Song #30: America - "A Horse With No Name"

Song #30: America - "A Horse With No Name" (1971)

America

"After two days in the desert sun, my skin began to turn. After three days in the desert fun, I was looking at a river bed. And the story had told of a river that flowed, made me sad to think it was dead."

Fewer songs put me at such a remarkable ease like the poetry brought forth in America's smash hit song "A Horse With No Name." Its visualizations are some of the best I've ever seen written and sung, and the song works as a master-class in folk/rock music. However, even after hearing it for the umpteenth time, if one sits down and listens to the lyrics of the song, the song has a great deal of goofy, weirdly-phrased lyrics, some of which don't make a great deal of sense. Yet like most songs of the seventies, the beauty is in the sound, the instrumentation, and the voices, with lyrical interpretation not always being the forefront of a particular song. 

"A Horse With No Name" is another song off my list taken from the video game Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. This particular song existed on the game's fictional radio station of K-DST, the classic-rock station. Several of my fondest memories with my now ten year love affair with the game were cruising around the desert in a beat-up vehicle, either outrunning cops or just having a great deal of fun with my friend, as we took turns playing, with this song in the background for good measure. For some reason, the game's content and this particular song mesh together unbelievably well, so well that it almost seems like "A Horse With No Name" was written for the video game.

The bottom line is that "A Horse With No Name" has an unmistakable poetry and grace to its structure, equipped with sharp and vivid visualizations and some of the most soothing vocals this side of the Sahara. It's one of the best folk songs I know.

Give "A Horse With No Name" a listen, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zSAJ0l4OBHM