My Life in the Bush of Ghosts (album)
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My Life in the Bush of Ghosts is a 1981 album by Brian Eno and David Byrne, titled after Amos Tutuola's 1954 novel of the same name. It was rereleased in expanded form in 2006.
The album extensively incorporates human voices. Vocals include commercial recordings of Arabic singers, radio disk jockeys and an exorcist. Critic John Bush describes My Life in the Bush of Ghosts as "[a] pioneering work for countless styles connected to electronics, ambience, and Third World music."
Background
In the early 1980s, Talking Heads' main writer and lead singer David Byrne recorded My Life in the Bush of Ghosts in collaboration with the band's producer of the time, Brian Eno. It was strongly influenced by musical styles outside the standard "rock" genre, employing African-style percussion and Afro-American funk rhythms. It is also notable as one of the first rock albums to make extensive use of the then novel technology of sampling, incorporating vocal and musical samples from a wide range of sources including Arabic music. Dub music, a more atmospheric offshoot of reggae, was also appropriated as a rhythmic and production influence by many electronic musicians and underground rock bands of the era, particularly in the United Kingdom, where reggae had achieved mainstream success.
