# Mister Heartbreak

Mister Heartbreak is the second studio album by American avant-garde artist, singer and composer Laurie Anderson, released on February 14, 1984, by Warner Bros. Records.

## Contents

Like its predecessor, Big Science, Mister Heartbreak contains reworked elements of Anderson's performance piece United States Live ("Langue d'Amour", "Kokoku", and "Blue Lagoon"). However, Anderson also introduced new material ("Sharkey's Day"/"Sharkey's Night" and "Gravity's Angel"), while "Excellent Birds", written in collaboration with Peter Gabriel, was written for video artist Nam June Paik's installation Good Morning, Mr. Orwell.

## Background

"Gravity's Angel" borrows imagery from Thomas Pynchon's Gravity's Rainbow (1973). Anderson had "wanted to make an opera of that book ... and asked him if that would be OK... He said, 'You can do it, but you can only use banjo.' And so I thought, 'Well, thanks. I don't know if I could do it like that." "Blue Lagoon" contains allusions to other tales of the sea: William Shakespeare's The Tempest and Herman Melville's Moby-Dick.
The album's opening track, "Sharkey's Day", formed the basis of a popular music video. Author William S. Burroughs read the lyrics of "Sharkey's Night", while Peter Gabriel co-wrote and provided vocals on "Excellent Birds", an alternate version of which, entitled "This is the Picture (Excellent Birds)", also appeared on the CD edition of his 1986 album So. According to Anderson, she and Gabriel "could never agree on what a bassline was...it turned into a standoff and so we each put out our own version of the song." A third version of the song can be heard in the music video version, directed by Dean Winkler.
Despite Anderson's aversion to guitars on Big Science, she changed her approach on Mister Heartbreak and employed the services of King Crimson guitarist Adrian Belew, who appeared on four tracks. Belew recalled that Anderson originally conceived of "Sharkey's Day" as having a "hoedown kind of feel" that centered around an instrument resembling a jew's harp. When describing his approach to the song, Belew stated that "I gravitated toward a very aggressive sound from a pedal called the Foxx Tone Machine, an octave fuzz pedal whose sound resembles the solo sound in Jimi Hendrix's 'Purple Haze'". Anderson subsequently reworked "Sharkey's Day" to accommodate for Belew's guitar overdubs.
Most of the songs on the album were later performed in Anderson's concert film Home of the Brave. Burroughs appears in the film in two brief segments, reciting lines from "Sharkey's Night". "Gravity's Angel" was used in a trailer for the 1991 film Naked Lunch, an adaptation of Burroughs' 1959 novel of the same name. "Sharkey's Night" was also featured in the Australian short documentary film Ladies Please! (1995). The album art was originally made as a series of lithographs published with Bud Shark when Anderson was a visiting artist at Anderson Ranch Arts Center in Colorado.
Professional ratings :
| Review scores ||
| Source | Rating |
| AllMusic | |
| Rolling Stone | |
| Sounds | |
| The Village Voice | A− |

## Track listing

All songs written by Laurie Anderson, except where noted.
Side one
* "Sharkey's Day" – 7:41
* "Langue d'Amour" – 6:12
* "Gravity's Angel" – 6:02
Side two
* "Kokoku" – 7:03
* "Excellent Birds" (Anderson, Peter Gabriel) – 3:12
* "Blue Lagoon" – 7:03
* "Sharkey's Night" (Anderson, William S. Burroughs) – 2:29

## Personnel

Musicians
* Laurie Anderson – vocals (tracks 1–6), Synclavier (track 1–6), violin (track 1), whistle (track 1), electronic conches (track 2), vocoder (track 2), bell (track 3), percussion (track 4)
* Adrian Belew – guitar (tracks 1, 3, 6, 7)
* Anton Fier – drums (track 1), toms (track 4), wood block (track 4)
* Bill Laswell – bass guitar (tracks 1, 3–6)
* Daniel Ponce – iya (tracks 1), ikonkolo (track 1), shekere (track 1), double bell from the Cameroons (track 1)
* November (Michelle Cobbs, Dolette McDonald, Brenda Nelson) – backing vocals (track 1)
* Peter Gabriel – backing vocals (tracks 2–3), vocals (track 5), Synclavier (track 5), LinnDrum (track 5)
* David Van Tieghem – plywood (track 3), bowls (track 3), Simmons drums (track 3), drums (track 3), steel drum (track 6), gato (track 6), bamboo (track 6)
* Sang-Won Park – kayagum (track 4)
* Phoebe Snow – backing vocals (track 4)
* Atsuko Yuma – backing vocals (track 4)
* Connie Harvey – Japanese chorus (track 4)
* Janet Wright – Japanese chorus (track 4)
* Nile Rodgers – guitar (track 5)
* Bill Blaber – soprano (track 6)
* William S. Burroughs – vocals (track 7)
Technical
* Laurie Anderson – co-producer (tracks 1–2, 4–7), producer (track 3), art, graphics
* Bill Laswell – co-producer (tracks 1, 4, 7), mixing assistance (track 3)
* Roma Baron – co-producer (tracks 2, 6)
* Peter Gabriel – co-producer (track 5)
* Leanne Ungar – engineer
* Bob Bielecki – technical consultant, systems design, Synclavier spectral displays
* Mike Getlin – assistant engineer
* Joe Lopes – assistant engineer
* Pat Martin – assistant engineer
* Larry Franke – assistant engineer
* Tim Cox – assistant engineer
* Mike Krowiak – mixing assistant
* Bob Ludwig – mastering
* Howie Weinberg – mastering
* Bud Shark – printing

## Charts

Album
| Year | Chart | Position |
| 1984 | The Billboard 200 | 60 |
| 1984 | Canada RPM | 41 |
| 1984 | Dutch Album Chart | 23 |
| 1984 | Swiss Album Chart | 19 |
| 1984 | New Zealand Album Chart | 12 |
| 1984 | Swedish Album Chart | 46 |
| 1984 | UK Album Chart | 93 |