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David Bowman

Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa: The Adventures of "Talking Heads" in the 20th Century Paperback – 19 Aug. 2002

by David Bowman (Author)

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Talking Heads have achieved the status of rock legends. With unforgettable hits including "Take Me to the River", "Burning Down the House" and "Psycho Killer", and a Hollywood film of their live performances, the band, formed in New York, 1970, have always been musical pioneers. Their ground-breaking fusion of different influences and styles - rock, funk, ska, reggae, country, Afro-Brazilian rhythms - combined with the relentlessly hip lead singer David Byrne has curiously afforded Talking Heads mainstream success. In "FA FA FA FA FA FA" David Bowman charts the early years, the worldwide success and eventual acrimonious break-up of the band. With unprecedented access to the original members the book is teaming with incident, rock personalities and fascinating musical insights capturing one of the most charismatic and individual groups of the twentieth century.

Print length

416 pages
Language

English
Publisher

Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
Publication date

19 Aug. 2002
Dimensions

13 x 2.7 x 19.9 cm
ISBN-10

0747558361
ISBN-13

978-0747558361
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Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Bloomsbury Publishing PLC (19 Aug. 2002)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 416 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0747558361
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0747558361
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 13 x 2.7 x 19.9 cm

Best Sellers Rank: 290,212 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- 1,540 in Popular Music
- 1,915 in Rock & Pop Musician Biographies
- 2,349 in Opera Singer Biographies

Customer reviews:
15 ratings

Product description

Review

'Hard for fans to resist' -- Daily Telegraph

'How often does a book fill you with the foot-stomping, hip-swaying urge to dance? Bowman's biograpy of Talking Heads will do the trick' -- Scotland on Sunday

'Near-definitive' -- Mojo

'There won't be anything near this good written about Talking Heads' -- Get Rhythm

'This book is a great gossipy read' -- Uncut

About the Author

David Bowman is a novelist and journalist. He is the author of LET THE DOG DRIVE and BUNNY MODERN. He was selected as one of Granta's Best Novelists under 40. He writes for the NEW YORK OBSERVER, SALON MAGAZINE, NEW YORK TIMES MAGAZINE and the NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW.

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Customer reviews

5 star		49%
4 star		24%
3 star		6%
2 star		14%
1 star		7%

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Top reviews from United Kingdom

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Echoroom

Very readable

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 24 May 2014

Verified Purchase

This is a scattergun but highly readable biography of TH. I am a causal rather than ardent Heads fan, but I really enjoyed this. It takes a number of odd detours, but generally is an entertaining and interesting tale. Not sure why the other reviews are quite so poor. It's probably more like 3 1/2 stars, but better than the reviews here suggest.

One person found this helpful

Helpful

Peter Uys

The complete history of Talking Heads

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 15 February 2003

Bowman's book maps the early years, the huge worldwide success and eventual breakup of this talented band Talking Heads. Book One deals with Byrne and Weymouth's early years (Byrne's first band was called Revelation) and how the band came together. They began as New Wave art rockers who understood soul music. This part also covers the scene at the famous New York clubs CBGB's and Max's Kansas City, including interactions with other famous musicians like Patti Smith and John Cale - for example an interesting account of a John Cale gig at Lower Manhattan's Ocean Club. Book Two includes the account of the recording of More Songs About Buildings And Food with Brian Eno at Compass Point Studios in the Bahamas, discussions of the albums Fear Of Music and Remain In Light, a quote from the respected rock critic Lester Bangs on the song The Big Country, the involvement of Adrian Belew with the band, Twyla Tharp as choreographer, Byrne and Eno's influential album My Life In The Bush Of Ghosts, Weymouth an Frantz's solo project Tom Tom Club and much more. Book Three deals with Little Creatures, True Stories and the conflict between Byrne and Weymouth that led to the demise of the band and concludes with a bibliography and notes, a discography, filmography and index. Black and white photographs enliven the text. Bowman's book is filled with incidents, rock personalities and musical insights and reads like a novel. Highly recommended to all who still enjoy the music of this unique band.

One person found this helpful

Helpful

lexo1941

Desperately disappointing

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 11 May 2004

Talking Heads need a proper biographer. I was once a crazed fan, and still own two previous efforts - David Gans' picture-heavy quickie job, which looked great but had been compiled from interviews, and Jerome Davis' later effort which at least involved some original research, but only took the story up to 1986 - by which time the band was already crumbling.
David Bowman has interviewed most of the participants, but he is not up to the job; for one thing, he's in thrall to a sort of Gertrude-Steinian idea that aggressive triviality is what this band was all about, and so much of his book consists of him paraphrasing the lyrics of the damn songs. Like we care. He is also far too fascinated by his own role in the biographical process. Tina Weymouth, who comes across as a woman with a fair few axes to grind, is an implacable antagonist to David Byrne almost from the off. Bowman knows he's doing this, yet he does it anyway. The strong impression is that he got bored with the subject almost as soon as he began work on the book, so the story of the band is coloured largely by his own impatience, depression and lack of interest; you'd think this band never had any fun, never liked each other's company, never kicked ass. He is also remarkably uninterested in anybody else's music; I for one would like to see somebody try to explain exactly what's going on in Talking Heads' remarkable and idiosyncratic failures to sound like a proper funk-rock band. But I suppose he thinks that that's beneath him.
Yes, many of the Heads' much-vaunted innovations weren't really innovative at all; Frank Zappa, for one, had had a multi-racial band that featured a female instrumentalist as early as 1974. What is important is that they wrote some great songs, did some stonking performances and inspired a lot of other people to greater heights. Bowman's disdain for the nitty-gritty of music is just the usual failing of the typical English music journalist writ large. Too damn large. Talking Heads need their Ben Watson, their Peter Guralnick. Can't anybody...?

4 people found this helpful

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Tapia Paez Jorge

the book was very used and with fungus. fasr ...

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 5 March 2015

Verified Purchase

the book was very used and with fungus.fasr delivery.when i termine to read the book .i will throw to the dustbin

One person found this helpful

Helpful

S. Loft

Fear of Music

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 15 March 2014

I bought this ten years ago and have just reread it. Strangely I don't remember having a strong opinion about it, but now find it really annoying. Inside the jacket it says "David Bowman is the biographer Talking Heads deserves." Whoever wrote that can't have a very high opinion of them! The result is that this is a biography of a band that I really love by someone who irritates me. It's more a history of New York art, dance, and stuff. Bowman has no real interest in who plays what or the evolution of songs. Instead he has this idea that Tina loves David, despite being married to Chris, and that that is all you need - all you need is love - to understand the band, its development and split. This book might have done well on the other side of the pond, but I would advise English readers to avoid it. Without looking for it I found this passage "David (Byrne) flew to England to produce a record by an obscure group called Fun Boy 3. Their music is not important...." He also slags off Duran Duran, calls them "silly". His problem with DD is that they are not arty enough. He couldn't use them as an excuse to explore the other stuff that is clearly his main interest. Here is something Jerry Harrison may have said "I found Latin Europe, particularly France, really different." (page 100). More US ignorance of Europe. Bowman's attempts to educate me about New York have fallen equally flat, and I don't think this is my fault.
And anyway, what sort of a name is David Bowman? Firstly, he sounds like a cross between Bowie and Starman, somehow emerging as another DB. Secondly, it does solve the mystery of 2001 A Space Odyssey which now seems to have a very disappointing ending! Nuff said.

3 people found this helpful

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