Love This Giant is a studio album made in collaboration between musiciansDavid Byrne andSt. Vincent, released on4AD andTodo Mundo on September 10, 2012, in the United Kingdom and the following day in the United States. Marking Byrne's ninth studio album overall and Annie Clark's fourth, Byrne and Clark began working together in late 2009,^[2] using a writing and promotion process that Byrne had previously used on his 2008 collaboration withBrian EnoEverything That Happens Will Happen Today.^[3] The duo had previously played together live at anActor Tour concert, and on the albumHere Lies Love.^[4] The performers enlisted a variety ofbrass musicians to augment their songwriting andtoured over the following year to promote the album.

Love This Giant
Studio album by David Byrne andSt. Vincent
Released	September 10, 2012
Recorded	Late 2009 – 2012
Studio	Water Music Studio,Hoboken,NJ (brass) Patrick Dillett's Studio,New York City,NY (additional elements)
Genre	Art pop[1]
Length	44:33
Label	4AD Todo Mundo
Producer	David Byrne Annie Clark Patrick Dillett (co-production) John Congleton (co.)
David Byrne chronology
Live at Carnegie Hall (2012) Love This Giant (2012) Brass Tactics (2013)
St. Vincent chronology
Strange Mercy (2011) Love This Giant (2012) Brass Tactics (2013)
Singles from Love This Giant
"Who" Released: June 14, 2012 (promo) "I Should Watch TV" Released: November 19, 2012

David Byrne incorporated a reworked performance of "I Should Watch TV" in his American Utopia Tour, and later in its Broadway production, documented inthe film of the same name.

The two artists met in 2009 at aRadio City Music Hall benefit concert for the AIDS/HIV charityDark Was the Night.^[5] However, the collaboration stemmed from a second meeting, at New York thrift shop Housing Works, whereBjörk andDirty Projectors were performing. A concert organizer suggested Byrne and Clark try a similar collaboration.^[6] Their work was initially slated just for a single live performance, but Clark suggested addingbrass^[7] to their line-up^[6] and the two realized they could write original music around horns.

"I suggested brass as a prominent voice because, at the time David and I decided to write songs together, I had just done theActor record with a lot ofwoodwind and a lot ofstrings on it. So I hadn't explored brass and I wanted to. Originally, we were going to do a night of music at a bookstore for charity. So I was thinking, Okay, it could be a small ensemble: just me and David and a couple of guitars and we'll call it a day. But then obviously it grew and grew and grew. Brass was a way to bridge what we do in some sort of neutral, middle ground. When we toured the album, just the sheer number of people onstage was exciting and overwhelming, and these people organised the stage movement in really fun and idiosyncratic ways and it made for such a lighthearted, beguiling show." – Annie Clark^[8]

The musicians composed lyrics in person and via e-mail,^[6] which resulted in an entire album's worth of material. Byrne and Clark each wrote and sing their own lyrics, with the exception of "The Forest Awakes"—which Byrne wrote, but Clark sings.^[9] The instrumentation andfunkgrooves discouraged Byrne from writing his typical personal lyrics to writing about larger themes and Clark emphasized theart music nature of the recordings while composing.^[10]

The album cover was inspired byBeauty and the Beast, with Byrne as a "Buzz Lightyear-like" beauty and Clark as agrotesque beast.^[11] The duo originally intended a plastic beauty and feral beast as a joke about the age difference between the two, but altered their idea when they met the prosthetics designer.^[10]

David Byrne and St. Vincent worked with digital promotions companyTopspin Media to distribute the promotional single "Who" and create embeddablewidgets tostream the album. A music video directed by Martin du Thurah was released on September 4 for "Who".^[12] Jon Dolan ofRolling Stone gave the song three and a half out of five stars, calling the collaborators' chemistry "shocking".^[13] In reviewing the track,WNYC's John Schaefer drew parallels between their use ofbrass instruments and Byrne's previous work onThe Knee Plays.^[14] On July 30, the track "Weekend in the Dust" became available for streaming on the album's official website. On September 2, the full album became available for streaming viaNPR.^[15]

Byrne and Clark appeared on the September issue ofFilter^[16] and performed on the September 10 episode ofLate Night with Jimmy Fallon. On November 1, 2012, the duo performed onThe Colbert Report.^[17]

The duo embarked on theLove This Giant Tour to promote the album between September 2012 and September 2013, with a backing band that includes eight brass players (led byKelly Pratt of Bright Moments), St. Vincent's keyboardist Daniel Mintseris, andMy Brightest Diamond's drummer Brian Wolfe. Like Byrne's previousSongs of David Byrne and Brian Eno Tour, the performers engaged in complex choreography onstage while performing.^[11] Byrne also simultaneously did book readings to promote his bookHow Music Works.^[18]

Brass Tactics is a promotional EP that was released via Topspin's platform on May 28, 2013. Contains a new song, remixes fromLove This Giant and live recordings from the Love This Giant Tour.

