"Los Angeles" is the debut solo

single Single may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media * Single (music), a song release Songs * "Single" (Natasha Bedingfield song), 2004 * "Single" (New Kids on the Block and Ne-Yo song), 2008 * "Single" (William Wei song), 2016 * "Single", by ...

written and performed by

Frank Black Charles Michael Kittridge Thompson IV (born April 6, 1965) is an American singer, songwriter, and guitarist. He is best known as the frontman of the alternative rock band Pixies, with whom he performs under the stage name Black Francis. F ...

. It was the first track on his solo debut album ''

'', released in 1993. It served as the main theme song for the short lived but cult favorite VH1 talk show ''

Late World with Zach ''Late World with Zach'' is a television show on VH1 during the spring of 2002 starring Zach Galifianakis, who appeared without his now-trademark beard for most of the show's run. ''Late Worlds theme song was Frank Black's "Los Angeles", a nod ...

''. It was also featured in the

soundtrack A soundtrack is recorded music accompanying and synchronised to the images of a motion picture, drama, book, television program, radio program, or video game; a commercially released soundtrack album of music as featured in the soundtrack o ...

of ''

Tony Hawk's American Wasteland ''Tony Hawk's American Wasteland'' is a skateboarding video game developed by Neversoft and published by Activision. It is the seventh entry in the ''Tony Hawk's'' series and was released initially for the GameCube, PlayStation 2 and Xbox in ...

'' as well as in Girl Skateboards' 2003 video ''Yeah Right!'', in which the song played during Eric Koston's video part. Also, a

music video A music video is a video of variable duration, that integrates a music song or a music album with imagery that is produced for promotion (marketing), promotional or musical artistic purposes. Modern music videos are primarily made and used as a m ...

was made for the song featuring Black himself. The music video was featured on an episode of

MTV MTV (Originally an initialism of Music Television) is an American cable channel that launched on August 1, 1981. Based in New York City, it serves as the flagship property of the MTV Entertainment Group, part of Paramount Media Networks, a di ...

's ''

Beavis and Butt-head ''Beavis and Butt-Head'' is an American adult animated series created by Mike Judge. The series follows Beavis and Butt-Head, both voiced by Judge, a pair of teenage slackers characterized by their apathy, lack of intelligence, lowbrow humor, ...

'', and was directed by

John Flansburgh John Conant Flansburgh (born May 6, 1960) is an American musician. He is half of the long-standing Brooklyn, New York-based alternative rock duo They Might Be Giants with John Linnell, for which he writes, sings, and plays rhythm guitar. Commo ...

They Might Be Giants They Might Be Giants (often abbreviated as TMBG) is an American alternative rock band formed in 1982 by John Flansburgh and John Linnell. During TMBG's early years, Flansburgh and Linnell frequently performed as a duo, often accompanied by a d ...

Composition

The song starts off with an

acoustic guitar An acoustic guitar is a musical instrument in the string family. When a string is plucked its vibration is transmitted from the bridge, resonating throughout the top of the guitar. It is also transmitted to the side and back of the instrument, ...

introduction. An

electric guitar An electric guitar is a guitar that requires external amplification in order to be heard at typical performance volumes, unlike a standard acoustic guitar (however combinations of the two - a semi-acoustic guitar and an electric acoustic gui ...

riff A riff is a repeated chord progression or refrain in music (also known as an ostinato figure in classical music); it is a pattern, or melody, often played by the rhythm section instruments or solo instrument, that forms the basis or accompani ...

is heard after that. With an

interlude Interlude may refer to: *a short play or, in general, any representation between parts of a larger stage production *''Entr'acte'', a piece of music performed between acts of a theatrical production *a section in a movement of a musical piece, se ...

back into acoustic guitar music, it ends with

helicopter A helicopter is a type of rotorcraft in which lift and thrust are supplied by horizontally spinning rotors. This allows the helicopter to take off and land vertically, to hover, and to fly forward, backward and laterally. These attributes ...

noises. Asked about the lyrical inspiration, Black said, "Well, mostly I had to get it done as someone from 4AD was flying in the next day to listen. It's loosely a sci-fi poem with a kind of ''

Blade Runner ''Blade Runner'' is a 1982 science fiction film directed by Ridley Scott, and written by Hampton Fancher and David Peoples. Starring Harrison Ford, Rutger Hauer, Sean Young, and Edward James Olmos, it is an adaptation of Philip K. Dick' ...

'' outlook, i.e., futuristic Los Angeles."

References

1993 songs 1993 debut singles Black Francis songs 4AD singles Elektra Records singles Songs about Los Angeles Songs about South America Songs written by Black Francis {{1990s-single-stub