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"Road to Nowhere" | ||||
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Single by Talking Heads | ||||
from the album Little Creatures | ||||
B-side | "Television Man" | |||
Released | June 1985 (US) [1] 30 September 1985 (UK) [2] | |||
Recorded | October 1984 – March 1985 | |||
Genre | ||||
Length |
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Label | Sire | |||
Songwriter(s) | David Byrne | |||
Producer(s) | Talking Heads | |||
Talking Heads singles chronology | ||||
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"Road to Nowhere" is a rock song written by David Byrne for the 1985 Talking Heads album Little Creatures . [3] [4] It also appeared on Best of Talking Heads , Sand in the Vaseline: Popular Favorites , the Once in a Lifetime box set and the Brick box set. The song was released as a single in 1985 and reached No. 25 on the Billboard Mainstream Rock Tracks chart and No. 6 on the UK, German and South African [5] singles charts. It also made No. 8 on the Dutch Top 40. [6]
"I wanted to write a song that presented a resigned, even joyful look at doom," recalls David Byrne in the liner notes of Once in a Lifetime: The Best of Talking Heads . "At our deaths and at the apocalypse... (always looming, folks). I think it succeeded. The front bit, the white gospel choir, is kind of tacked on, 'cause I didn't think the rest of the song was enough... I mean, it was only two chords. So, out of embarrassment, or shame, I wrote an intro section that had a couple more in it."
Cash Box said that "this marching single which features David Byrne's soothing lead vocal is a curious and circus-ride look at life." [7] Billboard said that within the song "a cappella gospel leads into Louisiana hootenanny." [8]
The video for the song was directed by Byrne and Stephen R. Johnson and features the band and various objects revolving, including boxes revolving around David Byrne's head. Tina Weymouth and Chris Frantz portray a couple growing older, and masked businessmen pummel each other with briefcases and a runaway shopping cart, as if in their own "road to nowhere".
Some parts were shot in the back yard and pool of actor Stephen Tobolowsky, who was co-writing Byrne's film True Stories at the time. [9] Scenes were also shot at Calvary Baptist Church in Hi Vista, California. Director Johnson re-used some of the effects techniques in award-winning videos for Peter Gabriel the following year: "Sledgehammer" and "Big Time".
It was nominated for Best Video of the Year at the 1986 MTV Video Music Awards, losing out to "Money for Nothing" by Dire Straits.
Talking Heads
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