1. "Cissus" (previously unreleased album track) – 3:14
2. "I Should Watch TV" (M. Stine remix) – 3:32
3. "Lightning" (Kent Rockafeller remix) – 3:12
4. "Marrow" (live) – 3:46
5. "Road to Nowhere" (live) – 4:27

Love This Giant has received generally positive reviews; aggregatorMetacritic scores it a 77 with 36 reviews, indicating "Generally favorable reviews".^[20] Reviewing the album,BBC Music's Jude Clarke calls it "a perfect cerebral pop pairing" that "improves and deepens on each listen" due to the songwriting and the singers' voices.^[31] Bram E. Gieben ofThe Skinny also praised the "engaging musical conversation" between the two singers, but criticized the musicianship for lacking experimentation^[32] and Heather Phares ofAllMusic agrees that the album is lacking in Clark's "guitar acrobatics".^[21]The Guardian's Maddy Costa has praised the vocals as well, contrasting them from subtle and seductive to "soft and whispy... with the glint of a razor blade."^[23]

The Independent's Andy Gill^[24] and Simmy Richman^[33] consider the brass instrumentation the greatest strength of the album with the latter declaring the work "a skewed and funky instant classic". Robert Leedham ofDrowned in Sound praised the "jaunty trombones" and "jubilant trumpet-lead fanfare" as well, but found the alternating vocals weak and Byrne-centric.^[1]

In 2012 it was awarded a silver certification from theIndependent Music Companies Association,^[34] which indicated sales of at least 20,000 copies throughout Europe. The album was Byrne's first solo effort to reach theBillboard Top 40, peaking at 23; this was subsequently surpassed by 2018'sAmerican Utopia, which debuted at No. 3.^[35]

All songs written by David Byrne and Annie Clark, except where noted

1. "Who" – 3:50
2. "Weekend in the Dust" – 3:05
3. "Dinner for Two" – 3:43
4. "Ice Age" (Clark) – 3:13
5. "I Am an Ape" – 3:05
6. "The Forest Awakes" (Byrne, Clark, andWalt Whitman) – 4:52
7. "I Should Watch TV" – 3:08
8. "Lazarus" – 3:13
9. "Optimist" – 3:49
10. "Lightning" – 4:15
11. "The One Who Broke Your Heart" – 3:46
12. "Outside of Space and Time" (Byrne) – 4:34

• David Byrne – guitar, vocals, production; percussionprogramming on "The Forest Awakes" and "The One Who Broke Your Heart";Omnichord on "Optimist"
• St. Vincent – guitar, vocals, production;synth bass on "Ice Age", "I Am an Ape", "I Should Watch TV", and "Lightning";piano on "Dinner for Two"

