Check out some Talking Heads hits refashioned as vintage paperbacks, ads, and pamphlets

Check out some Talking Heads hits refashioned as vintage paperbacks, ads, and pamphlets
Photo: Richard E. Aaron

With the close of another decade, our collective fondness for ‘90s nostalgia will soon give way to a rose-colored recollection of the ‘00s. If such doesn’t suit you, we’d direct you to the Instagram account of screenwriter and graphic artist Todd Alcott. He’s still neck-deep in the art and iconography of the 20th century, having surrounding himself with pulpy ephemera and vintage advertisements he merges with beloved musicians and their timeless. We first glimpsed his work smashing David Bowie into pulp paperbacks, but he’s now moved onto to some excellent faux-novelizations of Talking Heads songs.

Here’s Alcott’s rendition of the Talking Heads’ “Once In A Lifetime,” which was inspired by a ‘60s movie advertisement of the Gregory Peck film The Man in the Grey Flannel Suit.

Below, see “Take me to the River” as an old outdoor magazine, as well as a riff on “Psycho Killer” that manifests as an issue of Cahiers du Cinéma dated March 1974, the earliest date the song was known to be performed by David Byrne and his band The Artistics.

We’re also quite taken with this pulp version of “Burning Down the House.”

Alcott has also made a handful of faux-vintage paper materials for bands like Nine Inch Nails and Radiohead, as well songwriters Nick Cave and Leonard Cohen.

This instructional pamphlet, for example, includes directions on how to build your very own “Mr. Self-Destruct,” a nod to the Downward Spiral track. Below that is a Time Magazine cover featuring the fierce lyrics to “Closer.”

Alcott has a load of other prints, fake novels, and advertisements at his Etsy store for purchase. See some more examples below.

[Via Laughing Squid]

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