Chords for How the Talking Heads wrote "Once in a Lifetime"
Tempo:
111.45 bpm
Chords used:
Ab
A
D
E
Gb
Tuning:Standard Tuning (EADGBE)Capo:+0fret
Start Jamming...
This video is sponsored by Skillshare.
The first 500 people to go to skl.sh slash polyphonic12
will get two months of Skillshare for free.
In a lot of ways, the Talking Heads were an
unexpected success.
A group of [D] art students pulling punk ideas together with funk and world music
[E] doesn't exactly sound like the pitch [C] for a rock and roll hall of fame inductee,
but somehow it worked.
Their ability to mix general weirdness with [D] relevant social commentary was
unparalleled.
And despite how [E] strange their music was at times, they were able to create
pop hooks that [A] turned into earworms and stuck in [Em] listeners' heads for days on end.
[D] And I think
there's one song that best pulls all of this together.
Once in a Lifetime.
[E] Let's take a closer
look.
[Am]
[Fm] [D] [B] When the Talking Heads set out to create [Gb] their fourth studio album, Remain in Light,
they were looking to [Ab] change the way they made songs.
Instead of just having David Byrne write
everything, the band wanted a more democratic process.
And so they tried something they never
[B] had before.
Inspired by Afrobeat legend Fela Kuti, the instrumentalists in the band recorded a number
of jams.
These jams used iZimbra from their 1979 album Fear of Music as a starting [Fm] point.
[Eb] [F] [Ab]
[Eb] [F] [Ab]
With that funky foundation, they came up [B] with a number of concepts and pieces.
One of these songs, working titled Right Start, would become the groundwork for Once in a [D] Lifetime.
While the song is quite different from the final piece, you can hear Tina Weymouth's bass line in
Clear As Day.
And while Weymouth plays the bass line, it may have actually been written by her
husband, the drummer Tris France.
Weymouth recalled to NPR that during one of these jams, France was
yelling something at her across the room, something that she thought was this bass line.
When she played it, he said, that's more like it, and the lick [Ab] stuck.
The talking heads took [E] that
lick and extrapolated it, slowly building a piece around it.
After weeks of jamming, David Byrne and
producer Brian Eno came into the studio to start adding arrangements and lyrics to the musical
pieces.
However, when Eno approached the piece, he started counting it differently than the band.
The instrumentalists thought the one of the bar fell at the start of the phrase,
whereas Eno counted the one as the gap before the phrase began.
This created a kind of dissonance
and syncopation with his phrasing, and Eno leaned into this.
This [Gb] misheard counting became a key
[Gm] part of the song.
It makes the [B] music feel off-kilter and strange.
[A] But [Ab] the same thing that gives the song its [Ab] musical strength makes it [G] difficult to write to.
Eno nearly scrapped the track entirely, but Byrne insisted that he could find lyrics that would work.
This [Ab] determination eventually led to a [A] breakthrough for Eno,
where he wrote a call-and-response chorus melody.
[D]
The group thought it [Ab] sounded like a preacher speaking to his congregation,
and so [Gb] David Byrne channeled that in his lyrics.
He sat down and listened to televangelist sermons,
[N] pulling phrases from them and crafting them into lyrics.
The fact that one day you'll draw your last breath, your heart will beat its last time,
there'll be [Gb] no more life left in your body, where is your soul going?
But it wasn't just the words that these preachers were saying that Byrne was channeling,
it was their performance.
His vocals [Am] feature long [G] stretches of dramatic phrases with
[Gb] deep breaths and pauses for effect.
And you may ask yourself, how do I work this?
And you [N] may ask yourself,
where is that large automobile?
And you may tell yourself, this is not my beautiful house.
And you may tell yourself, [D] this is not my beautiful wife.
Put together, the song creates a trance-like state,
capturing the manic monotony of middle-class existence.
Same as it ever was, same as it ever was, same as it ever was, same as it ever was.
And I think this is [G] part of the reason it really resonated [B] with people.
