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.
Background
Following the release of Devo's sixth studio album,
Shout (1984), the band's label,
Warner Records, still had the band contracted to provide two more albums. After the commercial failure of
Shout, Warner Bros. contacted Devo's manager
Elliot Roberts and made an offer to terminate the arrangement, which they accepted, but by 1987, the band still had no new contract.
Enigma Records co-owners Bill and Wesley Hein, who'd had a huge success with
Stryper, had received a $50 million cash infusion and wanted to sign Devo to a two-record deal, and when Roberts left the band, they accepted the deal.
Longtime drummer Alan Myers also left at this time and was replaced by David Kendrick, who had previously worked with Devo's Bob Casale.
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.
Devo member
Gerald Casale later described the production as "sparse" and "back to basics".
However, like its predecessor,
Shout, the album once again makes use of digital equipment, namely the
Fairlight CMI and
Linn Drum, as well as the Roland D-50.
Composition
"Disco Dancer" was inspired by an Indian music video in which a man doing "exaggerated macho dances" declares "I'm a disco! Yeah, I'm a disco!"
"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, and later appeared on the compilation album Recombo DNA (2000).
"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.
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...", and the 2025 streaming release contains no caption.
Promotion
Two
were made for the album's second single, "Disco Dancer", both using remixed versions of the track by producer Ivan Ivan. The 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.
The video was shot on Super 8 film in Los Angeles and New York City.
"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.
The double CD set comes housed in a digipak
while the double LP comes in three vinyl color variations.
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
Village Voice critic
Robert Christgau awarded the album a C+ grade, noting its "retro-electro sheen".
of
Rolling Stone magazine awarded the album one star out of five, dismissing it as "a desperate SOS from main writer Mark Mothersbaugh."
Of "Baby Doll",
Cashbox said, "this terribly unimaginative (by their standards) single is trying to be commercial."
In a retrospective review, Steve Huey of AllMusic said Total Devo found the band to be "no longer innovative and not incredibly compelling."
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.
Personnel
Credits adapted from
CD liner notes:
Devo
Credits adapted from the original album's liner notes:
Additional musicians
-
Greta Greta – backing vocals on "Plain Truth"
-
Nan Vernon – backing vocals on "Plain Truth"
-
Steve Lindsay – bass sample on "Disco Dancer"
Technical
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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
Charts
External links
