Grown Backwards
Even before he departed his vaunted Talking Heads in the late \'80s, David Byrne had already embarked upon a solo career that encompassed various stage projects (*The Catherine Wheel*, *The Knee Plays*, *The Forest*) and film soundtracks (*True Stories*, *Last Emperor*) . But this 2004 release finds Byrne bristling with a sense of ambitious eclecticism rare even by his own elevated standards, a sensibility that carries Byrne deeper into the classical realm than he\'s ever been. Austin, Texas\' chamber outfit the Tosca Strings inform the melancholy, post-modernist opener \"Glass, Concrete & Stone,\" the limber \'n\' loopy rap fusion \"Tiny Apocalypse,\" and \"Un Di Felice, Eterea,\" aria adaptations from Verdi\'s *La Traviata*. That operatic fixation surfaces early on in a lovely, if unlikely duet with Rufus Wainwright on \"Au Fond du Temple Saint,\" adapted from Bizet\'s *The Pearl Fishers*.
Though rock has been pronounced dead countless times, it's still a reasonably young artform. Virgin\n\ territory is still ...
David Byrne, like fellow New York transplant David Bowie, has reached a well-deserved apex in his career.