"The Jezebel Spirit" | |
---|---|
Single by David Byrne and Brian Eno | |
from the album My Life in the Bush of Ghosts | |
Released | 1981 |
Format | 7" vinyl |
Length | 3:34 |
Label | EG/Polydor |
Writer(s) | Bryne and Eno |
"The Jezebel Spirit" is the fourth song from the 1981 album My Life in the Bush of Ghosts by David Byrne and Brian Eno. It was released as a single the same year.
The song includes a "found sound"—an exorcism performed by an anonymous exorcist—over Afrobeat music similar to that Byrne and Eno had used in the Talking Heads album Remain in Light. The exorcism was to have been a recording of Kathryn Kuhlman, but her estate prohibited the use of her voice.
While the album was generally well received by critics, the song attracted negative criticism. Jon Pareles wrote in Rolling Stone magazine that Byrne and Eno had used the exorcism for their own purposes and "trivialized the event".