David Byrne expands his sky with four songs
David Byrne is taking a thoughtful approach to the modern album, deciding that the artistic experience extends far beyond the initial release. One year after the success of Who Is the Sky? arrived on Matador, Byrne has just released a deluxe digital edition of his latest work, packed with bonus tracks and new material that invites listeners to explore the album’s layers further.
This expanded edition includes four bonus tracks, headlined by the newly released single “My Madness,” a buoyant piece of orchestral pop that sees the Talking Heads co-founder imagining a meeting—and eventual reconciliation—with his own notoriously unruly inner life.
The expanded edition also features extra material, including “T Shirt,” a song Byrne noted was added to the current tour set after being left off the original album, alongside a fresh take on “What Is the Reason for It,” which features co-writing and singing by Mexican Institute of Sound star Natalia Lafourcade.
In reflecting on this decision to expand the record, Byrne offers an expansive meditation on the nature of albums in the streaming era. He notes that while vinyl fans and crate diggers appreciate an album as a fixed object in a specific order, the digital age has flipped the script. “Albums can be super long, super short, and the songs can change over time,” he explains. “The only consistent thing might be that the songs were composed and recorded around a similar time, so they speak to that time and place, and have some sort of sonic continuity.”
Byrne feels that this approach provides a richer experience for modern listeners. He added the extra tracks not because they weren’t good, but to give the initial album a nice variety of grooves and subjects.
This latest release arrives amidst another intense year for Byrne, which has included an elaborate world tour and a companion concert film. He has also engaged in creative projects, turning Elon Musk’s words into lyrics for “Let Me Sell You a Dream,” his original song for Alex Gibney’s Musk documentary.
With the Who Is the Sky? trek wrapping up in New York on September 19, Byrne is now shifting his focus to his next major project: the book Sleeping Beauties: Why Good Ideas Go Dormant and How They Wake Up, which will arrive in North America on October 6. He will support the book with a New York event at Riverside Church and subsequent visits to major cities including Toronto, San Francisco, Los Angeles, and London.
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