The lyrics explore what it feels like to fall into mindless [Ab] repetition,
watching your life fly by as routine takes over.
[G] This is even reflected in the music of the [Gb] song, with relentlessly repeating keyboard and [A] bass.
[D]
[Ab] Byrne himself said this song was about the unconscious,
about how we operate half [B]-awake on autopilot.
The motif of water plays into this too.
Water is the flow [E] of time, inevitably pushing forward.
Water dissolving and water removing.
Water at the bottom of the ocean.
Under the water, carry the water.
In the coda, Byrne slips in a line, summing up one of the key messages of the song.
You can't change time, and time won't change [D] for you.
Time isn't holding up.
Time isn't ever the same as it ever was, same as it ever was.
Upon release, Once in a [F] Lifetime found modest success,
reaching number 14 on the UK singles chart, [Ab] but failing to crack the charts in the US.
[Gb] Shortly after though, it grew a cult following thanks to MTV.
Made on a shoestring budget, the video for Once in a Lifetime is
one of the most memorable of its time.
The band played with blue screen technology, composing
multiple David Byrnes on top of a white background or images of religious ceremony.
Alongside the blue screen effects, the real strength of the Once in a Lifetime video
comes from Byrne's choreography.
He was inspired by a religious ritual for the video,
so he and director Tony Basil poured over film of preachers,
people in trances, religious sects, and much, much more.
Now, some of these were put in the background, but more importantly,
they were used as the basis for [Ab] Byrne's dancing, and it works so well.
The way he [Am]
flails and jerks around conjures up arcane [A] rituals,
but they're paired with the monotony of his suit and the plain white background.
[Ab] Byrne's performance is absolutely electric throughout the video.
You can't help but [Gb] marvel at his energy, bringing [B] absurdity and hilarity to a pretty basic [G] concept.
Once in a Lifetime was [B] released on February 2nd, [Ab] 1981,
just six months before MTV first hit airwaves.
[Gb] With limited music videos to choose from,
Once in a Lifetime became a [G] staple for the channel [B] in its early years,
and this play helped the song gain some much-deserved recognition.
A [Ab] live version of the song released in 1986 found its way onto the Billboard charts,
hitting number 91, and the acclaim [Gb] just grew from there.
Today, Once in [Eb] a Lifetime is known as one of the finest works of a legendary band.
NPR named it one of the 100 most important American musical works of the [Ab] 20th century,
and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame slid it into their list of 500 songs that shaped rock and roll.
Once in a Lifetime is the walking embodiment of all that the Talking Heads were.
It's cutting edge, it's strange, and it's utterly brilliant.
[Am] One of the reasons [A] Once in a Lifetime was so good [G] was because the Talking Heads took a [Dbm] new
approach to their [D] songwriting.
If [Gb] you've ever wondered how exactly you [Em] should approach songwriting,
why not try out [A] Lauren Bookter's Songwriting and Composing Melodies on Skillshare.
In that course, Bookter [G] teaches the skills that she's learned [A] throughout a career composing for
film and TV.
By the end of the course, [Dbm] you'll have created your own song or composition.
If [A] that's not up your alley, there's plenty more that Skillshare has to offer.
Skillshare is an online learning community [Dm] with over 20,000 classes in
[D] design, business, music, and more.
[E]
Premium Membership gives you unlimited access to
high-quality courses on a myriad of skills.
A new course that I'd recommend [G] is Thomas Frank's
[Dm] Productivity Masterclass.
That class can help you get your life [A] in order and maximize [E] your time.
And really, that's just the beginning.
There's [A] countless courses that you can use to create your
best self.
[D] So why not give it a try?
The first 500 people to sign up [B] using the link in the description
[A] will be able to try out [E] Skillshare for two months at no cost.
[A] That means unlimited access
to more than [A] 20,000 classes for free.
[G] So act now [D] and start learning today.
[Dm] [E]
[Am] [E]
[D]
[E] [A]
The first 500 people to go to skl.sh slash polyphonic12
will get two months of Skillshare for free.