Additional musicians

• Jacquelyn Adams –French horn on "Who", "Ice Age", "I Am an Ape", "I Should Watch TV", and "Out of Space and Time"
• Randy Andos –tuba on "Weekend in the Dust"
• Antibalas Afrobeat Orchestra – "The One Who Broke Your Heart"
  • Stuart D. Bogie – saxophone
  • Jordan McLean – trumpet
  • Martín Perna – saxophone
• Jack Bashkow – saxophone on "Who", "Dinner for Two", "Ice Age", "I Am an Ape", "The Forest Awakes", "I Should Watch TV", "Lazarus", and "Lightning"; clarinet on "Optimist"
• Lawrence Di Bello – French horn on "The Forest Awakes"
• Ravi Best – trumpet on "Weekend in the Dust"
• Ron Blake – saxophone on "Weekend in the Dust"
• Jeff Caswell –bass trombone on "Ice Age", "I Am an Ape", "The Forest Awakes", "I Should Watch TV", "Lazarus", "Optimist", "Lightning", and "Outside of Space and Time"
• John Congleton – production, drumprogramming; synth on "I Should Watch TV"
• The Dap-Kings – "The One Who Broke Your Heart"
  • Cochemea Gastelum – saxophone
  • David Guy – trumpet
• Eric Davis – French horn on "Who", "Dinner for Two", "Ice Age", "I Am an Ape", "I Should Watch TV", "Lazarus", "Optimist", "Lightning", and "Outside of Space and Time"
• Dominic Derasse – trumpet on "Dinner for Two", "The Forest Awakes", and "Lazarus"
• Rachel Drehmann – French horn on "The Forest Awakes" and "Lazarus"
• Steve Elson – saxophone on "Who", "Weekend in the Dust", "Dinner for Two", "Ice Age", "I Am an Ape", "The Forest Awakes", "I Should Watch TV", "Lazarus", "Optimist", and "Lightning"
• Kenneth Finn – euphonium on "Dinner for Two"; trombone on "I Am an Ape", "The Forest Awakes", "I Should Watch TV", "Lazarus", "Optimist", and "Lightning"
• Gareth Flowers – trumpet on "Dinner for Two", "Ice Age", "I Am an Ape", "The Forest Awakes", "I Should Watch TV", "Lazarus", "Optimist", "Lightning", and "Outside of Space and Time"
• Alex Foster – saxophone on "Weekend in the Dust"
• Josh Frank – trumpet on "Ice Age", "I Am an Ape", "I Should Watch TV", and "Lighting"; trumpet andflugelhorn on "Outside of Space and Time"
• Paul Frazier – bass guitar on "Who" and "Outside of Space and Time"
• Earl Gardner – trumpet on "Weekend in the Dust"
• Mike Gurfield – trumpet on "Dinner for Two", "Ice Age", "I Am an Ape", "The Forest Awakes", "I Should Watch TV", "Lazarus", "Optimist", "Lightning", and "Outside of Space and Time"
• Stan Harrison – saxophone on "Weekend in the Dust"
• Ian Hendrickson-Smith – saxophone on "The One Who Broke Your Heart"
• Tom Hutchinson – euphonium on "Dinner for Two"
• Aaron Johnson – trombone on "The One Who Broke Your Heart"
• Ryan Keberle – trombone on "Weekend in the Dust"
• R. J. Kelly – French horn on "Dinner for Two", "Lazarus", and "Optimist"
• Chris Komer – French horn on "Who", "Dinner for Two", "Ice Age", "I Am an Ape", "I Should Watch TV", "Optimist", and "Lightning"
• Anthony LaMarca – drums on "Who"
• William Lang – trombone on "Dinner for Two" and "The Forest Awakes"
• Bob Magnuson – saxophone on "The Forest Awakes"
• Brian Mahany – trombone on "Dinner for Two", "Ice Age", "I Am an Ape", "I Should Watch TV", "Lazarus", "Optimist", and "Lightning"
• Ozzie Melendez – trombone on "Weekend in the Dust"
• Patrick Milando – French horn on "The Forest Awakes"
• Lenny Pickett – saxophone and brass arrangement on "Weekend in the Dust"
• Jonathan Powell – trumpet on "Weekend in the Dust"
• Kelly Pratt – trumpet on "Dinner for Two" and "Optimist"; brass arrangement on "Dinner for Two"
• Mauro Refosco –snare drum on "The Forest Awakes",timpani on "I Should Watch TV",surdo on "Optimist"
• Marcus Rojas – tuba on "Weekend in the Dust", "Ice Age", "I Should Watch TV", "Lazarus", "Lightning", and "Outside of Space and Time"
• Mike Seltzer – trombone on "Ice Age"
• Evan Smith –clarinet and flute on "Who" and "I Am an Ape"
• Bob Stewart – tuba on "The One Who Broke Your Heart"
• Tom Timko – saxophone on "Who", "Dinner for Two", "Ice Age", "I Am an Ape", "I Should Watch TV", "Lazarus", "Optimist", and "Lightning"
• Kyle Turner – tuba on "Dinner for Two" and "The Forest Awakes"
• Steve Turre – trombone on "Weekend in the Dust"
• Michael Williams – trombone on "The One Who Broke Your Heart"

Technical

• Jon Altschuler –engineering
• Greg Calbi –mastering at Sterling Sound, New York City
• Patrick Dillett – production,mixing, drum programming
• Tony Finno – brass arrangements
• Ken Thompson – brass arrangements on "The Forest Awakes" with Tony Finno
• Yuki Takahashi – engineering

Design

• Gabe Bartalos – prosthetics
• Richard Burbridge – cover photo
• Catalina Kulczar – art
• Juan Marin – art
• Steve Powers – type design
• LeeAnn Rossi – art
• Noah Wall – package design and art

• 2012 in American music
• Everything That Happens Will Happen Today (2008)
• Here Lies Love (2010)
• 2012 in music

• Official website