Grown Backwards

Byrne took a different approach to writing Grown Backwards, than he has previously used. He worked from the “top down,” humming melodies into a micro-cassette recorder and later unscrambling them to create songs—a significant change from his usual practice of starting with improvised textures and grooves and later adding tunes. The result is a richly melodic set of fifteen songs that feature strings, rhythm section, and guitar. In addition to the eleven original songs, the disc features two opera arias (“Un di Felice” from Verdi’s La traviata, and “Au Fond Du Temple Saint” from Bizet’s The Pearl Fishers, which features a duet with Rufus Wainwright); Byrne’s cover of the Lambchop song “The Man Who Loved Beer;” and the bonus track “Lazy.” This new version of Byrne and X-Press 2’s 2002 song was re-arranged by Stephen Barber based on arrangements by Dan Foster, Steven Hussey and Anu Pillai for Freeform Five.

Tracks:

1. Glass, Concrete and Stone
2. The Man who Loved Beer
3. Au Fond du Temple Saint
4. Empire *
5. Tiny Apocalypse
6. She Only Sleeps
7. Dialog Box
8. The Other Side of This Life
9. Why
10. Pirates
11. Civilization
12. Astronaut
13. Glad
14. Un di Felice, Eterea
15. Lazy (Bonus track)

*) "Empire" was previously released as bonus track on the Japanese edition of "Look into the Eyeball"

**) Lazy is a newly arranged version based on the Freeform Five remix for the original X-press 2 song.