In a lot of ways, the Talking Heads were an
unexpected success.
A group of [D] art students pulling punk ideas together with funk and world music
[E] doesn't exactly sound like the pitch [C] for a rock and roll hall of fame inductee,
but somehow it worked.
Their ability to mix general weirdness with [D] relevant social commentary was
unparalleled.
And despite how [E] strange their music was at times, they were able to create
pop hooks that [A] turned into earworms and stuck in [Em] listeners' heads for days on end.
[D] And I think
there's one song that best pulls all of this together.
Once in a Lifetime.
[E] Let's take a closer
look.
[Am]
[Fm] [D] [B] When the Talking Heads set out to create [Gb] their fourth studio album, Remain in Light,
they were looking to [Ab] change the way they made songs.
Instead of just having David Byrne write
everything, the band wanted a more democratic process.
And so they tried something they never
[B] had before.
Inspired by Afrobeat legend Fela Kuti, the instrumentalists in the band recorded a number
of jams.
These jams used iZimbra from their 1979 album Fear of Music as a starting [Fm] point.
[Eb] [F] [Ab]
[Eb] [F] [Ab]
With that funky foundation, they came up [B] with a number of concepts and pieces.
One of these songs, working titled Right Start, would become the groundwork for Once in a [D] Lifetime.
While the song is quite different from the final piece, you can hear Tina Weymouth's bass line in
Clear As Day.
And while Weymouth plays the bass line, it may have actually been written by her
husband, the drummer Tris France.
Weymouth recalled to NPR that during one of these jams, France was
yelling something at her across the room, something that she thought was this bass line.
When she played it, he said, that's more like it, and the lick [Ab] stuck.
The talking heads took [E] that
lick and extrapolated it, slowly building a piece around it.
After weeks of jamming, David Byrne and
producer Brian Eno came into the studio to start adding arrangements and lyrics to the musical
pieces.
However, when Eno approached the piece, he started counting it differently than the band.
The instrumentalists thought the one of the bar fell at the start of the phrase,
whereas Eno counted the one as the gap before the phrase began.
This created a kind of dissonance
and syncopation with his phrasing, and Eno leaned into this.
This [Gb] misheard counting became a key
[Gm] part of the song.
It makes the [B] music feel off-kilter and strange.
[A] But [Ab] the same thing that gives the song its [Ab] musical strength makes it [G] difficult to write to.
Eno nearly scrapped the track entirely, but Byrne insisted that he could find lyrics that would work.
This [Ab] determination eventually led to a [A] breakthrough for Eno,
where he wrote a call-and-response chorus melody.
[D]
The group thought it [Ab] sounded like a preacher speaking to his congregation,
and so [Gb] David Byrne channeled that in his lyrics.
He sat down and listened to televangelist sermons,
[N] pulling phrases from them and crafting them into lyrics.
The fact that one day you'll draw your last breath, your heart will beat its last time,
there'll be [Gb] no more life left in your body, where is your soul going?
But it wasn't just the words that these preachers were saying that Byrne was channeling,
it was their performance.
His vocals [Am] feature long [G] stretches of dramatic phrases with
[Gb] deep breaths and pauses for effect.
And you may ask yourself, how do I work this?
And you [N] may ask yourself,
where is that large automobile?
And you may tell yourself, this is not my beautiful house.
And you may tell yourself, [D] this is not my beautiful wife.
Put together, the song creates a trance-like state,
capturing the manic monotony of middle-class existence.
Same as it ever was, same as it ever was, same as it ever was, same as it ever was.
And I think this is [G] part of the reason it really resonated [B] with people.
The lyrics explore what it feels like to fall into mindless [Ab] repetition,
watching your life fly by as routine takes over.
[G] This is even reflected in the music of the [Gb] song, with relentlessly repeating keyboard and [A] bass.
[D]
[Ab] Byrne himself said this song was about the unconscious,
about how we operate half [B]-awake on autopilot.
