It’s a nicely paced set, showing the band’s steady development from quirky punks to experimental groove masters. After two early demos, the “Love -> Buildings On Fire” single, and the B-side to “Psycho Killer”, the program democratically samples from each of the band’s albums, along with two live versions from Stop Making Sense that, frankly, make sense. The set ends with four “new” songs, all very modern and danceable: “Sax And Violins”, which had snuck out on a movie soundtrack the year before; “Gangster Of Love”, which combines a drum track from 1980 with music from 1987, newly finished for this set; “Lifetime Piling Up”, another leftover from Naked; and “Popsicle”, from 1982.
That was fine for most people, but the record industry has often been about repackaging. A decade later, just after the band’s induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, the Once In A Lifetime box set expanded the catalog overview to three discs, with the extra draw in the inclusion of a DVD that expanded their Storytelling Giant VHS compilation of music videos. With the added space they went a little deeper into each album, going so far as to included eight tracks from the first two albums. As for rare material, three of the four early tracks and two of the later tracks from Sand In The Vaseline were repeated, while some alternate mixes were scattered throughout. Along with “A Clean Break” from the then-out-of-print The Name Of This Band Is Talking Heads, the Naked leftover “In Asking Land”, which would evolve into “Carnival Eyes” on Rei Momo, makes it necessary for collectors. (A year after that, The Best Of Talking Heads attempted to distill the legacy down to a single disc, opening with “Love -> Buildings On Fire”, making a few substitutions that weren’t on Sand In The Vaseline, and eschewing live versions.)
Talking Heads Sand In The Vaseline: Popular Favorites 1976-1992 (1992)—4
Talking Heads Once In A Lifetime (2003)—3½
Talking Heads The Best Of Talking Heads (2004)—4
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