TheLifeofBrian(andDavid),1981
ire Records was getting ready to release the Brian Eno and David Byrne album
My Life in the Bush of Ghosts, which they had recorded together from 1979 to
1980,” recalls Ebet Roberts. “I had been asked byTrouser Pressmagazine to
photograph them at an interview that writer Scott Isler was doing for the upcoming
release of the record.
“I arrived at a sparse Soho loft in downtown Manhattan that Brian Eno had been sub-
letting in January of 1981. They were in the middle of the interview when I arrived, and I
took some candid photographs while they were talking and drinking tea. Following the
interview, as I was looking for a place in the loft to take formal photographs of the two
of them, they resumed working on a project they were doing involving a video camera,
a small TV monitor, and polaroids. They were creating images of video feedback by
shooting directly into the TV monitor and manipulating photos they had taken of
themselves with the polaroid camera, in hopes of finding something that would work
as a cover for the LP.
“It was a great opportunity to capture them as they were working together, and a
real pleasure to witness two artists whose work I have admired for a long time.”Photographed by Ebet RobertsSeptember, 2017 RollingStoneAus.com | Rolling Stone | 33