My Life in the Bush of Ghosts (album)
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| My Life in the Bush of Ghosts | ||
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| Studio album by Brian Eno & David Byrne | ||
| Released | February 1981 | |
| Recorded | August 4, 1979 — October 1980 | |
| Genre | Art Rock | |
| Length | 39:40 | |
| Label | Sire Records | |
| Producer(s) | Brian Eno & David Byrne | |
| Professional reviews | ||
|---|---|---|
| Brian Eno chronology | ||
| Ambient #3: Day of Radiance (1980) |
My Life in the Bush of Ghosts (1981) |
Ambient #4: On Land (1982) |
| David Byrne chronology | ||
| Remain in Light (1980) |
My Life in the Bush of Ghosts (1981) |
The Catherine Wheel (1981) |
| Slip cover of 2006 reissue | ||
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My Life in the Bush of Ghosts is a 1981 album by Brian Eno and David Byrne, titled after Amos Tutuola's 1954 novel of the same name. The album was re-released in expanded form in 2006.
The album was one of the first non-rap releases to make extensive use of sampling, especially in seamlessly incorporating human voices: most of the vocals on the albums come from other sources, such as commercial recordings of Arabic singers, radio disk jockeys and an exorcist. Critic John Bush describes My Life in the Bush of Ghosts as "[a] pioneering work for countless styles connected to electronics, ambience, and Third World music."[1]
Most of the album's songs draw heavily on funk and mostly feature multilayered percussion reminiscent of various world musics. The result is often reminiscent of Talking Heads albums from this era, such as Fear of Music (1979) and Remain in Light (1980). In fact, My Life was recorded mostly between touring for Fear of Music and the recording of Remain in Light.
The "found objects" credited to Eno and Byrne were common objects used mostly as percussion. In the notes for the expanded edition of the album, Byrne writes that they would often use a normal drum kit, but with a cardboard box replacing the bass drum, or a frying pan replacing the snare drum; this would blend the familiar drum sound with unusual percussive noises.
My Life In The Bush of Ghosts was recorded entirely with analogue technology, before the advent of digital sequencing and MIDI. The sampled voices were synchronized with the instrumental tracks via trial and error, a practice that was often frustrating, but which also produced several happy accidents.
Also according to Byrne's 2006 notes, neither he nor Eno had read Tutuola's novel before the album was recorded. Both were familiar with Tutuola's earlier The Palm-Wine Drinkard (1952), but his My Life in the Bush of Ghosts was not easily obtained in the U.S. in the late-1970s/early-1980s. Even without reading the book, Eno and Byrne thought the title reflected their interest in African music, and also had an evocative, vaguely sinister quality that also referenced the voices sampled for the album: the vocalists were recorded sometimes several decades before being re-appropriated by Eno and Byrne, and the voices often seemed to take on unanticipated qualities when placed in the new context.
Contents |
[edit] Original track listing
- "America Is Waiting"
- "Mea Culpa"
- "Regiment"
- "Help Me Somebody"
- "The Jezebel Spirit"
- "Qu'ran"
- "Moonlight In Glory"
- "The Carrier"
- "A Secret Life"
- "Come With Us"
- "Mountain of Needles"
The track "Qu'ran", which features samples of Qur'anic recital, was replaced by "Very, Very Hungry" in some later releases. On some early editions of the record, "Very, Very Hungry" was included along with "Qu'ran" as a non-cassette and non-LP CD only release.
[edit] Voices (by track)
- "Unidentified indignant radio host, San Francisco, April 1980"
- "Inflamed caller and smooth politician replying, both unidentified, Radio call-in show, New York July 1979"
- "Dunya Yusin, Lebanese mountain singer, (from The Human Voice in the World of Islam, Tangent Records TG131)"
- "Reverend Paul Morton, broadcast sermon, New Orleans, June 1980"
- "Unidentifed exorcist, New York, September 1980"
- "Algerian Muslims chanting Qu'ran (Same source as 3)"
- "The Moving Star Singers, Sea Islands, Georgia (FS3841)"
- "Dunya Yusin (see 3)"
- "Samira Tewfik, Egyptian popular singer, (From Les Plus Grandes Artistes du Monde Arabe, EMI Records)"
- "Unidentified radio evangelist, San Francisco, April 1980"
[edit] 25th anniversary re-release
The album was reissued on 27 March 2006 in the UK and 11 April 2006 in the US, remastered and with seven extra tracks. To mark the reissue, two songs will be made available to download online, consisting of the entire multitracks. Under the Creative Commons License, members of the public are able to download the multitracks, and use them for their own remixes.
The track "Qu'ran" was excluded from this release without comment. However, in an interview for Pitchfork Media about the 2006 reissue, Byrne said:
- "Way back when the record first came out, in 1981, it might have been '82, we got a request from an Islamic organization in London, and they said, 'We consider this blasphemy that you put grooves to the chanting of the Holy Book.' And we thought, 'Okay, in deference to somebody's religion, we'll take it off.' You could probably argue for and against monkeying with something like that. But I think we were certainly feeling very cautious about this whole thing. We made a big effort to try and clear all the voices, and make sure everybody was okay with everything. Because we thought, 'We're going to get accused of all kinds of things, and so we want to cover our asses as best we can.' So I think in that sense we reacted maybe with more caution than we had to. But that's the way it was."[2]
[edit] Extra tracks on 2006 re-release
- "Pitch To Voltage"
- "Two Against Three"
- "Vocal Outtakes"
- "New Feet"
- "Defiant"
- "Number 8 Mix"
- "Solo Guitar With Tin Foil"
[edit] Personnel
- David Byrne and Brian Eno - guitars, bass, synthesizer, drums, percussion, found objects
- John Cocksey - drums
- Chris Frantz - drums
- Dennis Keeley - bodhran
- Mingo Lewis - bata sticks
- Prairie Prince - can, bass drum
- Jose Rossy - congas, agong-gong
- Steve Scales - congas, metals
- David Van Tieghem - drums, percussion
- Busta Jones - bass
- Bill Laswell - bass
- Tim Wright - click bass
[edit] References
- ^ Bush, John. My Life in the Bush of Ghosts. Allmusic.
- ^ Dahlen, Chris (2006-07-17). Interview: David Byrne. Pitchfork Media.
