Talking Heads: 77

Labels had approached the trio from its earliest days. A Beserkley demo cut at K&K Studios in Great Neck held Artists Only, Psycho Killer and First Week, Last Week. Lou Reed offered to produce a debut, but the band declined the contract his manager proposed on a lawyer's advice and kept a respectful relationship with Reed. Seymour Stein of Sire offered a deal in November 1975 after seeing them open for the Ramones, but the band did not yet feel ready. They signed with Sire on 1 November 1976. Jerry Harrison, recommended by former Modern Lovers bassist Ernie Brooks, would not officially join until a deal was in place, and the trio taught him the songs at his Ipswich apartment in January 1977.

Sessions began at Sundragon Studios in April 1977 with Tony Bongiovi and Lance Quinn producing and Ed Stasium engineering. Frantz said Stasium did most of the work, and the band found Bongiovi condescending. Psycho Killer was the first song to get vocals, and Byrne asked Stasium to keep Bongiovi away while he sang. Sessions paused for a spring 1977 European tour with the Ramones. At the Rock Garden in Covent Garden on 14 May, John Cale, Brian Eno and Chris Thomas watched them play. After the band returned on 7 June, a four-day session at ODO Studios finished the vocals, overdubs and mix.

The album came out on 16 September 1977, and Psycho Killer reached 92 on the Hot 100. Robert Christgau reviewed it in The Village Voice in 1977 and concluded the band were punks after all. It placed seventh in that paper's Pazz and Jop poll, and Rolling Stone ranked it 290 in 2003. Pitchfork's Andy Cush wrote that Frantz plays like an R&B session drummer with a gun held to his head. A 2005 DualDisc reissue added five bonus tracks. An expanded edition on 8 November 2024 added outtakes and a concert recording from 10 October 1977, and an acoustic Psycho Killer with Arthur Russell on cello was released ahead of it.