Article #32194

Forty years since her pioneering concert film Home of the Brave, and ahead of a European tour, we count down the best of a surprisingly poppy avant garde catalogue

From a compilation released by William Burroughs associate John Giorno – fellow contributors included Patti Smith, Philip Glass and the Fugs – comes the fledgling sound of Laurie Anderson’s breakthrough Big Science: spoken word, electronically manipulated voices, violin. It doesn’t quite work, but it’s worth hearing, not least for the distinctly country-ish slant to her violin playing.