More Songs About Buildings and Food

More Songs About Buildings and Food

More Songs About Buildings and Food is the second studio album by the American rock band Talking Heads, released on July 14, 1978, by Sire Records. It was the first of three albums produced by collaborator Brian Eno, and saw the band move toward an increasingly danceable style, crossing singer David Byrne's unusual delivery with new emphasis on the rhythm section composed of bassist Tina Weymouth and her husband, drummer Chris Frantz.

More Songs established Talking Heads as a critical success, reaching No. 29 on the U.S. Billboard magazine's Pop Albums chart and No. 21 on the UK Albums Chart. The album featured the band's first top 30 single, a cover version of Al Green's 1974 song "Take Me to the River".

Artwork and title

More Songs About Buildings and Food

The front cover of the album, conceived by Byrne and executed by artist Jimmy De Sana, is a photographic mosaic of the band comprising 529 close-up Polaroid photographs. The album's rear cover shows "Portrait U.S.A.", the first satellite color analog photomosaic of the United States from space, created by NASA and General Electric (GE) for National Geographic, published in July 1976. In his 2020 memoir, Remain in Love, Frantz recalled that Byrne and Weymouth took the Polaroid photographs for the front cover on the roof of the loft building in Long Island City that Frantz and Weymouth lived in. Frantz wrote that he "later realized [the cover art] was 'heavily influenced' by Andrea Kovacs' work. We should have given her credit for that."

Of the album title, Weymouth told Creem in a 1979 interview:

When we were making this album I remembered this stupid discussion we had about titles for the last album. At that time I said, 'What are we gonna call an album that's just about buildings and food?' And Chris said, 'You call it more songs about buildings and food.'

English musician Andy Partridge of XTC later claimed, however, that he gave the title to Byrne.

Release

More Songs About Buildings and Food

More Songs About Buildings and Food was released on July 14, 1978. It peaked at number 29 on the Billboard magazine's Pop Albums chart. The album's sole single, a cover of the Al Green hit "Take Me to the River", peaked at No. 26 on the pop singles chart in 1979. The single pushed the album to gold record status.

Warner Music Group re-released and remastered the album in 2005, on its Warner Bros., Sire and Rhino Records labels in DualDisc format, with four bonus tracks on the CD side—"Stay Hungry" (1977 version), alternate versions of "I'm Not in Love" and "The Big Country", and the 'Country Angel' version of "Thank You for Sending Me an Angel". The DVD-Audio side includes both stereo and 5.1 surround high resolution (96 kHz/24bit) mixes, as well as a Dolby Digital version and videos of the band performing "Found a Job" and "Warning Sign". In Europe, it was released as a CD+DVDA two-disc set rather than a single DualDisc. The reissue was produced by Andy Zax with Talking Heads. On July 25, 2025, a 3CD deluxe edition was released.

Critical reception

More Songs About Buildings and Food

Writing for Christgau's Record Guide: Rock Albums of the Seventies (1981), critic Robert Christgau said "Here the Heads become a quintet in an ideal producer-artist collaboration—Eno contributes/interferes just enough... Every one of these eleven songs is a positive pleasure, and on every one the tension between Byrne's compulsive flights and the sinuous rock bottom of the music is the focus".

More Songs About Buildings and Food was ranked at number four among the top "Albums of the Year" for 1978 by NME, with "Take Me to the River" ranked at number 16 among the year's top tracks. In 2003, the album was ranked number 382 on Rolling Stone's list of the 500 greatest albums of all time, 383 in 2012, and 364 in 2020. It was ranked number 57 on Rolling Stone's list of the greatest albums of 1967–1987.

It was ranked the 45th best album of the 1970s by Pitchfork in 2006. Reviewing the album for Pitchfork, Nick Sylvester said: "More Songs About Buildings and Food transformed the Talking Heads from a quirky CBGB spectacle to a quirky near-unanimously regarded 'it' band."

Track listing

More Songs About Buildings and Food

() Mixed at Mediasound Studios by Brian Eno and Ed Stasium

Personnel

More Songs About Buildings and Food

Harrison and Byrne (right) with Talking Heads at Jay's Longhorn Bar in Minneapolis, Minnesota, August 1978

• David Byrne – lead vocals, guitars, synthesized percussion • Chris Frantz – drums, percussion • Jerry Harrison – piano, organ, synthesizer, guitar, backing vocals • Tina Weymouth – bass guitar

• Brian Eno – synthesizers, piano, guitar, percussion, backing vocals • "Tina and the Typing Pool" (Tina Weymouth plus women who worked in the studio offices) – backing vocals on "The Good Thing"

• Benji Armbrister – assistant engineer • Rhett Davies – engineer, mixing • Joe Gastwirt – mastering • Ed Stasium – mixing on "Found a Job"

Charts

Weekly charts

Chart (1978–79)	Peak position
Australian Albums (Kent Music Report)	46
Canada Top Albums/CDs (RPM)	42
New Zealand Albums (RMNZ)	4
UK Albums (OCC)	21
US Billboard 200	29

Chart (2025)	Peak position
Hungarian Physical Albums (MAHASZ)	9

Year-end charts

Chart (1979)	Position
New Zealand Albums (RMNZ)	17
US Billboard 200 (RMNZ)	49

Chart (2025)	Peak position
Scottish Albums (OCC)	40
UK Albums Sales (OCC)	39

Certifications and sales

More Songs About Buildings and Food

Region	Certification	Certified units/sales
New Zealand (RMNZ)	Gold	7,500^
United Kingdom (BPI) 2006 release	Gold	100,000^
United States (RIAA)	Gold	500,000^
^ Shipments figures based on certification alone.