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Total Devo
Studio album by Devo
Released	May 24, 1988 (1988-05-24) [1]
Recorded	1987–1988
Studio	Devo ( Marina del Rey) Master Control ( Burbank)
Genre	Dance-pop electronic
Length	41:30
Label	Enigma
Producer	Devo
Devo chronology
Shout (1984) Total Devo (1988) Now It Can Be Told: Devo at the Palace (1989)
Singles from Total Devo
" Disco Dancer" Released: 1988 "Baby Doll" Released: 1988

Total Devo is the seventh studio album by American new wave band Devo, released in 1988 by Enigma Records. " Disco Dancer" hit No. 45 on Billboard's Hot Dance Club Play chart for the week of September 3, 1988. ^[2]

Production

Total Devo was recorded between 1987 and 1988, with the basic tracks recorded at Devo studios, in Marina del Rey, and the additional tracks at Master Control, in Burbank, California.^{[ citation needed]}

The album was the first Devo studio album released after the departure of drummer Alan Myers, who was replaced by former Sparks and Gleaming Spires drummer David Kendrick. This was the last Devo album to include the use of the Fairlight CMI digital sampling synthesizer, which was mostly used for pre-sequencing the album and sampling in the choruses of "Some Things Never Change" and "Agitated".^{[ citation needed]}

Composition

"Some Things Never Change" contains a portion of lyrics from an earlier composition entitled "Some Things Don't Change", which was rejected from their previous studio album, Shout (1984), and later appeared on the compilation album Recombo DNA (2000). The song also paraphrases a lyric from the Beatles' " A Day in the Life" and appeared in Interplay's computer adventure game, Neuromancer, itself an adaptation of the 1984 novel of the same name by William Gibson.

"The Shadow" has lyrics that contain numerous references to literary works such as the Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. The chorus is partially lifted from T. S. Eliot's poem " The Hollow Men" and it incorporates and paraphrases the catchphrase from the serials following the character the Shadow ("Who knows what lurks in the hearts of men?/The shadow knows!").

Artwork and packaging

The cover photograph is based on an early promotional photo by Devo from 1977. For the silhouette photo on the back cover, the band members posed naked, in a spoof of Prince's Lovesexy album art. It is a common misconception that David Kendrick's chin on the front cover was taken from another photo and pasted on, having supposedly fallen behind Bob Casale's uniform; however, according to Kendrick, and based on alternate shots from the cover photo shoot, the "pasted-on" effect is simply due to the odd lighting from Kendrick's arm casting a shadow on his face.^{[ citation needed]}

The caption on the front cover has changed depending on the number of tracks contained in each release. The cover of the original vinyl release included the caption "11 digital cartoons from the de-evolution band," while the original CD release, which included two additional tracks, was captioned "13 digital cartoons from the de-evolution band." A cassette release was captioned "12 digital cartoons..." and the Restless Records re-release is captioned with "16 digital cartoons...". The 2018 Futurismo release simply says "Digital cartoons...".

Promotion

Two music videos were made for the album's second single, " Disco Dancer", both using remixed versions of the track by producer Ivan Ivan. Both videos are similar, but the 12-inch mix video has additional footage, including a topless woman, and was only on promotional VHS tapes distributed to nightclubs. According to Devo co-songwriter and bass guitarist Gerald Casale, the video for the 7-inch Mix failed to receive airplay after first being aired on MTV's "Smash or Trash?", in which a video was aired and viewers would call in and vote on it. The video was "trashed" and MTV refused to air it after that. ^[3]

"Baby Doll" was used that same year in the comedy film Tapeheads, with newly recorded Swedish lyrics, and was credited to (and shown in a music video by) a fictitious Swedish band called Cube-Squared.

Total Devo was the only Devo album to be released on DAT in addition to the standard releases on vinyl, cassette, and CD.

Reissue

In 2018, Futurismo Inc. issued a two-disc deluxe edition of Total Devo, on both CD and vinyl formats. ^[4] The double CD set comes housed in a digipak ^[5] while the double LP comes in three vinyl color variations. ^{[6] [7] [8]} Both formats include gatefold sleeves with spot gloss logos and shapes, a fold-out poster and liner notes from band member Gerald Casale.

Critical reception

Professional ratings

Review scores
Source	Rating
AllMusic	[9]
Robert Christgau	C+ [11]
Rolling Stone	[10]

Village Voice critic Robert Christgau awarded the album a C+ grade, noting its "retro-electro sheen". ^[12] Michael Azerrad of Rolling Stone magazine awarded the album one star out of five, dismissing it as "a desperate SOS from main writer Mark Mothersbaugh." ^[13] Of "Baby Doll", Cashbox said, "this terribly unimaginative (by their standards) single is trying to be commercial." ^[14]

In a retrospective review, Steve Huey of AllMusic said Total Devo found the band to be "no longer innovative and not incredibly compelling." ^[15]

Track listing

• Track 11 not included on vinyl release of the album.
• Track 13 included on first CD version, DAT version, and subsequent CD releases.

1994 Restless Records CD bonus tracks:

2018 Futurismo Inc. "Deluxe Edition" CD bonus disc:

• Tracks 9–14 previously unreleased.

Personnel

Credits adapted from Pioneers Who Got Scalped: The Anthology CD liner notes: ^[16]

Devo

• Mark Mothersbaugh – vocals, keyboards, guitar
• Gerald Casale – vocals, bass guitar, keyboards
• Bob Mothersbaugh – lead guitar, vocals
• Bob Casale – rhythm guitar, keyboards, vocals
• David Kendrick – drums

Credits adapted from the original album's liner notes: ^[17]

Additional musicians

• Greta Greta – backing vocals on "Plain Truth"
• Nan Vernon – backing vocals on "Plain Truth"
• Steve Lindsay – bass sample on "Disco Dancer"

Technical

• Devo – producer
• Bob Casale – engineer
• Ted Pattison – assistant engineer
• Gerald Casale – graphic concepts, art direction, World Service uniforms
• Mark Mothersbaugh – graphic concepts, art direction, World Service uniforms
• Rocky Schenck – photography
• Robert Mothersbaugh – Amiga computer graphics
• Muto-little – uniform fabrication
• Patrick Pending – layout, design
• Jim Mothersbaugh – Roland equipment, technical collaboration

Tour

After a four-year hiatus, the Total Devo tour saw the band scaling things back considerably. The sets were very basic with no complex visuals and the band wore plain red shirts and pants, with the computer generated image of a smiling and frowning face (as featured on the artwork of the album) on the back of the shirts. These outfits were augmented by energy domes as well as the "World Service" uniforms introduced at the time of release during certain parts of the show. ^[18] The tour was commemorated on the 1989 album Now It Can Be Told.

On later dates in the tour, two songs from their next studio album Smooth Noodle Maps (1990) were added to the setlist: "Post Post-Modern Man" and "A Change Is Gonna Cum".

Chart performance

Weekly charts

References

External links

• Total Devo at Discogs (list of releases)