written in 2022.