The motif of water plays into this too.
Water is the flow [E] of time, inevitably pushing forward.
Water dissolving and water removing.
Water at the bottom of the ocean.
Under the water, carry the water.
In the coda, Byrne slips in a line, summing up one of the key messages of the song.
You can't change time, and time won't change [D] for you.
Time isn't holding up.
Time isn't ever the same as it ever was, same as it ever was.
Upon release, Once in a [F] Lifetime found modest success,
reaching number 14 on the UK singles chart, [Ab] but failing to crack the charts in the US.
[Gb] Shortly after though, it grew a cult following thanks to MTV.
Made on a shoestring budget, the video for Once in a Lifetime is
one of the most memorable of its time.
The band played with blue screen technology, composing
multiple David Byrnes on top of a white background or images of religious ceremony.
Alongside the blue screen effects, the real strength of the Once in a Lifetime video
comes from Byrne's choreography.
He was inspired by a religious ritual for the video,
so he and director Tony Basil poured over film of preachers,
people in trances, religious sects, and much, much more.
Now, some of these were put in the background, but more importantly,
they were used as the basis for [Ab] Byrne's dancing, and it works so well.
The way he [Am]
flails and jerks around conjures up arcane [A] rituals,
but they're paired with the monotony of his suit and the plain white background.
[Ab] Byrne's performance is absolutely electric throughout the video.
You can't help but [Gb] marvel at his energy, bringing [B] absurdity and hilarity to a pretty basic [G] concept.
Once in a Lifetime was [B] released on February 2nd, [Ab] 1981,
just six months before MTV first hit airwaves.
[Gb] With limited music videos to choose from,
Once in a Lifetime became a [G] staple for the channel [B] in its early years,
and this play helped the song gain some much-deserved recognition.
A [Ab] live version of the song released in 1986 found its way onto the Billboard charts,
hitting number 91, and the acclaim [Gb] just grew from there.
Today, Once in [Eb] a Lifetime is known as one of the finest works of a legendary band.
NPR named it one of the 100 most important American musical works of the [Ab] 20th century,
and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame slid it into their list of 500 songs that shaped rock and roll.
Once in a Lifetime is the walking embodiment of all that the Talking Heads were.
It's cutting edge, it's strange, and it's utterly brilliant.
[Am] One of the reasons [A] Once in a Lifetime was so good [G] was because the Talking Heads took a [Dbm] new
approach to their [D] songwriting.
If [Gb] you've ever wondered how exactly you [Em] should approach songwriting,
why not try out [A] Lauren Bookter's Songwriting and Composing Melodies on Skillshare.
In that course, Bookter [G] teaches the skills that she's learned [A] throughout a career composing for
film and TV.
By the end of the course, [Dbm] you'll have created your own song or composition.
If [A] that's not up your alley, there's plenty more that Skillshare has to offer.
Skillshare is an online learning community [Dm] with over 20,000 classes in
[D] design, business, music, and more.
[E]
Premium Membership gives you unlimited access to
high-quality courses on a myriad of skills.
A new course that I'd recommend [G] is Thomas Frank's
[Dm] Productivity Masterclass.
That class can help you get your life [A] in order and maximize [E] your time.
And really, that's just the beginning.
There's [A] countless courses that you can use to create your
best self.
[D] So why not give it a try?
The first 500 people to sign up [B] using the link in the description
[A] will be able to try out [E] Skillshare for two months at no cost.
[A] That means unlimited access
to more than [A] 20,000 classes for free.
[G] So act now [D] and start learning today.
[Dm] [E]
[Am] [E]
[D]
[E] [A]
Key:
Ab
A
D
E
Gb
Ab
A
D
This video is sponsored by Skillshare.
The first 500 people to go to skl.sh slash polyphonic12
will get two months of Skillshare for free.
In a lot of ways, the Talking Heads were an
unexpected success.
