“Q: Are We Not Men? A: We Are Devo?” by Devo (1978)
Release Date: August 28, 1978
Produced by Brian Eno, David Bowie (additional co-producer)
Genre: New Wave, Electronic, Punk Rock
Label: Warner Bros, Virgin
Chart Positions: #7 (New Zealand), #12 (UK), #57 (Australia), #78 (US)
Certifications: Gold (US), Silver (UK)
Singles: “Mongoloid” (No chart data)
“(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction” #41 (UK), #48 (Netherlands), #98 (Australia)
“Jocko Homo” #62 (UK)
“Come Back Jonee” #60 (UK)
Other Charting Tracks: N/A
Best Tracks: “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction,” “Uncontrollable Urge,” “ Space Junk,” “Mongoloid,” “Jocko Homo,” “Come Back Jonee”
In 1977, David Bowie and Iggy Pop received a tape of Devo demonstration songs from the wife of Michael Aylward, guitarist in another Akron, Ohio band, Tin Huey. Both Iggy and Bowie, as well as Brian Eno and Robert Fripp, expressed interest in producing Devo's first release. At Devo's New York debut show in 1977, Bowie proclaimed that "this is the band of the future, I'm going to produce them in Tokyo this winter." Eventually, Eno was chosen to produce the album in Germany. Bowie was busy filming "Just a Gigolo," but helped Eno produce the record during weekends. Eno paid for the flights and studio cost for the band, confident that the band would be signed to a record contract. In return for his work on the album, Eno asked for a share of any subsequent deals.
Brain Eno envisioned many sides of Devo after he first heard their music, he stated, 'What I saw in them always happens when you encounter something new in art - you get a feeling of being slightly dislocated, and with that are emotional overtones that are slightly menacing as well as alluring. This induced a stiffening effect because with Devo you have something that makes your body move in a new way."
The album quickly became a cult sensation in part because of it's highly stylized visuals - videos, album art and costumes which made the band members look alike. The album was a touchstone in the development of American new wave. It was one of the first pop album to use the synthesizer as a prominent feature in their music. Devo was pivotal in the explosion of synth-pop that would soon follow.
Devo’s quirky version of The Rolling Stones’ “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction” was the second single from the album and chart debut and was originally from their “Be Stiff” EP released in 1977. Music History professor, Theo Cateforis had recognized that Devo's rendition of the Rolling Stones classic was a satirical contradiction of African American and Caribbean rhythms in a sense a parody of the nervous bodily awkward "whiteness" of the white male man machine torn between discipline and the urges of the flesh.
"(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction" (1978)
Their first single from the album was “Mongoloid” also from the “Be Stiff” EP.
"Jocko Homo," one of the album's several highlights was written in an unnerving and unusual 7/8 time which keeps the rhythm quirky on a level that outstrips any sort of quirky rhythms delivered by The Talking Heads or XTC.
Mark Mothersbaugh was a student at Kent State when he received a religious pamphlet from afraid titled "Jocko Homo" in which it debunked the theory of evolution. This was right after the students had been killed on campus at Kent State. The song was written based on a series of discussions Mothersbaugh and his bandmates had. They decided that what was happening to the planet and what they were seeing in the news was not evolution but more appropriately de-evolution. Hence the name Devo (which is short for de-evolution).
Devo (1978)
DEVO
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