Album · Talking Heads
Speaking in Tongues by Talking Heads
Speaking in Tongues is an album by Talking Heads, released in 1983. 5 songs from it have charted on rock radio countdowns, with 229 countdown appearances in total. The biggest is “Burning Down the House”, on 154 lists with a best position of #8.
Speaking in Tongues, Talking Heads' fifth studio album, came out on Sire in 1983, and it's the sound of Talking Heads finally throwing a full-blown party. After parting ways with producer Brian Eno and taking a break for side projects, the band came back together in 1982 and produced the record themselves, and what they found was a looser, funkier, sweatier groove that still keeps its oddball wit.
"Burning Down the House" is the monster, a twitchy, clattering, irresistible rush that became the band's only top-ten hit in the US, reaching number 9 on the Billboard chart. "Slippery People" rolls like a gospel revival run through a funk machine, "Swamp" oozes and grinds, and "Girlfriend Is Better" bounces with jittery, off-kilter glee. And "This Must Be the Place (Naive Melody)" is sweet, simple and strangely moving, a melody that lives up to its subtitle.
It was their commercial breakthrough. The album peaked at number 15 on the Billboard 200, their highest for a studio record, spent six weeks at number two on the dance charts, and went platinum in Canada, their biggest seller there. The tour behind it became the Jonathan Demme concert film Stop Making Sense in 1984, along with a live album of the same name.
Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.
Songs from Speaking in Tongues on radio countdowns
| # | Song | Strength | Lists | Best | #1s | Years |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Burning Down the House#71 of all time | 154 | #8 | – | 1983–2026 | |
| 2 | This Must Be the Place (Naive Melody) | 38 | #2 | – | 1988–2026 | |
| 3 | Girlfriend Is Better | 20 | #431 | – | 1999–2026 | |
| 4 | Swamp | 13 | #224 | – | 1989–2026 | |
| 5 | Slippery People | 4 | #47 | – | 1987–2003 |
Only songs that appear on at least one countdown are listed. Release data from MusicBrainz.