A group of [D] art students pulling punk ideas together with funk and world music
[E] doesn't exactly sound like the pitch [C] for a rock and roll hall of fame inductee,
but somehow it worked.
Their ability to mix general weirdness with [D] relevant social commentary was
unparalleled.
And despite how [E] strange their music was at times, they were able to create
pop hooks that [A] turned into earworms and stuck in [Em] listeners' heads for days on end.
[D] And I think
there's one song that best pulls all of this together.
Once in a Lifetime.
[E] Let's take a closer
look. _
_ [Am] _ _ _ _ _ _ _
[Fm] _ _ _ [D] _ _ [B] When the Talking Heads set out to create [Gb] their fourth studio album, Remain in Light,
they were looking to [Ab] change the way they made songs.
Instead of just having David Byrne write
everything, the band wanted a more democratic process.
And so they tried something they never
[B] had before.
Inspired by Afrobeat legend Fela Kuti, the instrumentalists in the band recorded a number
of jams.
These jams used iZimbra from their 1979 album Fear of Music as a starting [Fm] point. _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
[Eb] _ _ [F] _ _ _ _ [Ab] _ _
_ _ [Eb] _ _ _ [F] _ _ [Ab]
With that funky foundation, they came up [B] with a number of concepts and pieces.
One of these songs, working titled Right Start, would become the groundwork for Once in a [D] Lifetime. _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
While the song is quite different from the final piece, you can hear Tina Weymouth's bass line in
Clear As Day.
And while Weymouth plays the bass line, it may have actually been written by her
husband, the drummer Tris France.
Weymouth recalled to NPR that during one of these jams, France was
yelling something at her across the room, something that she thought was this bass line.
When she played it, he said, that's more like it, and the lick [Ab] stuck.
The talking heads took [E] that
lick and extrapolated it, slowly building a piece around it.
After weeks of jamming, David Byrne and
producer Brian Eno came into the studio to start adding arrangements and lyrics to the musical
pieces.
However, when Eno approached the piece, he started counting it differently than the band.
The instrumentalists thought the one of the bar fell at the start of the phrase,
whereas Eno counted the one as the gap before the phrase began. _ _ _ _
_ This created a kind of dissonance
and syncopation with his phrasing, and Eno leaned into this.
This [Gb] misheard counting became a key
[Gm] part of the song.
It makes the [B] music feel off-kilter and strange. _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ [A] _ But [Ab] the same thing that gives the song its [Ab] musical strength makes it [G] difficult to write to.
Eno nearly scrapped the track entirely, but Byrne insisted that he could find lyrics that would work.
This [Ab] determination eventually led to a [A] breakthrough for Eno,
where he wrote a call-and-response chorus melody.
_ [D] _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ The group thought it [Ab] sounded like a preacher speaking to his congregation,
and so [Gb] David Byrne channeled that in his lyrics.
He sat down and listened to televangelist sermons,
[N] pulling phrases from them and crafting them into lyrics.
The fact that one day you'll draw your last breath, your heart will beat its last time,
there'll be [Gb] no more life left in your body, where is your soul going?
But it wasn't just the words that these preachers were saying that Byrne was channeling,
it was their performance.
His vocals [Am] feature long [G] stretches of dramatic phrases with
[Gb] deep breaths and pauses for effect.
And you may ask yourself, how do I work this?
And you [N] may ask yourself,
where is that large automobile?
_ And you may tell yourself, this is not my beautiful house.
And you may tell yourself, [D] this is not my beautiful wife.
Put together, the song creates a trance-like state,
capturing the manic monotony of middle-class existence.
Same as it ever was, same as it ever was, same as it ever was, same as it ever was.
And I think this is [G] part of the reason it really resonated [B] with people.
The lyrics explore what it feels like to fall into mindless [Ab] repetition,
watching your life fly by as routine takes over.
[G] This is even reflected in the music of the [Gb] song, with relentlessly repeating keyboard and [A] bass. _
_ [D] _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ [Ab] Byrne himself said this song was about the unconscious,
about how we operate half [B]-awake on autopilot.
