Remain in Love – Chris Frantz and Tina Weymouth

Remain in Love book review by Duncan Ficke.

From Bowery loft room home rehearsals to being ‘bigger than Rod Stewart in New Zealand’ and a career-high gig in Rome in 1980, on the ‘Remain in Light’ tour. Chris Frantz’s life story reads like many budding musician’s dream come true: form a band, convince the person you have just fallen emphatically in love with to join, and live happily ever after.

Duncan Ficke

Regarding the Rome gig: They all agree it was the best crowd ever that night, and because they hit a peak with that album and most people, including the band, say that ‘Remain’ is their best album, they never ever bettered it, Frantz says.

‘Sometimes people ask me if it is hard to play music and tour with my wife,’ he states early on, ‘I tell them that I have never known any other way, and I love it, I really do. It takes kindness, patience, and a good sense of humour. But most of all, it takes a willingness to accept love and return love. Every man should be so lucky.’ And so say all of us!

Thank You for Sending Me An Angel

Born in Kentucky, an army officer’s son, he had a privileged middle class upbringing. He enrolled at Rhode Island School of Design, where he met fellow student Tina Weymouth. Together the couple created a perfect biorhythm long before their mantra-like syncopation of drums and bass in Talking Heads and later in their own creation Tom Tom Club.

In between is a rollercoaster of a riches to rags and back to riches story. Endless gigs at the now-defunct famed Bowery dive bar CBGBs and apprentices to the likes of The Ramones and Lou Reed. Indeed, Reed almost duped the young innocents into signing an album deal giving him the rights to their music. Meeting and hanging out with local residents Patti Smith, Blondie, Television, and Richard Hell, and lunches with Andy Warhol at the Factory were taken in their stride. All the while holding down day jobs to pay the rent. Any spare time was given to writing songs and honing their craft musically until it became second nature.

No Compassion

A friend recommended a singer/guitar player. Enter David Byrne. An awkward, shy character with a mad stare. His Scottish grandma once told him, ‘trust no-one Davey, even your own asshole will let you down’.

Byrne comes across as the perfect frontman for this original type of music. It fused post-punk, art rock, Afro-beat, and reggae with a slight jazz edge. However, as captivating and enigmatic as he was, with the introduction of Brian Peter George St John le Baptiste de la Salle Eno on production duties, Byrne began to exercise an inordinate level of control. He would later refuse to even recognise the other members in the songwriting credits. As Weymouth put it, ‘David couldn’t figure out where he stopped and other people began, a selfish character seemingly unable to respect people or return friendship’.

It should be borne in mind Frantz was more than a drummer for Talking Heads. He co-wrote many of the songs and came up with the style and the rhythm ideas. 

A drummer should make you want to get up and dance and feel good about yourself

Although first present on the band’s lp More Songs About Buildings and Food of Music, Eno would massively influence the follow-up album Remain in Light. Fresh from working with Bowie, he would bring swathes of moody often slightly scary electronic soundscapes. In the hands of any other band it may have ended up sounding a tad depressing. In the hands of the Heads it evolved into perfectly formed futuristic funk for the new decade.

A Clean Break

Inevitably the tensions would split the band. Byrne left the band and, separately, guitarist/keyboardist Jerry Harrison briefly pursued other projects. It was Frantz and his lifelong partner who would reap instant chart success with their new band Tom Tom Club. Named after an apartment they bought in Nassau, Bahamas, after an invitation from Island records boss Chris Blackwell, to come to record at his Compass Point Studios. The label was home to, among others, Grace Jones, Sly and Robbie, and Robert Palmer.

Two singles – ‘Wordy Rappinghood’ and ‘Genius of Love’ in the early 1980s – would take the world’s charts by storm. Ironically, they eclipsed any previous success of their former band. Their appearance on the American black music show Soultrain was a joint personal high and dream come true, for the couple. Although Talking Heads would re-convene, they would eventually split for good, after three more albums. Frantz and Weymouth started a family and be forever devoted to each other as they obviously remain to this day.

With Our Love

In these strange times this really is an engaging, moving, triumphant, uplifting tale of two world-beating bands with totally original styles, but the friendship, love, and sheer dedication the couple share towards each other is what leaves an even bigger impression than even the ground-breaking sexy nature of the music itself. Although it wasn’t all plain sailing as Weymouth threatened to leave at one point due to Frantz’s cocaine and alcohol abuse at that time.

Final thoughts

‘A drummer should make you want to get up and dance and feel good about yourself,’ Frantz says. This reviewer couldn’t agree with that statement more! He certainly sincerely and wholeheartedly achieved his goal, among a great many other achievements. Attempting to produce Happy Mondays notwithstanding!

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