DAVID BYRNE & BRIAN ENO > Everything That Happens Will Happen Today

David Byrne’s last album-length songwriting collaboration with Talking Heads’ producer Brian Eno, 1981’s My Life in the Bush of Ghosts, was a tour de force of pop experimentalism. But this new one, for which Eno provides instrumental tracks and his trademark electronic treatments while Byrne contributes lyrics and melodic shape, plays to the purest, happiest pop sensibilities in both men.Label: NONESUCH
[Label: 4 STARS]

David Byrne’s last album-length songwriting collaboration with Talking Heads’ producer Brian Eno, 1981’s My Life in the Bush of Ghosts, was a tour de force of pop experimentalism. But this new one, for which Eno provides instrumental tracks and his trademark electronic treatments while Byrne contributes lyrics and melodic shape, plays to the purest, happiest pop sensibilities in both men. For Byrne, that means writing songs that express wise, slightly existential joy and awe at the world (the title song, “The River,” “Home”) and singing them with outwardly evident emotion. For Eno, who has always loved early-1960s pop, that means cushioning Byrne with big, jubilant hooks, anthemic choruses and processed, angelic-sounding male back-up vocals. Plus, a little experimentalism here and there to keep things fresh.