The Talking Animals by T-Bone Burnett

The Talking Animals, T-Bone Burnett's 1988 album for Columbia, catches one of rock's great backroom operators stepping back into the spotlight. Burnett had played guitar in Bob Dylan's band, and his production work took in formative records by Los Lobos, Counting Crows and Sam Phillips, but here he's the man at the mic, with David Rhodes credited as producer and a guest list that runs to Peter Case, Bono and Tonio K.

It's rock and roll with a storyteller's eye and a real appetite for words, and "The Strange Case of Frank Cash and the Morning Paper" is the calling card, a title that reads like a pulp paperback. The critics split along predictable lines: AllMusic later heard a strong, inspired record despite a few weak songs, Trouser Press found it worth hearing but wished its maker were less taken with himself, and Robert Christgau flatly called him pretentious. It followed his self-titled album, and The Criminal Under My Own Hat came next.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.