The motif of water plays into this too.
Water is the flow [E] of time, inevitably pushing forward.
Water dissolving and water removing.
_ Water at the bottom of the ocean.
_ Under the water, carry the water. _
_ _ _ _ _ In the coda, Byrne slips in a line, summing up one of the key messages of the song.
You can't change time, and time won't change [D] for you.
Time isn't holding up.
Time isn't ever the same as it ever was, same as it ever was.
_ Upon release, Once in a [F] Lifetime found modest success,
reaching number 14 on the UK singles chart, [Ab] but failing to crack the charts in the US.
[Gb] Shortly after though, it grew a cult following thanks to MTV.
Made on a shoestring budget, the video for Once in a Lifetime is
one of the most memorable of its time.
The band played with blue screen technology, composing
multiple David Byrnes on top of a white background or images of religious ceremony.
Alongside the blue screen effects, the real strength of the Once in a Lifetime video
comes from Byrne's choreography.
He was inspired by a religious ritual for the video,
so he and director Tony Basil poured over film of preachers,
people in trances, religious sects, and much, much more.
Now, some of these were put in the background, but more importantly,
they were used as the basis for [Ab] Byrne's dancing, and it works so well.
The way he [Am]
flails and jerks around conjures up arcane [A] rituals,
but they're paired with the monotony of his suit and the plain white background.
[Ab] Byrne's performance is absolutely electric throughout the video.
You can't help but [Gb] marvel at his energy, bringing [B] absurdity and hilarity to a pretty basic [G] concept.
Once in a Lifetime was [B] released on February 2nd, [Ab] 1981,
just six months before MTV first hit airwaves.
[Gb] With limited music videos to choose from,
Once in a Lifetime became a [G] staple for the channel [B] in its early years,
and this play helped the song gain some much-deserved recognition.
A [Ab] live version of the song released in 1986 found its way onto the Billboard charts,
hitting number 91, and the acclaim [Gb] just grew from there.
Today, Once in [Eb] a Lifetime is known as one of the finest works of a legendary band.
NPR named it one of the 100 most important American musical works of the [Ab] 20th century,
and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame slid it into their list of 500 songs that shaped rock and roll.
Once in a Lifetime is the walking embodiment of all that the Talking Heads were.
It's cutting edge, it's strange, and it's utterly brilliant.
_ [Am] One of the reasons [A] Once in a Lifetime was so good [G] was because the Talking Heads took a [Dbm] new
approach to their [D] songwriting.
If [Gb] you've ever wondered how exactly you [Em] should approach songwriting,
why not try out [A] Lauren Bookter's Songwriting and Composing Melodies on Skillshare.
In that course, Bookter [G] teaches the skills that she's learned [A] throughout a career composing for
film and TV.
By the end of the course, [Dbm] you'll have created your own song or composition.
If [A] that's not up your alley, there's plenty more that Skillshare has to offer.
Skillshare is an online learning community [Dm] with over 20,000 classes in
[D] design, business, music, and more.
[E]
Premium Membership gives you unlimited access to
high-quality courses on a myriad of skills.
A new course that I'd recommend [G] is Thomas Frank's
[Dm] Productivity Masterclass.
That class can help you get your life [A] in order and maximize [E] your time.
And really, that's just the beginning.
There's [A] countless courses that you can use to create your
best self.
[D] So why not give it a try?
The first 500 people to sign up [B] using the link in the description
[A] will be able to try out [E] Skillshare for two months at no cost.
[A] That means unlimited access
to more than [A] 20,000 classes for free.
[G] So act now [D] and start learning today.
_ _ _ [Dm] _ _ _ [E] _ _ _ _ _ _
[Am] _ _ _ _ _ _ [E] _ _
_ _ [D] _ _ _ _ _ _
[E] _ _ _ _ _ _ [A] _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
The first 500 people to go to skl.sh slash polyphonic12
will get two months of Skillshare for free.
