My Gen X Playlist: Road to Nowhere – Talking Heads

“We’ve got to get out of here,” my buddy said over the phone twenty years ago. He was at a law firm and I was at a consulting firm and we were both up to our necks in long hours and stress. Then he floated out the idea.

Let’s quit our jobs and travel around the world for a year.

“Even if we are unsure if we’ll go, let’s at least plan it out. If nothing else, it’s a great diversion and you never know.” he said. With that, the planning began.

We found there was an Around the World airline ticket. At that time, I think it cost a few thousand bucks. What a deal. It was good for one year, you had to stay in the same hemisphere (north or south) and could only continue the journey in one direction (east or west). My job was to get us from Los Angeles to Africa. He would take over from there.

I researched destinations online and through travel books from Barnes and Noble. Our trip had us relaxing in volcanic hot springs in Costa Rica, walking among the moai statues on Easter Island and finding Darwin on the Galapagos Island. A walkabout in Australia sounded interesting, but reading about New Zealand made it an even more preferred outdoor destination. I found a boat ride down Vietnam’s Mekong river that led to a truck ride to Cambodia’s Angkor Wat ruins. The ride between the two seemed to be in the back of a chicken truck. Perfect. The hill tribes in Chiang Mai, Thailand were waiting for us before searching for spirituality in Nepal and Mother Teresa’s inspiration in Calcutta, India. The final excursion before handing it off was an African safari to experience the Great Migration across the Serengeti. What a fitting end to be a part of a migration within our own migration. My imagination lived between the maps and pages of these travel books. It was a beautiful escape.

Then life happened. He left his firm to start his private practice and I took a big step forward with a promotion at work. We never made the decision to leave it all behind to see the world. If I could relive a year, I’d pick that one and instead of only planning, I’d hop on a plane and go. I don’t have any regrets, the virtual journey opened our minds to adventure’s possibilities and ultimately, life turned out just fine. Next time we’ll pull the trigger when the opportunity arises in the next life. What a ride that would be.

The Talking Heads released Road to Nowhere in 1985. It had an upbeat sound about optimism in the face of challenging times.

“Road To Nowhere,” a deceptively upbeat pop-rock tune about facing a dire future with optimism. “I wanted to write a song that presented a resigned, even joyful look at doom,” Talking Heads singer David Byrne recalled.

Byrne told Q magazine in 1992 how the chorus came first and the rest of the song fell together: “It was just the four lines of what became the chorus that started the whole thing:

We’re on a road to nowhere
Come on inside
Takin’ that ride to nowhere
We’ll take that ride

That pretty much laid out the whole song. It’s this little ditty about how there’s no order and no plan and no scheme to life and death and it doesn’t mean anything, but it’s all right.”

– SongFacts

When my friend suggested the trip around the world, I could tell we both were on that road to nowhere, minus the upbeat tempo and optimism. What we did not realize at the time is road to nowhere stretches are short legs on a much longer journey. We just have to endure, keep looking forward and continue moving. A change in jobs, a move to a different city, a new relationship, a sabbatical to decompress. Each has life changing potential. You just never know. Life is one big migration. It’s our choice to step inside the map, pick the next stop and jump on that plane. It’s a chance worth taking.

–

For a complete playlist, please click here.

For the Spotify playlist, please click here.

Well, we know where we're going
But we don't know where we've been
And we know what we're knowing
But we can't say what we've seen
And we're not little children
And we know what we want
And the future is certain
Give us time to work it out

Yeah

We're on a road to nowhere
Come on inside
Taking that ride to nowhere
We'll take that ride
I'm feeling okay this morning
And you know
We're on the road to paradise
Here we go, here we go

We're on a ride to nowhere
Come on inside
Taking that ride to nowhere
We'll take that ride
Maybe you wonder where you are
I don't care
Here is where time is on our side
Take you there, take you there

We're on a road to nowhere
We're on a road to nowhere
We're on a road to nowhere

There's a city in my mind
Come along and take that ride
And it's all right, baby, it's all right
And it's very far away
But it's growing day by day
And it's all right, baby, it's all right
Would you like to come along
You can help me sing the song
And it's all right, baby, it's all right
They can tell you what to do
But they'll make a fool of you
And it's all right, baby, it's all right
There's a city in my mind
Come along and take that ride
And it's all right, baby, it's all right
And it's very far away
But it's growing day by day
And it's all right, baby, it's all right
Would you like to come along
You can help me sing the song
And it's all right, baby, it's all right
They can tell you what to do
But they'll make a fool of you
And it's all right, baby, it's all right

We're on a road to nowhere
We're on a road to nowhere
We're on a road to nowhere
We're on a road to nowhere