(The Hit Hammer is where I'm reviewing each #1 song on the Billboard Hot 100. Starting from when the chart started in 1958 and eventually working my way to the present. To see my inspiration and more information about this blog, please CLICK HERE)
America - "A Horse with No Name"
Hit Number 1: March 25, 1972
Stay at Number 1: 3 Weeks
Dewey Bunnell, just like the other members of America, was the son of an Air Force veteran. For a time, his family was stationed at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California, and he recalled his trips through the New Mexico and Arizona deserts while growing up. He liked how peaceful the desert was, and how it seemed like a whole other world out there. In fact, he liked it so much he wrote a song about it, but his song was considered an afterthought by the members of America, including himself. The band hadn't released any previous albums, and they made an original move by giving their debut album the same name as their band. The band, just like their album, were named America because they didn't want the public to think they were from England. They only lived in England because that's where all three of their fathers were stationed while the band members were in high school, and it's also how they all met.
The album America was first released in England, but without "A Horse with No Name" on it. The album wasn't met with the kind of success that the band had hoped. The band was looking for songs from their album for single release, with the leading candidate being member Gerry Beckley's ballad "I Need You", but the band's label, Warner Bros., didn't think a slow ballad would be a good first single for them. ("I Need You" was eventually released as a single, but not as the first one for America. It made it to #9, and it's a 4.) Warner Bros. wanted to find a song that would be popular in both England and America, and they asked the band if they had any other material that wasn't included on their debut album. That's when Bunnell, along with the rest of the band, seriously considered a song called "Desert Song" for release.
Of course, anything called "Desert Song" would never make it, so the song title had to be switched to "A Horse with No Name". Reportedly, the song was supposed to depict the hot and dry desert atmosphere that a Salvador Dali painting had, and the "horse" came from a strange horse that had ridden out of an M.C. Escher picture. The song was initially met with some criticism from people who thought that the "horse" was supposed to be a slang way to describe heroin, but Bunnell has and still does deny this. According to him, "A Horse with No Name" was only supposed to be something of a nostalgic trip for Bunnell, and he's described the horse of the song as being a metaphor for getting away from life's troubles and finding yourself in the calm, peaceful desert. It's nothing more than a way to get there. Realistically, "A Horse with No Name" could be about a million different things, but if you choose to believe what Bunnell says, the song is about finding your own peaceful euphoria in the desert, and nothing more than that.
Bunnell also received some criticism for sounding a lot like Neil Young on the song, as some even thought it was Young who sang it. (Incidentally, America's "A Horse with No Name" knocked Young's "Heart of Gold" out of the #1 spot) Some thought they were trying to imitate him. The thing they probably received the most criticism for, though, were the lyrics of the song. "A Horse with No Name" has some pretty stupid lyrics in it such as "The heat was hot" and "There were plants and birds and rocks and things". Overall, it's a pretty dumb song. Why was the guy in the desert for nine days? Why in those nine days did he never give the horse a name? It's a question people have been asking themselves for years, and it's probably why the heroin theory exists.
Despite those stupid lyrics, though, "A Horse with No Name" still works because of its quality musicianship. It has a politely meandering bass line that stays under everything else without stealing the show, it has a cool waterfall solo, and it also has some pretty top-notch harmonies that's similar to what Crosby, Stills & Nash were doing. It's also something America would become known for as the years went on. But most importantly, "A Horse with No Name" passes the vision test. Even though the story is described in the dumbest ways, I can still picture this guy riding on a horse in the desert. I can picture how hot it is, the dry river bed the narrator comes across, and the astonishment the narrator feels when he finds the sea after nine days in the desert. The las say more than any of the other lyrics, and they give me the feeling of isolation that the narrator is feeling somehow. It's hard to describe, but it paints a unique image in my head that a lot of other songs just can't do. It's pretty special.
"A Horse with No Name" ended up being America's big break, and today, it's still their signature song. I'm not sure if anyone else, including Bunnell, saw anything overly special about the song when it was first released, but the way everything blended together, and those descriptive images the song gave me was something I couldn't ignore. Bunnell never thought that his own nostalgia could spark something that would make its mark on music, but that's exactly what happened. It had to have felt like a dream come true.
GRADE: 8/10
Comments