| "This Must Be the Place (Naive Melody)" | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Single by Talking Heads | ||||
| from the album Speaking in Tongues | ||||
| Released | 1983 | |||
| Format | 7" | |||
| Recorded | 1982 | |||
| Genre | New Wave | |||
| Length | 4:56 | |||
| Label | Sire | |||
| Writer(s) | David Byrne, Chris Frantz, Jerry Harrison, Tina Weymouth [1] | |||
| Producer | Talking Heads | |||
| Talking Heads singles chronology | ||||
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"This Must Be the Place (Naive Melody)" is a song by New Wave band Talking Heads, released as the second single from their fifth album Speaking in Tongues. The lyrics were written by David Byrne, and the music was written by Byrne and the other members of the band, Chris Frantz, Tina Weymouth and Jerry Harrison.
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In the "Self Interview" on the DVD of the concert film Stop Making Sense, Byrne admits that it is a love song, a topic he tends to avoid because it is "kinda big". He also said of the song[2]:
"That's a love song made up almost completely of non sequiturs, phrases that may have a strong emotional resonance but don't have any narrative qualities. It's a real honest kind of love song. I don't think I've ever done a real love song before. Mine always had a sort of reservation, or a twist. I tried to write one that wasn't corny, that didn't sound stupid or lame the way many do. I think I succeeded; I was pretty happy with that."
According to the Stop Making Sense commentary track, the title "Naive Melody" refers to the music. On the track, the guitar part and the bass part are doing the same thing throughout the whole song. According to David Byrne, many professional musicians would not play a song written in that fashion, and that is what makes the melody naive. Byrne played the lead keyboard solo.
The song is featured in Stop Making Sense (1984), a concert film featuring the Talking Heads. Throughout the Stop Making Sense version, Byrne and his bandmates perform by a standard lamp, while close-up images of various body parts are projected onto a screen behind them. When the song reaches a bridge, the musicians step back and Byrne dances with the lamp, a reference to Fred Astaire's similar dance with a coat-rack in the film Royal Wedding.
The Stop Making Sense version was released as single in 1986, peaking at #100 on the UK Singles Chart.[3]
The music video depicts the band members and their session musicians watching light-hearted home movies, before going down into the basement and playing their instruments.
The song was covered live by the Montreal-based band Arcade Fire, and is featured as the B-side to their single "Neighborhood #3 (Power Out)". Their version features David Byrne on guest vocals.
The song has also been covered by Hotel X, Shawn Colvin, Perpetual Groove, MGMT, Mysteries of Life, Animal Liberation Orchestra, The String Cheese Incident, Gunnar Madsen, Counting Crows, the Ryan Montbleau Band, Miles Fisher, Tim Bowness/Samuel Smiles, Weatherbox, Youthless, Kyp Malone, Cornmeal, Euforquestra, Logger and the Fatties, Alex Mills & Alex Patten, Perpetual Groove, Hidden Ballroom [4]
This song is featured twice in the Oliver Stone movie Wall Street, playing over a scene in which Bud Fox, the protagonist, decorates his upscale apartment, and again over the closing credits. The song re-appeared in the 2010 sequel Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps, once again over the closing credits. Shawn Colvin's version was featured on the movie Wordplay (2006). The song appeared in TV series Northern Exposure, and appears in the 2007 film Lars and the Real Girl as well as the 2011 film, Crazy, Stupid, Love. The Colvin cover of the song closed the Pilot episode of the TV show Judging Amy. The song is also on the He's Just Not That into You soundtrack (released January 2009). The 2011 film, This Must Be the Place starring Sean Penn is named for the song.[5]
| Chart (1983) | Peak position |
|---|---|
| UK Singles Chart[3] | 51 |
| US Billboard Hot 100[6] | 62 |
| Chart (1986) | Peak position |
|---|---|
| UK Singles Chart[3] | 100 |
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