(Credits: Far Out / A24)
Fri 5 September 2025 20:30, UK
What would be the perfect soundtrack to the end of the world? Would you lean into the outright destitution or throw one last party? Perhaps there is a band out there who cross over the two seamlessly, like Talking Heads.
Essentially, it’s not a question I can say I’ve thought about a whole lot. But with things moving as they are, maybe I should have. The environmental and political climate seem to be locked horns in a race, with the winner wiping out all mankind upon crossing the line. In these times, music feels as important as ever as not only a means of escapism, but a means of understanding.
So I say Talking Heads might just be the perfect band for that soundtrack, simply because of how they straddle both sides. Texturally and sonically, they provide a vortex through which you can escape the humdrum of modern living. You can get lost in the rhythms and jangling melodies, as they coalesce to make songs that simply force you to move your body.
But if that isn’t enough and you want to take a closer, more intent listen, then the lyrics provide the ultimate guidebook to understanding. Whether it’s ‘Don’t Worry About the Government’ or ‘Life During Wartime’, Byrne was acutely observational. While he danced, he pointed fingers and raised questions for us to answer, when the bright lights of the dancefloor slowly faded away.
While the 1980s may have largely felt like a prosperous time in the United States, Byrne was astute enough to know that prosperity, particularly in the realms of capitalism, is temporary. The apocalyptic times we now find ourselves in were in Byrne’s thinking in 1985, specifically on the legendary song ‘Road To Nowhere’.
On the track, Byrne sings, “Would you like to come along? / You could help me sing this song” before sliding into the chorus line of ‘Road To Nowhere’ It straddles a slow groove and as close to a drawl as Byrne could muster, in what feels like a soft resignation to something. But according to Byrne, that something was the end of the world.
“I wanted to write a song that presented a resigned, even joyful look at doom,” Talking Heads singer David Byrne recalled. “At our deaths and at the apocalypse… (always looming, folks). I think it succeeded.”
But in terms of how the arrangement contributed to this wider idea, Byrne explained, “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.”
Isn’t that indicative of how we live modern lives? Even, in the face of the apocalypse, where expectations and judgements should be thrown out the window, our own sense of insecurity and self-deprecation overwhelms us. Writing one of the most memorable songs, designed to wave goodbye to the idea of, still wasn’t enough to rid one of our great artists from embarrassment. We truly are doomed.
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