Arts & Entertainment

Join the Tom Tom Club in Ridgefield June 10

What was once a side project for former Talking Heads members Chris Frantz and Tina Weymouth has become the center of their musical lives.

Festive, funky and fascinating.

That’s how drummer Chris Frantz describes his band, Tom Tom Club, which he spearheads with his wife, bassist Tina Weymouth.

If those names sound familiar, it might be because the then boyfriend-and-girlfriend, along with David Byrne, formed Talking Heads in New York City in the mid 1970s.

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Taking a break from Talking Heads in 1981, Frantz and Weymouth released their first Tom Tom Club record, eponymously titled, which included “Genius of Love,” a tune that would go on to be sampled by many artists, including Grandmaster Flash, Mariah Carey and Tupac Shakur.

“We are celebrating our 30th anniversary,” Frantz said of his current band. “Who knew Tom Tom Club would last longer than Talking Heads?”

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Tom Tom Club was a side project for Frantz and Weymouth until Talking Heads disbanded in the early 1990s. Five studio albums and a few live albums later, Tom Tom Club is still going strong.

Frantz and Weymouth, who’ve lived in Fairfield since 1985, are bringing their six-piece band to the Ridgefield Playhouse on Friday, June 10. The show will mark the last of five they’re playing on the East Coast before heading across the pond to England, Scotland and Ireland in July.

“We’re only doing a few dates in the States this summer,” Frantz said. “We’re doing a full length tour in the fall of North America with The Psychedelic Furs. This will be in September and October, and we can’t really play dates [this summer] in places where we’re playing in the fall.”

Aside from Friday being a good night to go out, Frantz said, if prospective concertgoers are looking to dance, “we’re really good for that.”

“It’s a lively show. We’ve got drums, bass, guitar, keyboards, percussion, a turntablist,” Frantz said. “The band is real tight and snappy and funky. We’re going to be playing a few songs that we haven’t been playing since way back in the ‘80s. We’re going to be playing something new. We’re just happy to be playing in Ridgefield.”

Frantz said he and his wife decided to move to Fairfield from New York City because they had a three-year-old and were expecting another kid.

“We needed some green grass and fresh air,” he said. “Fairfield County has plenty of that. You’re close to New York City, which is the center of our universe as a band. Nowadays with the Internet, you don’t have to be close to New York City anymore. But at the time, it made sense, and it still does make sense. New York is the center of culture in America for music and art.”

The audience is going to “hear some songs that reminds them of earlier times, but they’ll also hear some up-to-date cutting edge stuff,” Frantz said. “The Playhouse is great — they don’t care if you get out of your seat and shake your booty.”

Tickets for the show are available for $55 and $60, and can be bought online at ridgefieldplayhouse.org.


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