Road Movie To Berlin
From This Might Be A Wiki
| song name | Road Movie to Berlin |
| artist | They Might Be Giants |
| releases | Flood, Flood + Apollo 18 |
| year | 1990 |
| first played | June 23, 1988 (109 known performances) |
| run time | 2:22 |
| sung by | John Flansburgh |
Trivia/Info
- John Flansburgh on the song (during the February 2, 1997 Idiot's Delight radio show):
This song was actually written back when the Berlin Wall seemed like something that would actually never go down. It's weird. It's really a dated—I feel like it's actually sort of a topical—like, you know, pulling out my anti-Vietnam song. You know, it was written at a time when it was just obvious that the Berlin Wall was gonna be there forever. So, it's kind of strangely dated.
- Flansburgh later stated in an interview with Rolling Stone:
This song was designed to feel like a fragment of some bar room song just starting up again and again. Even though the verses resolve, there is a little bit of tension that is left hanging each go around, and that hopefully is a bit more unsettling with each verse. My voice is slowed down, which is kind of creepy.
- The liner notes for Flood included an additional verse not featured on the album, but often performed live during the song. Flansburgh: "There were a bunch of alternate lyrics written, but it didn't seem like the song should be that long" (tmbg.com Q&A). Flansburgh later said in Rolling Stone that the verse was "inadvertently left out." The extra verse's lyrics:
You said you were the King of Liars
And I believed you and called you sire
But I realize now that I have been deceived
- "If memory serves, a combination of a Sammy Davis Jr. blast and a stock Casio FZ1 brass sound." -Flansburgh on the source of the orchestra hit sound in the instrumental section (via Twitter)
- Covered by Frank Black on the the TMBG tribute album Hello Radio: The Songs Of They Might Be Giants.
Song Themes
Cities, Death, Drinking, German, Movies, Problems with Liner Notes, Religion, Supernatural, Skeletons, Swing Feel, Time, Transportation
Videos
- Watch it on
– Recorded live on October 25, 2008 by CapitalQ
Current Rating You must be logged in to rate this. You can either login (if you have a userid) or create an account with us today. Road Movie To Berlin is currently ranked #492 out of 910. (105 wikians have given it an average rating of 8.11) |
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