In a lot of ways, the Talking Heads were an
unexpected success.
A group of [D] art students pulling punk ideas together with funk and world music
[E] doesn't exactly sound like the pitch [C] for a rock and roll hall of fame inductee,
but somehow it worked.
Their ability to mix general weirdness with [D] relevant social commentary was
unparalleled.
And despite how [E] strange their music was at times, they were able to create
pop hooks that [A] turned into earworms and stuck in [Em] listeners' heads for days on end.
[D] And I think
there's one song that best pulls all of this together.
Once in a Lifetime.
[E] Let's take a closer
look. _
_ [Am] _ _ _ _ _ _ _
[Fm] _ _ _ [D] _ _ [B] When the Talking Heads set out to create [Gb] their fourth studio album, Remain in Light,
they were looking to [Ab] change the way they made songs.
Instead of just having David Byrne write
everything, the band wanted a more democratic process.
And so they tried something they never
[B] had before.
Inspired by Afrobeat legend Fela Kuti, the instrumentalists in the band recorded a number
of jams.
These jams used iZimbra from their 1979 album Fear of Music as a starting [Fm] point. _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
[Eb] _ _ [F] _ _ _ _ [Ab] _ _
_ _ [Eb] _ _ _ [F] _ _ [Ab]
With that funky foundation, they came up [B] with a number of concepts and pieces.
One of these songs, working titled Right Start, would become the groundwork for Once in a [D] Lifetime. _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
While the song is quite different from the final piece, you can hear Tina Weymouth's bass line in
Clear As Day.
And while Weymouth plays the bass line, it may have actually been written by her
husband, the drummer Tris France.
Weymouth recalled to NPR that during one of these jams, France was
yelling something at her across the room, something that she thought was this bass line.
When she played it, he said, that's more like it, and the lick [Ab] stuck.
The talking heads took [E] that
lick and extrapolated it, slowly building a piece around it.
After weeks of jamming, David Byrne and
producer Brian Eno came into the studio to start adding arrangements and lyrics to the musical
pieces.
However, when Eno approached the piece, he started counting it differently than the band.
The instrumentalists thought the one of the bar fell at the start of the phrase,
whereas Eno counted the one as the gap before the phrase began. _ _ _ _
_ This created a kind of dissonance
and syncopation with his phrasing, and Eno leaned into this.
This [Gb] misheard counting became a key
[Gm] part of the song.
It makes the [B] music feel off-kilter and strange. _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ [A] _ But [Ab] the same thing that gives the song its [Ab] musical strength makes it [G] difficult to write to.
Eno nearly scrapped the track entirely, but Byrne insisted that he could find lyrics that would work.
This [Ab] determination eventually led to a [A] breakthrough for Eno,
where he wrote a call-and-response chorus melody.
_ [D] _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ The group thought it [Ab] sounded like a preacher speaking to his congregation,
and so [Gb] David Byrne channeled that in his lyrics.
He sat down and listened to televangelist sermons,
[N] pulling phrases from them and crafting them into lyrics.
The fact that one day you'll draw your last breath, your heart will beat its last time,
there'll be [Gb] no more life left in your body, where is your soul going?
But it wasn't just the words that these preachers were saying that Byrne was channeling,
it was their performance.
His vocals [Am] feature long [G] stretches of dramatic phrases with
[Gb] deep breaths and pauses for effect.
And you may ask yourself, how do I work this?
And you [N] may ask yourself,
where is that large automobile?
_ And you may tell yourself, this is not my beautiful house.
And you may tell yourself, [D] this is not my beautiful wife.
Put together, the song creates a trance-like state,
capturing the manic monotony of middle-class existence.
Same as it ever was, same as it ever was, same as it ever was, same as it ever was.
And I think this is [G] part of the reason it really resonated [B] with people.
The lyrics explore what it feels like to fall into mindless [Ab] repetition,
watching your life fly by as routine takes over.
[G] This is even reflected in the music of the [Gb] song, with relentlessly repeating keyboard and [A] bass. _
_ [D] _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ [Ab] Byrne himself said this song was about the unconscious,
about how we operate half [B]-awake on autopilot.
The motif of water plays into this too.
Water is the flow [E] of time, inevitably pushing forward.
Water dissolving and water removing.
_ Water at the bottom of the ocean.
_ Under the water, carry the water. _
_ _ _ _ _ In the coda, Byrne slips in a line, summing up one of the key messages of the song.
You can't change time, and time won't change [D] for you.
Time isn't holding up.
Time isn't ever the same as it ever was, same as it ever was.
_ Upon release, Once in a [F] Lifetime found modest success,
reaching number 14 on the UK singles chart, [Ab] but failing to crack the charts in the US.
[Gb] Shortly after though, it grew a cult following thanks to MTV.
Made on a shoestring budget, the video for Once in a Lifetime is
one of the most memorable of its time.
The band played with blue screen technology, composing
multiple David Byrnes on top of a white background or images of religious ceremony.
Alongside the blue screen effects, the real strength of the Once in a Lifetime video
comes from Byrne's choreography.
He was inspired by a religious ritual for the video,
so he and director Tony Basil poured over film of preachers,
people in trances, religious sects, and much, much more.
Now, some of these were put in the background, but more importantly,
they were used as the basis for [Ab] Byrne's dancing, and it works so well.
The way he [Am]
flails and jerks around conjures up arcane [A] rituals,
but they're paired with the monotony of his suit and the plain white background.
[Ab] Byrne's performance is absolutely electric throughout the video.
You can't help but [Gb] marvel at his energy, bringing [B] absurdity and hilarity to a pretty basic [G] concept.
Once in a Lifetime was [B] released on February 2nd, [Ab] 1981,
just six months before MTV first hit airwaves.
[Gb] With limited music videos to choose from,
Once in a Lifetime became a [G] staple for the channel [B] in its early years,
and this play helped the song gain some much-deserved recognition.
A [Ab] live version of the song released in 1986 found its way onto the Billboard charts,
hitting number 91, and the acclaim [Gb] just grew from there.
Today, Once in [Eb] a Lifetime is known as one of the finest works of a legendary band.
NPR named it one of the 100 most important American musical works of the [Ab] 20th century,
and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame slid it into their list of 500 songs that shaped rock and roll.
Once in a Lifetime is the walking embodiment of all that the Talking Heads were.
It's cutting edge, it's strange, and it's utterly brilliant.
_ [Am] One of the reasons [A] Once in a Lifetime was so good [G] was because the Talking Heads took a [Dbm] new
approach to their [D] songwriting.
If [Gb] you've ever wondered how exactly you [Em] should approach songwriting,
why not try out [A] Lauren Bookter's Songwriting and Composing Melodies on Skillshare.
In that course, Bookter [G] teaches the skills that she's learned [A] throughout a career composing for
film and TV.
By the end of the course, [Dbm] you'll have created your own song or composition.
If [A] that's not up your alley, there's plenty more that Skillshare has to offer.
Skillshare is an online learning community [Dm] with over 20,000 classes in
[D] design, business, music, and more.
[E]
Premium Membership gives you unlimited access to
high-quality courses on a myriad of skills.
A new course that I'd recommend [G] is Thomas Frank's
[Dm] Productivity Masterclass.
That class can help you get your life [A] in order and maximize [E] your time.
And really, that's just the beginning.
There's [A] countless courses that you can use to create your
best self.
[D] So why not give it a try?
The first 500 people to sign up [B] using the link in the description
[A] will be able to try out [E] Skillshare for two months at no cost.
[A] That means unlimited access
to more than [A] 20,000 classes for free.
[G] So act now [D] and start learning today.
_ _ _ [Dm] _ _ _ [E] _ _ _ _ _ _
[Am] _ _ _ _ _ _ [E] _ _
_ _ [D] _ _ _ _ _ _
[E] _ _ _ _ _ _ [A] _ _
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